Established | 21 September 1980 |
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Location | Altoona, Pennsylvania |
Coordinates | 40°30′52.01″N78°23′57.01″W / 40.5144472°N 78.3991694°W |
Type | Railway Museum |
Executive director | Joseph DeFrancesco |
Chairperson | C. Wick Moorman |
Website | www |
The Railroaders Memorial Museum (RMM) is a railroad museum in Altoona, Pennsylvania. The museum focuses on the history of railroad workers and railroad communities in central Pennsylvania, particularly Altoona, the Altoona Works, and the greater Pittsburgh area. [1] [2] Since 1998, the museum has been located in the Master Mechanics Building, built by the Pennsylvania Railroad in 1882. [3] The museum also operates a separate museum, visitor center, and observation area at the Horseshoe Curve. [4] [5]
Public proposals to create a railroad museum in Altoona date at least to 1938, when the Altoona Mirror published a letter to the editor suggesting the city develop a tourism industry, including a "community railroad museum", centered around its railroad history. [6] In 1959, Altoona's Chamber of Commerce proposed a similar museum. [7] By 1963, a proposal for a "Pennsyland" railroad museum led representatives of the city's Tourism Bureau to compete against the Strasburg Rail Road in Lancaster County for possession of 28 pieces of decommissioned Pennsylvania Railroad rolling stock. Negotiations intensified when the Pennsylvania General Assembly chartered the Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania but did not immediately designate a location. In 1965, Strasburg was selected as the site for the state museum and later awarded the contested Pennsylvania Railroad stock, which included historic steam locomotives and passenger cars being kept at a roundhouse in Northumberland. [8] [9]
Despite the state's decision, the Altoona Railway Museum Club carried on with efforts to construct a museum in Altoona. In 1968, the club was granted a charter by the National Railway Historical Society to begin operating as the Horseshoe Curve Chapter. The chapter collected railroad artifacts to display in empty storefronts and at civic events in attempts to raise public support for a museum. The Railroaders Memorial Museum was incorporated in 1972 to raise more funds and collect more artifacts. [10] [11] The new group's first major acquisition was the 1975 purchase of The Loretto, a private railroad car built for steel tycoon Charles M. Schwab. [12] That same year, the Altoona Redevelopment Authority sold a parcel of land previously purchased from the Penn Central Transportation Company to a private developer for use as a shopping center. The land deal stipulated that the developer donate a portion of the property and $50,000 towards museum construction. The Railroaders Memorial Museum received full ownership of the property in 1978. [13] Groundbreaking ceremonies for the new museum were held on May 13, 1979. [14] The museum, still incomplete, opened to the public on September 21, 1980. [15]
In the early hours of October 8, 1983, The Loretto was badly damaged by arson. Two juveniles were charged with setting the fire, whose damage was estimated at $200,000. The Restore the Loretto Committee was formed to raise money to restore and preserve the railroad car. [16] [17]
Altoona's city council later wondered whether a similar campaign could be organized for PRR 1361, a deteriorating K4 steam locomotive owned by the city and displayed at the Horseshoe Curve. Museum officials immediately lobbied for a role in the project. [18] The city established the Horseshoe Curve Task Force to investigate the feasibility and costs of restoring No. 1361. In 1985, the Railroaders Memorial Museum was granted possession of the PRR 1361 on condition that a suitable replacement be provided to the Horseshoe Curve; Conrail subsequently donated PRR 7048, a GP9 diesel-electric locomotive, for the purpose. Pennsylvania State Representative Richard Geist announced that the museum would receive a $50,000 grant and a crew of state workers to move No. 1361 and begin a cosmetic restoration. [19]
At the museum's mortgage-burning ceremony on September 28, 1985, Conrail chairman L. Stanley Crane announced that his company would pursue steam train excursions. "The K4 [1361] would be a very appropriate locomotive to do that with," said Crane. The move was intended to put Conrail in step with other contemporaneous railroad operators during the company's bid for public offering. [20] Over the next two years, the engine was restored to working condition in Conrail's Altoona railroad shops, [21] but ran for just a year before bearing and axle failures sidelined it indefinitely. Inconsistent direction and financial issues at the museum hindered repairs to the steam engine. In 1996, the disassembled engine was sent for a complete restoration to Steamtown National Historic Site in Scranton, Pennsylvania. The Railroaders Memorial Museum ceased funding the incomplete project in 2007. Pieces of the engine were divided for storage between the museum and East Broad Top Rail Road. The restoration was officially canceled by the museum in 2010. [22] [23] The failed restoration remains a controversial topic due to its lengthy history, technical errors, and use of state funds. [24] [25]
