This is a pretty touchy subject, and I want to make it perfectly clear that I DON'T want to insult or offend anyone. I just wanted to voice some concern over the state of preservation in a couple of isolated cases.

What I'm discussing is the few railway museums out there that are dying. While new museums are popping up on a fairly irregular basis, and old museums are generally doing fairly well for themselves, there are a few museums which have become shadows of their former selves. For instance, a museum comes to mind that was one of the first - and finest - electric railway museums. They have a stellar collection of unique and/or rare cars, mainly from their area of the country. In the "old days," they were an active museum that was used as a role model for younger organizations. However, for reasons I find it unnecessary to speculate about, they gradually declined as membership and interest fell.

These days, their collection is in a sad state of stagnation. They have practically no operating cars, and most of their equipment is under tarpaulins. A good deal of it has been so neglected that it would be nearly impossible to restore it now. The question is, what is to be done? The recent step taken by the Connecticut Trolley Museum of deaccessioning a piece of equipment not fitting their collection guidelines impressed me greatly. Should a museum which has a collection it obviously has neither the capacity nor the apparent will to maintain, and which could be better cared for by another organization, feel obligated to sell some of it off for the good of the equipment? Or should they hold onto it in the hope that they will experience a resurgence of interest?

It is hard to see a museum melt into the ground over a period of several decades. While this may have already occurred, I like to think that there is always something that can be done to salvage what remains of an organization's former glory.

> What I'm discussing is the few railway
> museums out there that are dying. While new
> museums are popping up on a fairly irregular
> basis, and old museums are generally doing
> fairly well for themselves, there are a few
> museums which have become shadows of their
> former selves. For instance, a museum comes
> to mind that was one of the first - and
> finest - electric railway museums. They have
> a stellar collection of unique and/or rare
> cars, mainly from their area of the country.
> In the "old days," they were an
> active museum that was used as a role model
> for younger organizations. However, for
> reasons I find it unnecessary to speculate
> about, they gradually declined as membership
> and interest fell.

> These days, their collection is in a sad
> state of stagnation. They have practically
> no operating cars, and most of their
> equipment is under tarpaulins. A good deal
> of it has been so neglected that it would be
> nearly impossible to restore it now. The
> question is, what is to be done?

Sounds like the Ohio Railway Museum here in Columbus, OH. What happened there? From what I can gather,stupidity,infighting and the lack of a cohesive master plan is what did that place in. An operating railway museum in the middle of a 1,000,000 + person market in a city that many people lament there is nothing to do in. Many would kill (figuratively) to have their museum in such a rich market. But being open four hours on Sundays with rat infested, tarped remains of cars won't attract middle class and upper middle class patrons. You know, the people with DISPOSABLE INCOME.

When I was up in northeast Ohio I was an active member of two organizations. One has a sizable equipment collection but no permanent home. The other has a smaller collection and a small parcel of land that they had "started" a rail museum on with a string of equipment. I was the leading active member of both groups, but amazingly when I moved to Columbus all work on the equipment seemed to cease. I was hoping that someone would carry on and continue maintaining the equipment, but nobody has stepped forward from the membership ranks of either organization to maintain the equipment. It greatly distresses me to see that happening, because I spent a good 10 years working on pieces that are now losing the battle to vandals and the elements.

I am sure there are many stories like that. Well meaning organizations that are in way over their heads, with dreams of rail museums that will never materialize, meanwhile priceless equipment rots.

Oh well. What to do?



rickrailrd@aol.com

If a museum cannot properly take care of their collection, either now or in the forseable future, they should be looking for a good home for excess equipment.

Museums are susposed to be places for preservation of history, not storage yards for the dead past.

The California State Railroad Museum left their "AT&SF Collection" out in the open for so long that even cosmetic restoration would be an expensive venture. There are many groups (and some private collectors) that would have given those engines a roof over their heads and some TLC decades ago.

> This is a pretty touchy subject, and I want
> to make it perfectly clear that I DON'T want
> to insult or offend anyone. I just wanted to
> voice some concern over the state of
> preservation in a couple of isolated cases.

> What I'm discussing is the few railway
> museums out there that are dying. While new
> museums are popping up on a fairly irregular
> basis, and old museums are generally doing
> fairly well for themselves, there are a few
> museums which have become shadows of their
> former selves. For instance, a museum comes
> to mind that was one of the first - and
> finest - electric railway museums. They have
> a stellar collection of unique and/or rare
> cars, mainly from their area of the country.
> In the "old days," they were an
> active museum that was used as a role model
> for younger organizations. However, for
> reasons I find it unnecessary to speculate
> about, they gradually declined as membership
> and interest fell.

