I guess this still goes here instead of railfanning (it really belongs in Flimsies); anyway, it's history, in the form of an interview with a former trolley motorman:

http://www.theintelligencer.net/page/co ... ml?nav=515

We saw his presentation a couple of years ago and I'm glad the library got video. He was full of great stories, had a ton of photos and really knows his stuff. Son thought the best part was getting his autograph on the program...with his punch, of course. I wish he'd write the book he was threatening. He doesn't look, sound or act 92, but he is.

Thanks for sharing. This is a huge part of history that largely get lost while everyone is focused more tactile parts of railroading.

Seashore has a wonderfully renovated Wheeling car that the town would like back. The educational value to Wheeling young folks would be tremendous. In Maine its educational value is small compared to a New England trolley car, which they have many. Unfortunately the Seashore Board is very possessive/selfish, i.e. collectors not educators. 501(c)3 be damned. The car runs and Seashore can hardly keep enough of its 100+ rotting trolleys running to meet the daily operating need.

I find this lack of interest in educating the correct folks about the history of their local mass transit system very sad.

Ideas to wake the Seashore Board up would be appreciated?

It was my understanding that Seashore was a national collection of streetcars, interurbans and rapid transit cars, but with a focus on New England. Is this a correct understanding? If that is the case, the 501(c)(3) is not dammed, but part of a larger focus. Just because a museum is located in one geogrpahic area does not limit their collection. What limits their collection are the mission statement, collections policy and other important policy documents that every museum should have and follow.

That dastardly Seashore board! How dare they decide to keep an artifact that they acquired, possess raised funds for and completely restored with their own volunteer, contractor and/or paid labor! They should just immediately turn it over to Wheeling, pull it out of the barn, where it sits inside, and throw it on a flatbed! In fact, we should just enact a national policy that we can tell other museums to give up equiment we think should be in other places. I hereby propose that Lackawanna 97.....

The reason for that momentary outburst was to point out how ridiculous it is to keep wishing other museums, ones we aren't often involved with (at least in a decision-making capacity) would manage their collections to our liking. This usually entails them deaccessioning a piece from the collection that either we covet, or think would be "better off" in its home.

Seashore, even with its alledged problems, provides indoor shelter for the car, and its restoration will likely last longer than any potential use in Wheeling.

Thanks, David. I completely agree.

It is a rotting away collection of some wonderful traction vehicles from across the country. And I use your word "collection" and not "museum" because most of the collection is totally inaccessible to Seashore's visitors and will be until it disappears. Being a volunteer there gave me an inside look at pieces of U.S. urban transportation history that mother nature is reclaiming. The Maine salt air is destroying the collection. I'm suggesting that many of the cars could find far better homes in their hometown because Seashore has no resources to save most of its collection.

I picked the Wheeling car because the thread started about a Wheeling motorman and because Wheeling actually went to Seashore and asked for the car. David and Art, please go there and pick another car that is out back still in a good enough condition to be renovated and tell me it wouldn't be better to send it to its hometown's historical society. It has no value to at Seashore.

As for the Wheeling car, since Seashore put so much effort into it, I think Seashore should quote Wheeling a reasonable price and use the money to renovate another car. And another car is thus saved!

Questions for Marty:

How do you compensate someone who has spent 20 or so years as a volunteer restoring a car?

What financial resources and expertise does this unnamed Wheeling organization have to properly house and operate the car? Much of the restoration effort was to find and restore electrical and mechanical equipment to take the car from a body to an operating car, so static display wold be a waste.

The thing is...if it's the city of Wheeling, the recent government has a bad track record of holding onto anything historic. It's quite a catalog of destruction lately, from Mount deChantal to several blocks of Victorian houses, and the future of the NPS Heritage Area is in doubt because so much of historic value is gone. The Capitol Music Hall survived by the skin of its teeth after the city closed it and planned to tear it down. Several other landmarks look as if they're no longer being maintained. I can imagine the city government making noise about wanting the trolley back, but I can't imagine they had any real plans to pay for it or take care of it, let alone try to build even the downtown loop back to run it. The caboose at Heritage Port sat there rusting until the city decided to scrap it, then the Toy ad Train Museum hauled it out to its property in Elm Grove. I assume the same thing would happen to the trolley--a big celebration, a few months of sitting out in the open at the port, a couple of years of neglect and a "we need rid of this thing right now, so let's declare it an emergency and call in the scrappers."