The National Park Service's interest in western Pennsylvania's historic roads and sites led to the formation of America's Industrial Heritage Project in 1988. Congress authorized the commission to identify historic sites of heavy industry and to help develop a more interconnected tourism industry in southwestern Pennsylvania. The commission identified the cities of Altoona and Johnstown as potential focal points for the new tourist industry. [26] As part of the program, the Railroaders Memorial Museum collaborated with officials from the National Park Service to renovate tourist facilities at the nearby Horseshoe Curve. The $5.8 million renovations were completed in 1992 with the dedication of a new visitors center to be operated by the museum. [27]
Museum officials also collaborated with agents from America's Industrial Heritage Project to seek a larger space for the Railroaders Memorial Museum. In 1990, the museum expressed interest in moving to the nearby Master Mechanics Building. The four-floor brick office building had originally been constructed by the Pennsylvania Railroad, with sections of the building dating to 1882. It had last been occupied by Conrail and vacated in 1984. The $12 million project was funded by the National Park Service, the Federal Highway Administration, and a state grant. Bureaucracy and natural disasters delayed the project and briefly plunged the museum into a fiscal crisis. [28] Grand opening ceremonies were finally held on April 25, 1998. [29]
In May 2002, a new member of the board of directors—Dean McKnight, a senior vice president at M&T Bank—alerted his fellow board members that the museum was dangerously close to insolvency. An internal audit showed that the museum had maxed out its line of credit and was hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt. Despite public reports showing that the museum had been steadily losing money since its reopening in 1998, the board expressed shock upon learning that they couldn't "afford to open the doors." The eleven other members of the board soon resigned. [30]
The new board members hired the Westsylvania Heritage Corporation, another descendant of America's Industrial Heritage Project, to run the museum, and approved drastic measures to keep the museum afloat. They cut the operating budget and laid off more than half of the museum's employees. The paid services were largely replaced with volunteer labor. They began to seek more revenue by hosting events and renting the museum's facilities. The museum gradually reduced its outstanding debt. [31] [32]
In 2007, the board transferred museum operations to the Salone Management Group, which had previously organized concerts at the museum as part of its events programming. Board members and the outgoing executive director cited company's greater financial resources as reasoning for the transfer. [33] [34] In 2010, Salone Management Group oversaw construction of a quarter-roundhouse on the museum grounds.
In 2020, the board of directors hired a new executive director: Joseph DeFrancesco, a former executive director of the Blair County Historical Society. Shortly thereafter, the COVID-19 pandemic temporarily closed the Railroaders Memorial Museum and Horseshoe Curve visitor center. DeFrancesco ordered "cuts across the board" and restructured the museum. The museum reopened in March 2021. [35] [36] On June 24, 2021, the Railroaders Memorial Museum hired FMW Solutions to again restore the PRR 1361 to operating condition. [22] Charles "Wick" Moorman, a retired chairman and CEO of Norfolk Southern Corporation, was elected chairman of the board.
A new staff of professionals and a new board of directors has ushered in a new era for the organization with a solid financial foundation.[ citation needed ]
Since 1998, the museum has occupied the Master Mechanics Building built by the Pennsylvania Railroad as part of its Altoona Works, once the world's largest complex of railroad shop facilities. The railroad began building shop facilities at Altoona in 1849, and within three decades had multiple campuses across the city, including locomotive and rail car fabrication and repair shops, a paint shop, a blacksmith shop, a brass foundry, and an iron foundry. [37]
The two-story Master Mechanics Building was completed in 1882; it contained administrative offices and was the first home of the railroad's Test Department: physical and chemical testing laboratories inspired by those of European railroads. In 1886, a third story was added to the building, giving the Test Department two entire floors. Test Department workers helped the Pennsylvania Railroad achieve company-wide standardization through their analysis of materials used in railroad construction and maintenance. Railroad officials also used the laboratories for public relations; for example, Test Department employees gave demonstrations at the railroad's exhibit [38] at the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago. [37] [3] By 1909, the Master Mechanics Building had been expanded to four floors, but the Test Department needed yet more space, and in 1914, the department moved to its own building in the Altoona Works.
The Pennsylvania Railroad and its successors continued to use the building for administrative offices, including railroad police headquarters. It last housed Conrail's medical offices and was vacated in 1984. [37]
Beginning in 1990, the Master Mechanics Building was renovated and remodeled for the museum, which opened in its new space eight years later. [39] The building also houses administrative offices for the Railroaders Heritage Corporation.
