Sunday, October 20, 2013
Pine Buff, Arkansas

The first spade of dirt for the building that houses the Arkansas Railroad Museum in Pine Bluff, Arkansas, was turned in 1882.  The building reached its final form in 1894 as a full-fledged railroad shop and has been in continuous use since.  The originator of the building was the St. Louis and Southwestern Railroad, aka “The Cotton Belt.”  Building occupants have changed over the years.  The Southern Pacific Railroad, which eventually became part of Union Pacific, was the last occupant with rolling stock.  When Union Pacific moved out, the Arkansas Railroad Museum moved in.

A Brick of a Different Color

After taking a few steps into the museum, observant visitors will notice sections of unusual flooring.  What they are seeing are wooden “bricks.”  At one time these “bricks” covered most of the floor area in the building.  The rest was good ol’ dirt.  The wooden “bricks” created no sparks when workers dropped tools on the floor.

The Snow Didn't Stand a Chance.

After you are amazed by wooden “bricks,” you look up and see a giant machine that would have been right at home in George Lucas’ motor pool of unlikely machines in Star Wars.  This is a 1953 railroad snowplow, formerly operated by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.  While the museum makes no bones about not messing with the plow end, they have the latch string out for visitors to climb aboard the back of the machine and peruse the spartan interior, including the cab where the operators sat.  The snowplow's cab windows are best described as “peek-a-boo” slits.  The red thing in the lower right of the picture is the front left fender of an antique hook-and-ladder fire truck.  Space was cramped, requiring me to position one of my camera's tripod legs between the bumper and the grill of the truck.  The wide lens grabbed the fender at an angle that discouraged cropping out.

Huuuuuuuuuuuuuuuge!

When you first enter the Arkansas Railroad Museum, your lips begin to form the word huuuuuuuuuuuuuuuge!  I’m guessing the building is, give or take a few standard deviations, every bit as long as a city block.  The first thing you see is a lineup of rail cars and locomotives standing at dress-right, dress.  That line runs well over 75 per cent of the length of the building.  Across the way from the car-locomotive line-up is a collection of miscellaneous large and small objects that I’m thinking numbers deeply into the thousands.

If you have at least a scintilla of appreciation for rail history, you’ll find something you like in the Arkansas Railroad Museum.  If you are a certified, card-carrying railroad nut, you may need sedation to abate your excitement to a manageable level.  If you are like the rest of us, you will spend more time in the building than you had originally budgeted.  It’s that good.