If it's a private group wanting the trolley, that might--might--be different, but without the government's cooperation it would have to be a display piece. Numerous people have tried to get rail-related things going in town, but none have gne anywhere.

If that car should have to leave its present home, it should be up at PA Trolley Museum where it would be properly stored, maintained and run.

For the information of readers who are unfamiliar with the area, the Pennsylvania Trolley Museum is only 30 miles from Wheeling.

Given the description of Wheeling government by Becky Morgan, I'm surprised a representative of the city went to Seashore and asked for the car arguing it was their car. Conversely I am quite sure Seashore will take excellent care of the car. My suggestion that if Wheeling paid a reasonable amount for it Seashore could renovate another car.

I accept that the Wheeling cars was a poor choice to make my point. My overall point is many cars at Seashore need homes and for a large number, if they don't find homes they will become beyond renovation, i.e., cost prohibitive or so little of the fabric of the car is left that an essentially new car would emerge. I further wonder how many have crossed that line in the last decade. How many will in the next decade? We are loosing urban transportation history. And that's stupid.

The stash of inaccessible cars rotting and corroding away in the moist Maine salt air serve no educational purpose, thus my 501(c)3 be damned statement. They are not part of the museum.

My understanding, from talking with members and/or officials of other trolley museums, is that offers have been extended to Seashore to purchase, "reclaim" or "repatriate" pieces they have and are not restoring for more "appropriate" locations, that the majority of the membership approves of the ideas presented, but that a smaller bloc of members holding vastly larger numbers of votes have blocked such actions.

This supposed aspect of STM management has been discussed in this forum before, as I recall.

Yes it has been discussed. Discussion does not solve the problem. How do we solve the problem of a part of our urban transportation history disappearing before our eyes because of a few selfish collectors without the resources to even display the artifacts much less protect them.

You describe Seashore correctly. The organization is an aristocracy not a democracy.

So how do we solve the problem?

What problem? In whose perspective?

Each museum, or collection, has the right to set their own goals and to reach those goals by means they deem appropriate.

Trying to manage the affairs of another group by "suggestions" is interference, seldom welcome and even less often useful.

Put your effort into your own group/museum/collection and the world will better off.

Marty,

Even though it is a 501(c)(3), Seashore is a private museum, and not subject to the whims of the posters on this board, or elsewhere.

Aristocracy or not, we can bloviate all we want here, and it will have no effect. This "public shaming" you are doing will probably have the opposite effect of what you propose.

If you are really concerned about the direction Seashore or any other museum is taking, I'd recomend the following:

1. Pack your bags, return to Maine, as a full-time volunteer. End your boomer days.
2. Become a member of Seashore, esepcially one with voting power.
3. Work within the organization to bring change, rally other members to support your goals and visions.
4. Be an active member, concerned not only with the equipment, but the long term health and viability of the organization.
5. Read up on non-profit management, fundraising, endowments, etc. Offer to help the museum in these areas.
6. Be suspicious of alleged city officials who claim that a particular piece of equipment is "theirs" and demand its return. (I don't think Wheeling was a municipal system when streetcars ran there).
7. Suggest to volunteers who have been working 5-10-15 or more years on a restoration that the musuem should sell their hard work to fund other projects. Watch and learn from their reactions. (You might need quick reflexes for this, otherwise do at own risk.)

The problem with the internet is that people confuse advertising-style "awareness" with action. We can sit here and be aware of Seashore's alleged issues, but it won't do a darn thing about it. If it is your passion, however, Marty, then head back to Maine.

David Wilkins
Soapbox, MO