There has been a lot of attention paid to passenger cars here lately.

So you might want to have a look at the update on the web site at the Canadian Museum of Rail Travel in Cranbrook, BC First time it has changed in many years. The 2007 report is in three parts.

They have 32 passenger cars on display; grouped in a number of Canadian Pacific train sets.

They are going to try to raise money to build a large car barn to get the whole nine yards under a shelter. This will save dollars in utility bills, paint and most important historic fabric on the equipment.

Their wooden cars are really amazing!

Ted Miles

Ted,

How about an updated link. Google takes me to a site that hasn't been updated since about 2004. As a former VIA Rail man, it is high on my list of museums that I really want to visit.

Thanks,
Kevin

Try this one:

http://www.crowsnest.bc.ca/cmrt/index.html

While much of the page seems to date from 2004, there is a link to an 2007 update of the 1992 study of preservation of the collection:



The railroad component of the Cranbrook Archives, Museum and Landmark Foundation is unique as it is striving to restore and preserve specific train sets of the region's trains.

I don't know what the Museum is organized these days. But, years ago it was dependent upon the drive of the Executive Director.

brian,

Thanks for the web address.

Yes, It was the 2007 update that I was refering to. There is a proposed design for their car display building in there somewhere.

And it is on my must see list too. How many places can you see 32 passenger cars at one place?

Ted Miles

It is, indeed, a really cool place. The take on the equipment is unique, being more interested in the inside appointments, rather than the outward appearance. As such, it may be somewhat of a disappointment to the die-hard railfan and modeler, but by the same token be of greater than usual interest to the public at large. In essence, they are preserving a series of hotels.

That tie-in with hotels goes even further, as they have saved the grand ballroom from the CPR hotel in Winnipeg, I believe, installing the old interior finish in a brand new building. My first thought was, "what a waste of resources, and dilution of purpose." But now I'm not so sure. The resulting room is available for public rental, and can serve to connect the museum to the community in a way that few other museums can.

I wish them luck, even if they did slip a couple classic Soo Line cars out from under our noses in Wisconsin. They have been managing to get GOVERNMENT MONEY to rescue cottages that are really classic railroad cars, and that can't be a bad thing. The Soo cars are significant to the Cranbrook area also, having been built for joint Soo – CPR transcontinental service, and they have a chance of being well preserved for posterity. I just hope they are able to fund the building to bring them in out of the weather

Dennis,

This passenger car fanatic is longing to get there. I love locomotives as much as anyone here, but I enjoy seeing well kept passenger cars just as much.

Ted, thanks for starting the thread. I read the entire 38 page report.

Kevin

Kevin,

As stated in the report, I think that displaying whole trains is a good thing. I hope more museums do it.

Couple that come to mind are IRM with their Nebraska Zypher and the Western Pacivic railroad Museum which is working on a California Zypher but that project has a long way to go.

Such train displays will need to have some trading among the museums to gather complete more trains.

Ted Miles

Maybe some of us will remember the impressive lecture on the restoration of the interiors of the 1929 heavyweight train that the Cranbrook Museum staff gave at one of the 1980's T.R.A.In. conferences. After that, when another 1225 volunteer and I made an auto trip to Spokane in the late 1980's, there was no doubt but that we had to divert the trip to Cranbrook. The notion of restoring an entire 1920's consist from chicken coops was too neat to resist. The restorations were as impressive as we'd been led to believe.

Even more dramatic in its way was the museum's long-range plan, tacked to the depot wall, which called for a representative CPR passenger train from each of the major carbuilding eras of the 20th century, to be restored and displayed. We uncharitably scoffed at that, but it's evident that they are well on their way to achieving this plan. The hotel interior is entirely fitting, too. Remember, as Lucius Beebe verbosely pointed out, hotels and trains were elements of a single process: long-distance travel in the pre-automotive age.

On my office wall I've got a souvenir of the trip, a reproduction poster reading,
Trans-Canada
Vita-glass Solarium
Sleeping Car Passengers Only between Montreal, Toronto, and
Vancouver
from May 12 to Sept. 28th, 1929.
A very neat piece. The Vita-glass Solarium was intended to pass healthful ultra-violet rays to the car interior.

This is not the only souvenir of our night in Cranbrook, but the story of our visit to the hotel bar operating in the abandoned sanitarium across from the former site of the train museum, and the shocking Sylvester the Cat hand-puppet episode, cannot be reprinted here owing to the standards of decency of this forum. It will suffice to say that Lucius would have felt at home. You never know what you'll find across the street from the depot in Canadian railroad towns.