‘All aboard’ to visit B&O Railroad Museum

BALTIMORE — A century or so ago, when the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad’s Mount Clare yards were busy with the din of a working railroad’s shops, the sound of one small voice would easily have gone unnoticed. Today, as the directors of the B&O; Railroad Museum take stock of a multimillion dollar renovation, it’s often the little voices that matter most.

“Do you know how long it’s been since we heard a child’s voice in this building?” says Executive Director Courtney Wilson. “It’s been 22 months since our last opening day.”

After the devastating snowstorm of Presidents Day 2003, which dumped more than two feet of snow on the 1884 roundhouse roof, causing its collapse and destroying millions of dollars’ worth of rolling stock and the 60-foot turntable, the museum is poised to reopen to the public this weekend.

What has risen from the debris of the great storm is a museum that is bigger and better than ever. You don’t have to be a rail fan to enjoy the 40-acre site, which includes an 1851 station and the first mile of commercial track in the United States, in addition to the roundhouse.

The museum today covers 75,000 square feet. By May that will grow to 120,000 square feet. Three galleries of expanded exhibition space, 975 square feet of it, means that there is something here for just about everyone; history buffs, lovers of fine china, and folks who just like to have a gander at the way things work.

“This is not just a museum of machinery,” says Mr. Wilson. “We want this to be a museum about people.”

Costs for the renovation topped out at $30 million. Of this, $20 million was covered by insurance, leaving the museum to raise an additional $10 million. Thus far, private donors have given $7 million. The city of Baltimore, the state of Maryland, and the U.S. government have also contributed significant funds.

What did the money bring? The turntable has been rebuilt and the museum’s much acclaimed rolling stock is here, of course. Nineteenth century locomotives, voluptuous Pullmans, and the once ubiquitous red caboose take pride of place in the newly renovated national historic landmark, the perfect setting for some of the jewels of the glory years of railroading.

What first strikes the visitor as he makes his way through the brand-new entrance gate is a larger-than-life photograph - enlarged for the new exhibit - of railroad workers making their own way through the gates of the Mount Clare yards. Their racial mix is particularly noteworthy, says Deputy Director and Chief Curator Ed Williams.

“The B&O; was integrated by race from the very beginning,” he says. “Baltimore had one of the highest percentages of free black people on the East Coast.”

The story of Baltimore is as much tied up with the birth of railroading as Washington’s is bound up with politics.

In Baltimore, the railroad got started early, when the state granted the B&O; a charter in 1827. Three years later, things were humming as Peter Cooper’s engine, Tom Thumb, made the run to Ellicott City in a little more than an hour. A month earlier, Cooper’s train had raced a horse and lost, thanks to a leaky boiler. But the run to Ellicott City, called Ellicott’s Mills in those days, ensured that the railroad would be here to stay.

Some of those early trains can be seen in miniature at the museum, where they form part of the collection of models that trace the development of railroad science from George Stephenson’s 1829 Rocket to behemoths like Big Boy, the world’s largest steam locomotive.

Washingtonians may recognize the set; these were once part of the Smithsonian’s collection, displayed in the Transportation Hall at the Museum of American History, and they are all new to the B&O; Museum. The space that features them is one of the three new exhibition galleries.

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