> These days, their collection is in a sad
> state of stagnation. They have practically
> no operating cars, and most of their
> equipment is under tarpaulins. A good deal
> of it has been so neglected that it would be
> nearly impossible to restore it now. The
> question is, what is to be done? The recent
> step taken by the Connecticut Trolley Museum
> of deaccessioning a piece of equipment not
> fitting their collection guidelines
> impressed me greatly. Should a museum which
> has a collection it obviously has neither
> the capacity nor the apparent will to
> maintain, and which could be better cared
> for by another organization, feel obligated
> to sell some of it off for the good of the
> equipment? Or should they hold onto it in
> the hope that they will experience a
> resurgence of interest?

> It is hard to see a museum melt into the
> ground over a period of several decades.
> While this may have already occurred, I like
> to think that there is always something that
> can be done to salvage what remains of an
> organization's former glory.


Thime@aol.com

Interesting topic, Frank. Once again, great thinking from younger perspectives.

Most "mature" old line museums were founded and collected when times were good, railroads were still railroads, and equipment was in plentiful supply. The active membership that started and ran these organizations now makes me look young.

The personal motivation of many of those pioneers was ego and fantasy driven, and since they had a plentiful supply of stuff coming in, they never worried about using things up.

If there was a business plan, it didn't provide for collections review, periodic review of the total operation, defining failure, and providing some guidelines for the eventual demise of the "club".

In other words, actual professional style museum management and ethics weren't part of the original equasion.

The personalities involved in such places are usually loath to pass along leadership to newer blood, and gradually fall further from true understanding of the changes that are adversely affecting their formerly sucessful passion. They truly don't know why it doesn't work anymore.

In volunteer managed organizatons, the fallacy of democratically elected management has futher pushed operation from the most qualified into the realm of the most popular or at least the least objectionable. Good managers will make enemies by making decisions which will be unpopular but are necessary. One reason why you plan on a short stay rather than a lifetime career.

The most successful have evolved and changed over time and made decisions from business rather than personal perspectives. You can only stay afloat so long by deferring maintenence before it adversely affects your ability to market. I kind of like Thomas Jefferson's idea that the constitution should require reratification every so often, and all laws should expire if not renewed. So should all museums, NRHS chapters, and railroad clubs reinvent themselves periodically.

More to a practical point, make plans for your demise while you are still healthy. If you are struggling to reinvent as a more focused entity, offer surplus stuff free to any good home and thank those that take it off your hands, regardless of the fond memories of how nice it ran back in 1968. If you are dying, do it fast and salvage what you can. Don't wait until there is nothing left worth saving.

Dave



lathro19@idt.net

Frank, I have been pondering this since I have visited many of the places mentioned in the thread, starting when I was around your age, not all too long ago. Since then, there has been the death and revival of East Troy, and Steamtown, and the trolleys of Eastern Pennsylvania. Equipment, as a result, went through some interesting relocations in the process. I think that those volunteers that didn't just give up with the death of the old organization, went and joined the new ones. There was certainly an invigorated atmosphere by the new groups and old groups with newly aquired equipment.

Kindof reminds me of Springtime.....

Now we hear there are changes with what was known as Warehouse Point, with deacquistion of steam locomotives, and the remains of a B&M coach and a BERy Type 5 streetcar. Steamtown is getting practical about its collection. We see the potential of a super interurban and railroad museum (or museums) in Ohio, but something somewhere has to change to get the ball rolling faster, and generate the interest that draws volunteers. I am sure this pattern is true for a checkerboard of areas across the country. I hope to see in the years ahead more healthy births and rebirths out of the semi-aborted attempts and withering collections that are out there.

You're certainly right about the capacity of railway museums to start over where necessary. There is a difference between the interesting examples you've pointed out and the museum I had in mind when I asked about that organization selling off their cars. The difference is interest. While the East Troy, Steamtown, and Buckingham Valley groups all went through huge changes, they always had a group of people who were interested in them, and who were willing to do the work to make sure the museum changed and didn't just disappear. East Troy didn't really die; it just split in two, and one half of the former organization is still running cars on that site. Steamtown always had Nelson Blount to carry it from place to place, and the Buckingham Valley group has simply had really horrible luck in finding a permanent home (they seem to have gotten it right with the new site in Scranton). My point is, when virtually everyone stops caring, is there a reason for the organization to exist any more?

