Sunday, May 13, 2012

Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania

The Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania in Strasburg, PA is one of those places that we drive by frequently but never seem to have the time to go in and explore. This trip to PA we decided to make the the time. 





The Museum houses “one of the most significant collections of historic railroad artifacts in the world” (I have no idea if that is true or not). The Museum displays over 100 locomotives and cars from the mid-19th and 20th centuries. It has over 100,000 sq ft of indoor exhibits and an outdoor yard where locomotives and cars await restoration.







Honestly, this was not among my favorite museums. I guess that if you were a serious train buff you would love it. I did not like that you could not tour through the locomotives and cars – only a couple were open to walk through. And, truth be told, in this day of interactivity in museums this one is sadly lacking. I guess I just did not find it very entertaining.

The highlight of the Museum for me was walking in to the Museum Store and the first thing I saw, prominently displayed, was Rival Rails, written by Walter Borneman, the best friend and mountain climbing partner of my cousin Omar Richardson. A few years ago we spent Independence Day with a group of family and friends in Colorado and Walter was there and besides Walter being there in person we also got to see him on TV as it just so happened that CSPAN Book TV was showing an interview that Walter had done about his book on President Polk.


2 comments:

maureen said...

Ben would have loved this museum!

~Cheryl said...

Pretty cool to spot Walt's book!