Cody Park Train Museum, North Platte, Nebraska

One of the stops here in North Platte was the Cody Park Train Museum. Took a bit to find it as the address given is not where the museum is actually located. It's actually located inside Cody Park. Once inside the park, Jim found it on Maps and we were able to find it that way. It's not a big museum; there are a couple of trains outside and one that you can walk from one end to the other, plus a small building to look in.

Union Pacific Challenger 3977

The main attraction is this engine -- the Union Pacific Challenger 3977. It was built in 1943 for freight and passenger service with speeds up to 70 mph. It is the only one of this class on display in the world. It is 121 feet 10 inches long, 16 feet 4 inches high, and 11 feet 6 inches wide. The tender capacity is 28 tons of coal.

Engine Control Room

Inside the coal furnace

When the Challenger Engine 3977 was delivered to the Union Pacific Railroad in June 1943, it was one of 105 such engines built by the American Locomotive Company of New York. There are two remaining "3900" class locomotives, and the only one in the world on public display is the center of the Union Pacific Railroad Museum in North Platte. These engines were designed for both freight and passenger service and for speeds up to 80 mph. The first source of energy used was coal, but in 1945 the engine was converted to an oil burner and the number was changed to 3710. The engine is actually two locomotives under one boiler. 

The Challenger was the largest engine on the rails for her time. Her first assignment was hauling freight between Los Angeles and Salt Lake City and from Los Angeles to Caliente, California. After diesels took over, she was assigned to the Wyoming Division and then to the Nebraska Division until her retirement in November 1961. The original number 3977 was restored at that time.

William A. Brady's Transcontinental Special ~~ De Wolf Hopper and the Gilbert and Sullivan Opera Company, Denver, Colorado 1914

Roundhouses & Turn Tables

A roundhouse is a circular or semi-circular building where engines are cleaned and repaired for their next run. Inside the roundhouse, tracks spread out fanwise like the spikes of a wheel. A turntable (a track pivoted at the center and supported at the ends by wheels which run on a circular track) sits at the base of the fan. Locomotives are driven onto the turntable track, the turntable revolves and the locomotive or railcar is moved onto a different track leading to an empty stall. When an engine is coming in, the turntable operator walks beside it. When it stops, he throws a chain under the wheel. Each stall has a pit beneath the tracks to permit inspection and repair of locomotives from underneath. When the locomotive is finished, the engine is driven back onto the turntable and the operator carefully lines it up with the tracks that return it to the yard.

In the past, turntables were used to turn steam locomotives around for return trips since their controls were often not configured for extended periods of running in reverse. They were also used to turn observation cars so that their windowed lounge ends faced toward the rear of the train. 

North Platte's first roundhouse was built at the end of the 1860s and had ten stalls. A document sent from G.M. Dodge, chief engineer, to the treasurer of Union Pacific in 1868 states that the cost of the roundhouse was $80,000. It shows the cost of the turntable in North Platte was $1,500 and that $150,000 was spent for the shops. In 1881 wind blew the roundhouse down and work began on a new one of cement with 20 stalls. That roundhouse was replaced in 1913 with a 28-stall roundhouse.

Over the years, the number and size of the roundhouse and turntables increased to accommodate the new locomotives and passenger service. It was natural for people familiar with dealing with horses for transportation to locomotives as iron horses and to call the places in the roundhouse where they were kept stalls. The men who took them in and out of the stalls were hostlers. 

The roundhouse is long gone and engines now go in one end of the diesel repair shop and out the other by means of switches, but those who move engines around the yard  are still called hostlers.

Along with the history of the roundhouse and turn tables is the Golden Spike Tower, where you can go up in the tower to view the North Platte Train Yard. This is an amazing site, and one you should not miss.

The Progressive Spirit ~~ When critics looked at Union Pacific's tiny wood-powered locomotive of the 1860s, and heard of the dreams and plans for a great transcontinental railroad, they said: "They'll have to sprout wings to get over those mountains. It can't be done." But it was done -- as shown in Paramount's Union Pacific. 

Thus was exemplified the courage and the initiative that have characterized Union Pacific's entire history . . . from the tiny locomotive that critics said "rocked and puffed like a baby volcano" to today's giant 5400-hp. Diesel-powered streamliners that make the trip from Chicago to Los Angeles in 39-1/4 hours.

"Old 58" ~~ 70-year old wood-burning locomotive featured in Cecil B. DeMille's Paramount Picture, "Union Pacific."

Union Pacific Freight House Early 1900s

Whistle from North Platte Roundhouse
Used for fire, curfew & emergencies

Notice that these mail operators are carrying guns? That's because they carried actual mail and money, so they had to be ready if necessary. One pictures shows the mail carrier with a coin bag destined for the Federal Reserve Bank, Minneapolis.

Mail Car

Sorting mail in a Railway Post Office Car

How the train catches a mail bag

When we visited the Historic Railpark and Train Museum in Bowling Green, Kentucky, they highlighted the life and history of Owney, Mascot of the Railway Mail Service. Owney was a stray mutt who wandered into the Albany, New York Post Office in 1888. The clerks let him stay, and he fell asleep on some mailbags. Owney was attracted to the texture or scent of the mailbags and followed them when they were placed on a Railway Mail Service train. Owney began to ride with the bags on trains across the state -- and then the country. In 1895 Owney made an around-the-world trip, traveling from mailbags on trains and steamships to Asia and across Europe, before returning to Albany.

Railway mail clerks considered the dog a good luck charm. At a time when train wrecks were all too common, no train Owney rode was ever in a wreck. The railway mail clerks adopted Owney as their unofficial mascot, marking his travels by placing medals and tags on his collar. Each time Owney returned home to Albany, the clerks there saved the tags.

Owney died in Toledo on June 11, 1897. Mail clerks raised funds to have Owney preserved. In 1911, the department transferred Owney to the Smithsonian Institution, where he has remained ever since. Owney can be seen on display in the National Postal Museum's atrium, wearing his jacket and surrounded by several of his tags.

Owney

Inside the museum

This engine was retired April 15, 1985, and was donated to the City of North Platte by the Union Pacific Railroad. It was installed in the park in August 1985.

Us in front of the Union Pacific 3977

North Platte has the good fortune of being the home of Bailey Yards (where the Golden Spike Tower is located), the largest classification yard in the world. The Union Pacific Railroad has been a very generous benefactor for our park systems. The Volunteers for the Preservation of Railroad Displays in the City Parks have obtained the railroad depot from Hershey, Nebraska, set it on a foundation and connected all the utilities.

The Union Pacific has donated a sermaphore type block signal, dispatchers telephone, operators telephone, telegraph equipment, Union Pacific shields for the gables, along with the appropriate depot furniture and a baggage truck. 

A railroad mail car, steel caboose, an order board, a water plug (spout) from the North Platte roundhouse formerly used to fill the steam engine tenders with water have also been added to the mallet-type steam locomotive, a 4-6-6-4, 3977 Challenger engine, 6922 unit, and baggage car. 

The Union Pacific Railroad Museum portrays a history of the Union Pacific Railroad in North Platte and surrounding communities.