Rolling stock is displayed in a courtyard, quarter-roundhouse, and turntable on museum grounds.
The former museum building, also located on the museum grounds, is used for storage. [40]
The museum began marketing the Master Mechanics Building as a haunted tourist attraction in 2003. Halloween tours that year centered on the museum's "real ghost stories." [41] Ghost Hunters, an American paranormal and reality television series, filmed part of an episode inside the museum. The episode portrayed the haunting as fictional. [42] [43] After the episode aired in 2004, local ghost hunters wrote a book claiming that deceased railroad workers haunt the museum. [44]
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The museum's rolling stock [45] includes Pennsylvania Railroad 1361, a K4 steam locomotive that stood on static display at the Horseshoe Curve from June 8, 1957, until September 1985. It was restored to operating condition but suffered an axle failure within a year. Since 2015, it has been under restoration at a roundhouse on the museum grounds. [46] [47] [48]
No. 1361 was replaced at the Curve by Pennsylvania Railroad 7048, a preserved GP9 Diesel-electric locomotive. [49] The locomotive was built by Electro-Motive Division of General Motors in December 1955 for the Pennsylvania Railroad, and later passed to Conrail. [50] In 1985, Conrail repainted No. 7048 in its original Pennsylvania Railroad livery and donated it to the museum. A cosmetic restoration of 7048 was underway in late summer 2021.
Altoona is a city in Blair County, Pennsylvania, United States. The population was 43,963 at the time of the 2020 census, making it the 18th-most populous city in Pennsylvania. It is the principal city of the Altoona metropolitan area, which includes all of Blair County and was recorded as having a population of 122,822 at the 2020 census.
The Pennsylvania Railroad, legal name The Pennsylvania Railroad Company also known as the "Pennsy", was an American Class I railroad that was established in 1846 and headquartered in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It was named for the commonwealth in which it was established. At its peak in 1882, the Pennsylvania Railroad was the largest railroad, the largest transportation enterprise, and the largest corporation in the world.
The Horseshoe Curve is a three-track railroad curve on Norfolk Southern Railway's Pittsburgh Line in Blair County, Pennsylvania. The curve is roughly 2,375 feet (700 m) long and 1,300 feet (400 m) in diameter. Completed in 1854 by the Pennsylvania Railroad as a way to reduce the westbound grade to the summit of the Allegheny Mountains, it replaced the time-consuming Allegheny Portage Railroad, which was the only other route across the mountains for large vehicles. The curve was later owned and used by three Pennsylvania Railroad successors: Penn Central, Conrail, and Norfolk Southern.
The Pennsylvania Railroad GG1 is a class of streamlined electric locomotives built for the Pennsylvania Railroad (PRR), in the northeastern United States. The class was known for its striking art deco shell, its ability to pull trains at up to 100 mph, and its long operating career of almost 50 years.
John Bull is a historic British-built railroad steam locomotive that operated in the United States. It was operated for the first time on September 15, 1831, and became the oldest operable steam locomotive in the world when the Smithsonian Institution ran it under its own steam in 1981. Built by Robert Stephenson and Company, it was initially purchased by and operated for the Camden and Amboy Railroad, the first railroad in New Jersey, which gave it the number 1 and its first name, "Stevens". The C&A used it heavily from 1833 until 1866, when it was removed from active service and placed in storage.
The Pennsylvania Railroad (PRR) K4 4-6-2 "Pacific" was its premier passenger-hauling steam locomotive from 1914 through the end of steam on the PRR in 1957.
Conrail, formally the Consolidated Rail Corporation, was the primary Class I railroad in the Northeastern United States between 1976 and 1999. The trade name Conrail is a portmanteau based on the company's legal name. It continues to do business as an asset management and network services provider in three Shared Assets Areas that were excluded from the division of its operations during its acquisition by CSX Corporation and the Norfolk Southern Railway.
The PRR S1 class steam locomotive was a single experimental duplex locomotive of the Pennsylvania Railroad. It was designed to demonstrate the advantages of duplex drives espoused by Baldwin Chief Engineer Ralph P. Johnson. It was the longest and heaviest rigid frame reciprocating steam locomotive that was ever built. The streamlined Art Deco styled shell of the locomotive was designed by Raymond Loewy.
The Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania is a railroad museum in Strasburg, Lancaster County, Pennsylvania.
The East Broad Top Railroad (EBT) is a 3 ft narrow gauge historic and heritage railroad headquartered in Rockhill Furnace, Pennsylvania.