Building relationships and friends at the museum - it the painting, board meetings, toliet cleaning parties - it's those friendships which will keep a museum together. Too many "business decisions" are made when a museum isn't a traditional "for-profit" business. It's job is to preserve and present history.

Try like hell to keep everyone together working to a common goal. I have learned the hard what that good people make a good museum - and they are hard to find.

Be friends.

JimLundquist55@yahoo.com

This is, regrettably, THE most important topic to come about in this forum since I started looking at it. Perhaps if I find time i can wrangle an article out of it.

The brutal facts are plain. The objects of our affections--steam locomotives, interurbans, trolleys--were retired at least two generations ago. I theoretically could have a child that has never known anything before Conrail. If efforts are not made to relate the objects in the museums to the grand scale of history as a whole, the interest will plummet and your museum or tourist line will find itself in a death spiral.

Today, the novel concept is not the steam locomotive, but taking a train, PERIOD.

If efforts are not made--via outreach by both rail historians and the railroad industry in general--to stimulate interest in the general public in railroad history, the inevitable result will be the destruction, via rationalization or neglect, of over half the railroad preservation projects in America.

Do you doubt me? Please show me the collections of 19th-century artifacts and rolling stock that survived into the 21st century. Are we prepared for that small an anount of 20th-century railroading to survive into the 22nd century?

LNER4472@gateway.net

With respect Jim, that prescription is the one that will build a social club that can do good works for only as long as simple social club activities are required for good works to be done and not much longer. The people need a plan, and resources, and a way to manage their resources to get the planned goals met. They also need a way to change plans and evolve as things around them change. Spending every Saturday afternoon with good friends and having a great time is wonderful and has been the catylist of many programs, but when those friends start to move away, die, or burn out, what happens?

People are a given for most of us, but not a necessity. I have seen many privately owned collections of various things, responsably preserved and maintained, for just the enjoyment of the private (usually wealthy) collector. Antique automobiles comes to mind immediately.

If we forget we are operating a business we won't be around and in business for longer than our current and whatever accidental resources show up last. One of the most valuable resources is people , and therefore people need the most careful management of all. The fact that they tend to be harder to manage than a bank account or a lathe, and come equipped with baggage and preconcieved concepts which may or not tie in with plans and goals makes it interesting to say the least.

Dave

lathro19@idt.net

Ships too, have their problems. I spent a good part of a summer paintiong a 135'long Lightship some years ago, she looked great! Today she is lying on the bottow with the water running in and out as the tide flows.

People are the answer! A museum of large objects has to attract visitors. Most visitors as reported, don't know a thing about any of this stuff. But that is the job of the museum to teach them!

Lawst weekend I did a talk on an Interurban,that pointed out such basics as the fact that the family did not have a car in 1910, the year the car started running. Not what kind of electric motors the car ran with.

Later in the day I talked to two older long time members of the museum, they wanted to know what kind of motors and were they 600 volts or 1200 volts. The rail fans are the smallest portion of the people the museum meets (the car ran on both 6 & 12). But the museum needs them too. Ted


ted_miles@NPS.gov

While some museums may start as social clubs and remain as social clubs and while other museums may rely on community spirit to survive the museums that will survive and prosper will be the ones that realize they have to act as museums, develop a business and marketing plan, have a paid staff, secure a stable covered location and successfully raise money.



tcox@parknet.pmh.org

> With respect Jim, that prescription is the
> one that will build a social club that can
> do good works for only as long as simple
> social club activities are required for good
> works to be done and not much longer. The
> people need a plan, and resources, and a way
> to manage their resources to get the planned
> goals met. They also need a way to change
> plans and evolve as things around them
> change.

Exactly right. I recently left a museum group over the repeated failure of those in charge to effectively plan for the future and manage finances. When we were a group of guys getting together on Saturdays to paint a caboose, living hand to mouth and socializing was allright. When we got lucky, found a place to operate, and began to actually carry passengers and think about a permanent home, the "good old boy" social attitude did not change. Once you start making money (whether through operations or some other way), you need to think and plan like a business. This doesn't mean you can't have fun - just that there are some things that you have to do right to ensure your continued success.

Spending every Saturday afternoon
> with good friends and having a great time is
> wonderful and has been the catylist of many
> programs, but when those friends start to
> move away, die, or burn out, what happens?

This is another good point. Moving, dying, and burnout happens, and the group needs to be able to continue despite these changes. This is where a plan is really important; without one, you are constantly having to go over the same issues with new people.

