The Mad River & NKP Railroad Museum (MR&NKP) is pleased to announce the creation of an agreement with the Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania (RRMPA) that would allow Nickel Plate Road Steam Locomotive #757 to return to Bellevue, Ohio.

Plans are now underway to relocate the locomotive from Strasburg, PA, to the museum site in Bellevue for static display. “We are very excited to be able to bring the 757 back to Bellevue. The absence of a mainline steam locomotive in our collection has been something we have wanted to correct for a long time. To have the chance to return the 757 to Bellevue is an incredible victory for our organization,” said museum President Chris Beamer.

The locomotive is a Berkshire type (2-8-4 wheel arrangement), the staple design that was made famous by the Nickel Plate Road (NKP). It was built by the Lima Locomotive Works in 1944 and was last operated on June 15, 1958. As steam locomotives were
retired on the Nickel Plate, several were saved by the railroad as monuments to the towns along the line and donated accordingly. 757 was saved for Bellevue, Ohio, Nickel Plate’s largest classification terminal. Unfortunately, at that time, Bellevue did not have a
railroad museum and the city was unable to provide and fund a display site. After being stored at Bellevue for several years, the railroad donated the locomotive to the Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania in 1966.

Ten years after Bellevue lost its steam locomotive, the Mad River & NKP Railroad Museum was founded. Since then, the MR&NKP has grown to encompass 50 pieces of equipment, 10 acres of property, five buildings, countless artifacts, and a rail viewing platform. The MR&NKP is a non-profit 501(c)3 organization that is operated and maintained by volunteers with no government assistance. Admission to the museum, fund raising events, and donations are the museum’s primary sources of income. The MR&NKP has the most extensive collection of NKP equipment and artifacts of any museum, however owning an actual NKP steam locomotive has eluded the museum since its inception.

In early 2017, the MR&NKP and the RRMPA entered into negotiations to bring 757 back home. Within the past few months, the RRMPA and the Pennsylvania Historical & Museum Commission has agreed that 757 does not have as strong a connection to
Pennsylvania’s railroading history as some of their other locomotives and railroad cars, which also require considerable attention. They have made the difficult decision to deaccession 757 from their collection, with the intention of transferring the locomotive to an organization that has a better connection to the locomotive’s history and is willing and able to immediately restore it.

The MR&NKP will begin movement preparations as funds permit and will be granted ownership of the locomotive after its removal
from the RRMPA site. “The people of the Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania have been great to work with on this project and toward the common goal of preserving our country’s railroad heritage,” Beamer added.

This is a rare opportunity and may not be available again. The MR&NKP estimates the relocation, restoration, and preparation of a special exhibit site will cost $250,000. The Mad River & NKP Railroad Museum needs your help to bring this iconic locomotive
back home to Bellevue. Please visit http://www.bringback757.org for more information and/or to donate.

Great news for all involved!

Missed the time by ONE MINUTE......... <:-D

Best place for 757, sometimes called "the forgotten Berkshire". Congratulations to you folks and the RMPA. This is a huge positive!

Excellent! I used to visit the museum often and lament how the 757 was so out of place there, having very little connection with railroading in Pennsylvania. Now she will be going back to a place where she fits. Can't think of a better place for her!

Alan

For your information, the Nickel Plate ran through Pennsylvania to New York State.

The Baltimore & Ohio also ran through Pennsylvania. So did the Erie, and Western Maryland, and Delaware, Lackawanna & Western, and Bessemer & Lake Erie, and New York Central, and the Jersey Central.

It's the Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania, not the Pennsylvania Railroad Museum.

Any move of a piece to a more appreciating location is a plus.

As for NKP's presence in PA, might I suggest that B&LE 643 belongs in an OH museum about as much as 757 belongs in a PA museum. So.....which OH museum will step up to preserve 643?

Or does it better belong at RRMPA? Hint, hint, hint........

When are they going to change the name of RRMPA to PRRM?

Congratulations to the people at the RRMPA and MR&NKP. It is inspiring to see two organizations working cooperatively to develop a viable long-term plan to preserve this artifact at a location where it can tell its story and the story of the locality's ties to the railroad.

So many questions? But the big one is what are Pennsylvania taxpayers getting in return?

I could give a rat's posterior about "where it belongs", I do care that the people whose salaries and benefits I pay do their job as trustees of property-they are not fee simple owners.

Hmm, sounds like the taxpayers get one less drain on their resources? Good grief.

Exactly! The Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania has far too many rusting, deteriorating pieces of equipment which either ran primarily in, or were built in PA. NKP 757 was never going to get proper attention in our Commonwealth's museum, so sending it to Ohio where a museum desperately wants a NKP locomotive is a good decision.

Remember also, PA still has a NKP Berkshire in Scranton. NKP #759 resides in the collection at the Steamtown National Historic site.