Class E6 on the Pennsylvania Railroad was the final type of 4-4-2 "Atlantic" locomotive built by the railroad, and second only to the Milwaukee Road's streamlined class A in size, speed and power. Although quickly ceding top-flight trains to the larger K4s Pacifics, the E6 remained a popular locomotive on lesser services and some lasted to the end of steam on the PRR. One, #460, called the Lindbergh Engine, is preserved at the Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania. It was moved indoors to begin preparations for restoration on March 17, 2010. On January 10, 2011, PRR #460 was moved to the museum's restoration shop for a two- to three-year project, estimated to cost $350,000. The engine is listed in the National Register of Historic Places.
Altoona Works is a large railroad industrial complex in Altoona, Pennsylvania. It was built between 1850 and 1925 by the Pennsylvania Railroad (PRR), to supply the railroad with locomotives, railroad cars and related equipment. For many years, it was the largest railroad shop complex in the world.
Pennsylvania Railroad 1361 is a 4-6-2 K4 "Pacific" type steam locomotive built in May 1918 by the Pennsylvania Railroad's (PRR) Juniata Shops in Altoona, Pennsylvania. It hauled mainline passenger trains in Pennsylvania and commuter trains in Central New Jersey on the PRR until its retirement from revenue service in 1956. Restored to operating condition for excursion service in 1987, No. 1361 along with its only surviving sister locomotive, No. 3750, were designated as the official state steam locomotives by the Pennsylvania General Assembly. In 1988, it was sidelined due to mechanical problems and was currently owned by the Railroaders Memorial Museum (RMM) in Altoona, Pennsylvania, who were currently attempting to return No. 1361 back to operating condition.
The Pennsylvania Railroad G5 is a class of 4-6-0 steam locomotives built by the PRR's Juniata Shops in the mid-late 1920s. It was designed for passenger trains, particularly on commuter lines, and became a fixture on suburban railroads until the mid-1950s. The G5 was the largest and most powerful 4-6-0 locomotive, except for a single Southern Pacific 4-6-0 that outweighed it by 5,500 lb.
The Pittsburgh Line is the Norfolk Southern Railway's primary east–west artery in its Pittsburgh Division and Harrisburg Division across the U.S. state of Pennsylvania and is part of the Keystone Corridor, Amtrak-Norfolk Southern's combined rail corridor.
The 21st Century Steam program was conducted by the Norfolk Southern Railway from 2011 to 2015, featuring four classic steam locomotives pulling passenger excursions along Norfolk Southern rails in the eastern United States. The last train was to be Southern 4501's Piedmont Limited excursion trip from Atlanta, Georgia, to Toccoa, Georgia, but cancelled on October 1 due to Hurricane Joaquin.
The Colebrookdale Railroad, also known as the Secret Valley Line, is a tourist railroad located in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania. The railroad operates between Boyertown in Berks County and Pottstown in Montgomery County.
Muleshoe Curve is a curve of track on the former Pennsylvania Railroad, located near Duncansville, Pennsylvania. It never reached the same amount of popularity as the nearby Horseshoe Curve, located 4.34 mi (7 km) north of Muleshoe curve, mainly due to it being merely a secondary route. Built in 1850s by the state of Pennsylvania as part of the New Portage Railroad, Pennsylvania Railroad (PRR) purchased the line in 1857 and promptly closed it, as the PRR already had its own line in the region. It was brought back into service in the 1890s due to increased rail traffic. Subsequently, the rails were removed and used by the Pittsburgh, Fort Wayne & Chicago Railroad. In 1904, the line was reopened and double-tracked by the PRR as a bypass. One track was removed in 1955 and the other in 1981. After the railroad was taken over by Conrail, Muleshoe Curve was permanently abandoned in 1981.
Western Maryland Scenic Railroad 1309 is a compound articulated class "H-6" "Mallet" type steam locomotive with a 2-6-6-2 wheel arrangement. It was the very last steam locomotive built by the Baldwin Locomotive Works in 1949 and originally operated by the Chesapeake and Ohio Railway (C&O) where it pulled coal trains until its retirement in 1956. In 1972, No. 1309 was moved to the B&O Railroad Museum for static display until 2014 when it was purchased by the Western Maryland Scenic Railroad (WMSR), who undertook a multi-year effort to restore it to operating condition. The restoration was completed on December 31, 2020, and the locomotive entered tourist excursion service for the WMSR on December 17, 2021. This was the first time an articulated locomotive operated in the eastern United States since the retirement of Norfolk and Western 1218 in late 1991.
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