On our way north on I-85 from Atlanta today, my wife and I visited the Southeastern Railroad Museum, or rather tried to. It turns out they are closed on Sundays. We did look through the fence and take some pictures. We were there for about 20 minutes. While we were there, three other families pulled up to the gate and would have liked to visit too. I wonder how often this happens, and how many visitors they are missing. It seemed like a nice place and a well maintained set of displayed cars and engines. I can't think of a good way for a museum to know about the visitors they missed getting because they were closed.

-Mark Trebing

Mark -

Our museum is also open on Saturdays, but not usually on Sundays. And yes, I think we are missing some visitor opportunities. I wonder how many other rail museums are open on one of the weekend days, but not the other?

Les Beckman (Hoosier Valley Railroad Museum/North Judson, Indiana)

I know it can be hard to staff a site with volunteers on Sundays. This is because people reserve Sunday for church, family, and/or other events.

The problem is that other people want to take their family to places like a museum or park on a Sunday. And the railroad museum down the road is just such a place.

Over the years, I have often seen higher visitor counts on Sunday than on Saturday. Of course, some of this has equalized in recent years since shopping malls, etc. have been open on Sunday.

[quote="Mark Trebing"]On our way north on I-85 from Atlanta today, my wife and I visited the Southeastern Railroad Museum, or rather tried to. It turns out they are closed on Sundays. We did look through the fence and take some pictures. We were there for about 20 minutes.

Mark,

Sorry this happened, but if you are traveling through the area again, try to get to the museum. I have been there several times (most recently last Christmas season) and thoroughly enjoyed myself. I'm sure you will find a visit worthwhile.

Kevin

Last I knew, the SERM is open Thursday thru Saturday. Of course week days are had for the weekend traveler.

Unfortunately, the Atlanta Chapter became too political for me and I have not been out there very much even though I was a weekend volunteer from about 1970-1975 (when collage started taking up too much time). Ever since the end of the SOU/NS steam program, the political hacks moved their attention to the museum and I went out for enjoyment in preserving history and not for playing politics.

I doubt 750 or 290 will operate again in my lifetime. CV 21 was inspected some 15-20 years ago and, if I recall correctly, there were still grease pencil marks on the flues from the last major overhaul. 21 was retired when the tender rotted out.

I hope they do good.

Doug vV

Reminds me of a museum I visited in 2007. The sign said that it would be open at 1 PM on Sundays. 1 PM came and went; the volunteer finally arrived around 1:15 and apologized for his lateness, commenting, "Monseigneur was a bit long-winded today." I told him it wasn't a problem, I got photos of their outside exhibits and found some friendly cats--a sort of furry, purry welcoming committee.

For whatever value it may hold, their website (which is one of the better online efforts I've personally come across), does clearly list their operating hours, on which Sunday is not included.

http://www.srmduluth.org/default.shtml

I think his point is that the museums should be open on Sunday. What possible good is it to be open Thursday-Saturday when your greatest amount of visitors will come on Saturday and Sunday? Weekends are when people who have day jobs have time to visit museums.

My personal belief, welcome to the South. A lot of people go to church down here, a lot have their priorities elsewhere on Sundays, and as such there's a good amount of places that aren't open on Sundays here.

Thats something that many of us Yankees just can't get a grasp on! :)

It is improving. When I moved to NC in 1978 you couldn't buy a drink in a restaurant, and there were no bars. Wednesday afternoons businesses shut down. TV stations stopped broadcasting at 1AM.

If we could only retain the graciousness and hospitality while advancing into a global economy at the same time......