"Hmm, sounds like the taxpayers get one less drain on their resources? Good grief."

By that logic, we should dispose of much if not all of the collection. Is there something you want? Could you see your way to accepting about 500,000 residents of Philadelphia or Allegheny Counties?

"Exactly! The Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania has far too many rusting, deteriorating pieces of equipment which either ran primarily in, or were built in PA. NKP 757 was never going to get proper attention in our Commonwealth's museum, so sending it to Ohio where a museum desperately wants a NKP locomotive is a good decision."

I have no argument with the group that "desperately" wants the locomotive, but the PHMC is supposed to be conserving its artifacts for the people of Pennsylvania.

http://www.legis.state.pa.us/cfdocs/leg ... HTM&ttl=37

My real argument is with the idiots in the legislature who seem to have money for a variety of stupid and useless programs, but ignore their responsibilities to expend money on things like historic preservation, whose benefits are great, but not personal and conspicuous enough to result in the receipt of votes or donations by the boys and girls under the dome.

Four years ago they spent MILLIONS of dollars to rename the "Department of Public Welfare" to the "Department of Human Services" in order to avoid a "stigma" to recipients.

http://www.post-gazette.com/news/state/ ... 1411240040


And let's not forget the other sort of welfare:

https://www.commonwealthfoundation.org/ ... te-welfare

Unless you are a Pennsylvania taxpayer with an more intimate knowledge of the fiscal situation that exceeds mine (hint, I've forgotten more than you'll ever know) please allow those of us on the field wearing helmets and taking hits to disregard the "other team's" cheerleader's pom-pom waiving and game commentary.

Post Script:

For your information, the Nickel Plate ran through Pennsylvania to New York State.

The Baltimore & Ohio also ran through Pennsylvania. So did the Erie, and Western Maryland, and Delaware, Lackawanna & Western, and Bessemer & Lake Erie, and New York Central, and the Jersey Central.

It's the Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania, not the Pennsylvania Railroad Museum.


Nobody alive can affect the fact that there's only two CNJ engines, one LNE, no Lehigh Valley, two DL&W, and only a handful collectively from those other roads-so the disposition of 757 furthers the confusion that the Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania is actually the Pennsylvania Railroad Museum.

Reading the brief history of 757 as provided by the OP, the Nickel Plate originally intended to donate the artifact to the City of Bellevue but the city did not have a proper place to display it, so, after a few years, the railroad donated it to RRMPA. Now that Bellevue has an appropriate place for the restoration, preservation, long-term care and display of the artifact, the RRMPA, as custodian and trustee of the property, has decided to return the locomotive to the donee locality of the donor's original intent.

One of the contributing factors in this decision was no doubt of a fiscal nature. The RRMPA, like all other museums, faces the hard reality that they do not have the resources to properly care for all of the items in their collection. The responsible course of action, from both a fiscal standpoint and as preservationists, is to find an organization that is able to be a proper steward of this piece of history well into the future. The RRMPA has a duty to manage its collection in a fiscally responsible way and to see to it that all of the items in its care are properly preserved. Working well with other organizations to see to it that these goals are met is laudable and a great example of how museums should operate.

The alternative is to allow the artifacts to decay outside until their remains are scooped up by a backhoe and placed in a dumpster.

"What is a cynic? A man who knows the price of everything and the value of nothing." - Oscar Wilde, in Lady Windermere's Fan (1892)

"One of the contributing factors in this decision was no doubt of a fiscal nature."


Scranton Yard, you are missing my point here. This is almost purely motivated by fiscal conditions; as well as the staff cuts made in the Rendell era. Eddie was to busy being-as one Philadelphian I know described him-the finest Governor Philadelphia ever had-doing things getting Hyundai Rotem to relocate the Southeast PA for SEPTA's benefit to worry about "general welfare" things.

The problem is that once you start jettisoning off parts of your collection (especially one that provides much need balance to the overwhelmingly PRR based collection) based on fiscal concerns and without any exchange, there's nothing to stop what is thought to be single action motivated by exigency and duress from becoming part of a patterned response to an ongoing lack of care by the Legislature.

Now, had they worked some sort of multilateral deal where say any of the following locomotives would have been received in return.

LNE #207
DLW #3001
DLW #952
RDG #2101

(Not saying those items are available or should be available, so hold your fire)

Then it would have been a good deal for the residents of the Commonwealth; as of now it's just a give-away.

I have no problem with "rationalizing" a collection, so long as those doing it-act in good faith for the benefit of the residents or citizens of the political authority that pays their salary, especially if individual pieces are in danger, not coherent-and not merely disfavored.

This should be an embarrassment to the people under the dome-but what can you expect when they couldn't even know that they had a rat problem in the Capitol lunch a few years back?

http://www.pennlive.com/midstate/index. ... teria.html