Dear Pioneer,
U-505 makes a good point that it’s rarely just one person who helps preserve an engine. Our guys can certainly attest to that. It can take an entire team of people just to get even a small engine situated on the property. It makes sense then that it took an entire city to move a submarine!
Our guys have been quite busy on that front. If last month was a bit of a drought in terms of donations, May has been something of a flood. We acquired two new railcars and something a little unusual for us locomotives and rolling-stock; an International Harvester semi-tractor.
He wasn’t donated to be preserved but rather to help with transporting some used rails and switches we received from Commonwealth Edison last year. He’s not very talkative, but everyone who’s been working on the rail project has said he’s been invaluable so far, so we’re very happy to have him! Rail and road vehicles have a long and proud history of working together to get things done, so it’s nice to have it shown here at the museum too.
The railcars are from the Chicago North and South Shore lines, though the two of them being donated at roughly the same time was coincidental. The North Shore car is Milwaukee Car 253, a combination passenger and baggage car from 1917. You mentioned having your papers signed over to the museum, and that’s exactly what happened with 253! She’s been with the museum since before I arrived, but she was still owned by one of our members. There’s always a chance that a private car could be called upon to move somewhere else or be used again, so the museum has to focus most of their effort on those of us they own outright. Her being donated officially means that she can be moved into one of our barns and protected from the weather and maybe even restored.
The South Shore & South Bend car is 504. She was originally an RPO combine when she started out on the Indiana Railroad, but when South Shore bought them out, they blanked out her windows and put in baggage doors on both sides so she could do express package service. When South Shore stopped doing express package service, she and her twin, #503, worked on wreck train service instead, helping carry the supplies for the wrecker. Last year she was retired, bought, and donated to us.
Even though she is a donation, the work of getting her on the museum proeprty still falls to us. One of our guys, Randy, was sent off to Indiana to ride with her on the trip back up and make sure she made it to the museum safely. He thought it was going to be an easy enough thing. He had a sleeping bag and a cot to spend the night in 504 and he had packed some candy bars to eat on the way. Meaning no offense to 504, but a baggage car isn’t the most comfortable accommodation. I can’t say I know much about food either, but I get the impression from our volunteers that candy bars are about as nice a meal as sleeping in a baggage car is comfy. But it was only supposed to be for one day so “roughing it” should have been fun.
And it might have been, if they hadn’t missed the connection at the South Shore interchange. They were supposed to meet up with a train from the Elgin, Joliet, and Eastern Railway in Gary that would take them some of the way here, but that train had to leave before they could get added to it. They’d have to wait for another train going the same way, but that wouldn’t be until the next day so they had to stay overnight. To make matters worse, a very strong storm came in that evening so on top of the already rough riding, it was now also cold and wet and thundery outside.
All in all, it took them three days to get here, and it sounded like Randy was ready for a proper bed by the end of it. But he and 504 are both home safely now so I’m sure it was worth all the hassle.
If they do make a television that can be placed outside, please let us know! Your museum gets all the newest things first so you will surely know before we do. Apparently ours showed some safety films made by Union Pacific during the annual safety meeting last month to prepare our volunteers for their safety qualification exam, and I wouldn’t mind seeing them myself. They show them on a film reel with a projector though and it can be too windy and bright to set up outside.
Work has been progressing steadily on the concession stand and technical library as well. I can see the shape of the stand from the wye. It’s being built close to the streetcar line so that once it’s finished, it can be one of a few stops around the property. They say the back half will also have a shower next to the restrooms, which I can imagine will feel very nice for our staff and volunteers after a day like the one we just had!
Speaking of, I hope U-505’s rollers are handling these temperature fluctuations alright. I hope you are too.
Your friend,
Pilot
P.S. – Our call for a typewriter was answered. We actually received two typewriters and an adding machine. If your museum needs any help with accounting or sums, let us know!