Which isn't to suggest that SERM - or any other - can't recruit some good agnostics or pagans to run the joint on Sundays, providing there is adequate traffic to make it worthwhile. How much is it market driven VS blind following of tradition?

dave

Hi,
I would like to mention that the North Georgia Live Steamers built a live steam track inside the loop at the old SERM location. We were a club of hobbyists that wanted to operate our locomotives and show off our machining skills. The SERM had Georgia Power 0-6-0 97 operational and (I think) the hiesler. They did not want to operate for some reason I do not recall.
The NGLS started offering free rides one Saturdays a month and people came. Not too long after, SERM started operating with 97.
For NGLS, it was a relaxing way to spend Saturday with our hobby.
By the time SERM moved to the new site, they were open on Saturday and Sunday and operating during the summer months.
When the move to the new site was considered, there was no room for a good live steam track - it would have been placed along the property's fence and did not have room for a tunnel or other items we had at the old site. We probably would have figured out something except that the SERM wanted us to operate every weekend (both days) and charge us rent for our track. In exchange, we would get part of the gate fees.
SERM did not seem to understand that the NGLS was not a business but just hobbyists. Many who had been regulars to the track quite coming out when it began to feel like work.
I am glad the SERM was able to get the old Duluth depot moved to the new site. If is a great building. They have covered storage for much. Unlike the old site, the only ride they have to offer is a back and forth run of about 1000-1500 feet down a spur from the front behind diesels.
Diesels are much easier to care for than steamers.
The new site is somewhat hidden from the highway. The old site was right on the highway - great for passer-bys and spur of the moment visits. I have talked to several non-railroad visitors to the old site mention to me over the years that they were sorry the "railroad in Duluth" was gone. Once I was sure they were talking about the SERM, I told them that they had moved and where to find it.
I think that many visitors forget that volunteer organizations are basically hobbyists and expecting them to have hired help over the weekend is beyond most groups abilities and desires.
If the museums can find a sponsor to aid in the museum that would be optimal. The RR Museum of PA, the B&O Railroad Museum, and the California Railroad Museum are all great examples.
Food for thought.
Doug vV

I know just how you feel the only day I could get to the Oyster Bay Railroad Museum was on a Friday. All I could do was look through the fence.

Some museums are open both days of the weekend. Others such as the Niles Canyon Railway in Sunol, Ca are only open on Sundays. That is the day they run the steam trains.

remember that the vast majority of the railroad and other kinds of historical museums are run by volunteers and they can only devote some time to the museums with household chores, family activity and other items competing for their time.

With the Baby Boomers reaching retirement age; there is starting to be activity on Wednesdays on some of the museums.

The hardest time to schedule is the Sunday after a big event at the museum. The place is usually dead with the volunteers home after the big evernt.

I know of a guy who has given his weekend days for something like 40 years. Now that is what I call dedication!

Ted Miles

It can be difficult to find volunteers on Sundays when many people have family obligations such as church on Sundays. However, on the other hand, many families like to spend time together on Sundays which includes going to museums. Many weekends, our attendance is higher on Sundays than it is on Saturdays. In order to allow our volunteers to have family time as well, we do not open on Sundays until noon. We open at 10am on other days.

Having been a non-rail museum volunteer and special events organizer for the past couple of decades, I think this is absolutely amazing, and a little crazy. In this part of the world (northern IL / Chicago metro area) Sundays are traditionally the BUSIEST days of the week for just about any event-related venue. True, the site may be completely dead until the first round of church gets out after 11:00 in the morning, but by 2:00 the site will be packed. During football season (now) the site will be empty by 5:00.

Case in point: last weekend, I worked a WWII reenactment in Rockford, IL. The paying gate for Sunday was larger than the museum center's walk-in crowd for all of the rest of summer combined. The crowd was let in at 10, the public display battle was at 2, and the site was empty by 5. Being open for seven hours on a single Sunday gave the site 1/3 of their admission fee revenue for the year.

Whenever I help a museum center organize any special event, I always tell them two things: the crowd only cares about "things that go BOOM", and hold the event on Sunday in the early afternoon. Years of experience, and more than a few gate surveys have taught me that very important lesson. Any museum that isn't following this sort of advice is shooting itself in the foot. There are enough "godless heathens" around in just about any volunteer organization that won't mind "missing out" on church to help run a Sunday event.

Ray Breyer
Elgin, IL