Just as important is how you will work new members into your group. Their knowledge and experiences will be different from that of the old group, and they will have new ideas, abilities, and contributions. Your group should be willing to be flexible with plans and ideas based on the contributions of all of your membership. Don't let one core group run things their way to the exclusion of others, especially those with good ideas. To do so will contribute to the leaving/burnout problem.

> People are a given for most of us, but not a
> necessity. I have seen many privately owned
> collections of various things, responsably
> preserved and maintained, for just the
> enjoyment of the private (usually wealthy)
> collector. Antique automobiles comes to mind
> immediately.

> If we forget we are operating a business we
> won't be around and in business for longer
> than our current and whatever accidental
> resources show up last. One of the most
> valuable resources is people , and therefore
> people need the most careful management of
> all. The fact that they tend to be harder to
> manage than a bank account or a lathe, and
> come equipped with baggage and preconcieved
> concepts which may or not tie in with plans
> and goals makes it interesting to say the
> least.

Amen, brother. Running a museum, like any other business, is hard work. Do it wrong, and it will fold, just like any other. Just because you are a museum or are working with trains does not guarantee your survival.

Petty personal differences and an inflated sense of self-worth and/or knowledge - these are the two things that, in my experience, lead to the loss of good people and the fracturing of museum groups. I may not be able to tell the heritage of one stainless steel passenger car from another, but the fact that you can does not mean that you know all there is to know about railroading, business, or life in general. Listen to everyone, whether you agree with them or not, take their suggestions under review, and use the best of what everyone brings to the table. This is the only way for a museum or group to grow and prevent stagnation or death. I only hope the group I left comes to its senses sometime.



rrguy2147@hotmail.com

Unfortunately saving some of the former glory of the once viable and proud museums is not enough.We need to ask ourselves what failed and how do we communicate this to other organizations.

I believe that there will be some old and venerable museums that will die in the next few years. I am not sure that they can be saved. They are to set in their ways. They have either never figured out and / or lost the succesful system they once had. You may ask me what I mean by a system? I would ask you and everyone around you if you could make a better hamburger than McDonalds. You would probably answer yes. Yet McDonalds makes mega money because they have a working system. Most railway museums do not.

All museams have to first look at what will attract the public. It is the publics money that makes it possible for the members to play. Unfortunately, most museum organizations do not develope the right vision that attracts enough of the public to survive.

The next thing that museums need to learn is how to attract and retain strong, talented members who can take the vision and make it a reality. To often museams attract frustrated proffesionals ( not good leaders) who want to be in charge and tell members what to do. They drive away the key members that can make the vision a reality. Good leadership, not leader want to be's, is a must for success.

What will the future hold? Unless museums pay attention to the needs of the public, retaining the right kind of members and developing a winning system there will be more museums dying.


cchestnut@earthlink.net

> The brutal facts are plain. The objects of
> our affections--steam locomotives,
> interurbans, trolleys--were retired at least
> two generations ago. I theoretically could
> have a child that has never known anything
> before Conrail.

I, quite literally, do have a child who has never known anything before the CSX/ NS breakup of Conrail! His birth last July makes this comment hit right at home for me. Should we be pushing to save the GP-30, or the SD45? Heck, try and find a high nose GP unit anywhere (sans NS of course) now. My son, now 7 1/2 months, will probably never see these units in mainline service. Where is the movement to save these 2nd and 3rd generation diesels?

We, unlike the British, seem to only think of preserving a piece of equipment after we look around and realize that there isn't one there. For instance; where are all the 40-foot boxcars? We have tens of hundreds of steam locomotives rusting away in parks, yet there has only been a real movement to preserve the period equipment that they hauled in the last, what, 15 to 20 years or so?

This same discussion continues to brought up in different forms and yet nothing seems to really have changed. Frank, I too do not wish to attack specific groups like ORM, but that may be the only way that anything ever happens. We all seem to generally agree something needs to be done, but no one seems to be willing to take the first step. Who is going to confront the ORM's of this world with the reality of their situation, before its too late? I wish with all my heart that I could take my son to see that most historic of traction equipment in the country somewhere else than that glorified scrap heap. There's a DSR Peter Witt rotting away under the tarp there that I would dearly love to ride!

TJG



Port Huron Museum
peremarquette@hotmail.com

In addition, a increasing percentage of our fellow citizens were born outside the United States. How do we make railroad history relevant to this expanding segment of the general population?
Ken



ken.middlebrook@nsc.com