Transportation museum opens in downtown Springdale

Dick Hovey (left), president of the J. Reilly McCarren Transportation Museum, and Chuck Girard, volunteer passenger conductor for the Arkansas & Missouri Railroad, talk Thursday about some of the photos on display for the opening of the museum at the A&M Railroad depot in Springdale. The museum is sponsored by the Friends of the Arkansas Missouri Railroad and features several exhibits highlighting the past of passenger and freight trains. Exhibits include antique locomotive lights, lanterns, serving wear, uniforms and an interactive locomotive control.
Dick Hovey (left), president of the J. Reilly McCarren Transportation Museum, and Chuck Girard, volunteer passenger conductor for the Arkansas & Missouri Railroad, talk Thursday about some of the photos on display for the opening of the museum at the A&M Railroad depot in Springdale. The museum is sponsored by the Friends of the Arkansas Missouri Railroad and features several exhibits highlighting the past of passenger and freight trains. Exhibits include antique locomotive lights, lanterns, serving wear, uniforms and an interactive locomotive control.

SPRINGDALE -- The sound of a train's whistle punctuated the air as community members gathered Thursday in a new transportation museum in downtown Springdale.

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NWA Democrat-Gazette

Mike Gilbert, chief operating officer for the Jones Center, works the controls for a locomotive throttle simulator Thursday during the opening for the J. Reilly McCarren Transportation Museum at the Arkansas & Missouri Railroad depot in Springdale. The exhibit allows the user to control a model train with controls from an old locomotive.

Chatter filled the building at 307 E. Emma Ave., and people peered into display cases while others looked at train related photos on the walls.

J. Reilly McCarren Transportation Museum

• Location: 307 E. Emma Ave., just south of the Arkansas & Missouri Railroad depot

• Hours: 8 a.m. - 5 p.m., Monday - Friday (other hours may vary)

• Price: Free

Source: Staff Report

Arkansas & Missouri Railroad

Springdale-based Arkansas & Missouri Railroad operates a 150-mile route from Monett, Mo., to Fort Smith, according to its website, amrailroad. com. The company provides freight service and excursion passenger service between Springdale and Van Buren.

Friends of the Arkansas Missouri Railroad held an opening Thursday for the museum. The group is a nonprofit organization with a focus on education about the history and culture of railroads and other forms of transportation, said Dick Hovey, museum president.

Transportation is a big part of Northwest Arkansas history, said Allyn Lord, director of the Shiloh Museum of Ozark History. She spoke of the fruit, vegetable and poultry industries; Jones Truck Lines and J.B. Hunt in the trucking industry as well as Tyson Foods and Wal-Mart.

The museum is called the J. Reilly McCarren Transportation Museum. McCarren was the chairman of Arkansas & Missouri Railroad when he died in 2015, said Brenda Rouse, passenger train operations manager for the company. He had a passion for trains and transportation logistics.

Officials remodeled a shop building next to the railroad's depot on the south side of Emma Avenue for the museum, Rouse said. The building use to have dirt floors, two sets of railroad tracks and was open inside.

The building is at least 160 by 30 feet, she said, and was renovated in phases, which included walls, heat, air conditioning, insulation and new floors. Arkansas & Missouri Railroad donated the money for the renovation, but Rouse wouldn't say how much.

The rooms in the museum are edged with display cases full of lanterns, model trains, menus and dishes. A train seat with red upholstery sits against one wall. Rouse said employees arrived one day to find that someone had left it by the door to the museum.

Some items in the museum are on loan, some were donated and the railroad owns others, Rouse said. A majority of the items on display will continue to be related to trains, but other transportation types will be represented.

Shiloh Museum donated multiple train related items, including a mural of a train, Lord said.

A large collection of items donated by an individual sits in a display case against a wall. Menus, a model train, multiple items with "FRISCO LINES" on them and some dishes and other items containing the presidential seal can be viewed. James and Patricia McNalley of Yellville donated the collection, Rouse said. James McNalley grew up in Springdale.

Rouse and Hovey noted items museum visitors shouldn't miss. They include the presidential items in the donated collection from the McNalleys, transportation videos, railroad china, the train cars outside the museum building, telegraph equipment and the American Locomotive Co. exhibit.

Chuck Girard of Fort Smith planned to attend a meeting Thursday evening at the museum for the Arkansas-Boston Mountains Chapter of the National Railway Historical Society. He got to the museum early for the grand opening.

Girard described the museum as impressive and noted the donated collection from the McNalleys' contained rare items.

The museum also contains an interactive train throttle that visitors can use to control the movements of a model train. The throttle is from the 1950's, Hovey said.

Various vehicles sat in the parking lot Thursday. A car that was refurbished to look like an old taxi cab was parked with an open trunk. A Wal-Mart semi-tractor trailer, two Jones Truck Lines trucks, an old Springdale Fire Department truck and an old Tyson Foods truck also sat in the parking lot.

The vehicles won't be parts of the museum, but were brought to the parking lot for the opening, said Ryan Tiffin, event coordinator for the railroad.

The museum fits with efforts to draw people downtown, Lord said, adding it can be an additional destination for students on field trips who visit the Shiloh Museum.

Misty Murphy, executive director of the Downtown Springdale Alliance, referred to the transportation museum as a destination and a learning experience. It's another reason for people to come downtown, which is at an "intermodal crossroads" with highways, the Razorback Greenway and the railroad, she said.

Officials hope to expand the museum with an open air space if the city closes East Meadow Avenue near the train tracks, Rouse said. The outdoor expansion would include a picnic area and possible outdoor exhibits, she said.

NW News on 04/22/2016

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