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Train enthusiasts roll into Nelson for convention, exhibit

International conference coincided with Nelson museum’s history exhibit on trains in the Kootenays
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The Touchstones Museum exhibit Back on Track features a working model train from the Creston Museum from the 1980s. Photo: Bill Metcalfe

Max McCulloch has a difficult time with the question, “Why are you so passionate about trains?”

“God only knows,” he says, laughing. “That’s impossible to explain.”

Then he gets serious and thinks about it some more.

“That’s kind of like asking, ‘Why did you fall in love with your wife?’” he says.

McCulloch, from Holly Springs, Miss., is the president of the Great Northern Railway Historical Society. He was in Nelson on the weekend as part of a joint conference between his organization and the Canadian Pacific Railway Historical Society.

One of the many archival photos in the Back on Track exhibit shows a Procter-Kootenay Landing construction crew in the 1920s. Photo: Bill Metcalfe
One of the many archival photos in the Back on Track exhibit shows a Procter-Kootenay Landing construction crew in the 1920s. Photo: Bill Metcalfe

More than 200 train enthusiasts from across the continent spent the weekend in workshops, field trips, meetings, and social events, culminating in a visit to Touchstones Museum on Monday for the official opening of Back on Track, an exhibition about the history of trains in the Kootenays. The exhibit is open until Feb. 5, 2023.

“I can’t remember a time when I wasn’t fascinated with trains,” said Richard McQuade of Hamilton. “I do model trains, as well as photography of railroads and historical research on them, too. I did a book some years ago about Canadian passenger cars.”

Bill Sharpe of Toronto said he’s loved trains since the age of four.

“When I was about seven years old, I became a model railroader. But I’m fascinated with anything that is large, mechanical, industrial, as long as it’s used for peaceful purposes,” he said.

Richard McQuade (left) of Hamilton and William Sharpe of Toronto were delegates at the railway conference over the weekend in Nelson. They are shown outside Touchstones Museum at the opening of the exhibit Back on Track. Photo: Bill Metcalfe
Richard McQuade (left) of Hamilton and William Sharpe of Toronto were delegates at the railway conference over the weekend in Nelson. They are shown outside Touchstones Museum at the opening of the exhibit Back on Track. Photo: Bill Metcalfe

“People get caught in the romance of trains,” said Dave Love of Kelowna, “whether it’s the clicking and clacking of the wheels, the trains going by, the scenery that they travelled through. There are many ways to hook into it.”

The Touchstones exhibition features artifacts, photographs, maps, and other documents from museums, archives, and individuals around the region and beyond. A highlight of the exhibit is a working model train from the 1950s, which spans a nine-by-five foot table.

Tom Carr of Maple Ridge (right) representing the Great Northern Railway Historical Society, presents a plaque of appreciation to Touchstones Museum executive director Astrid Heyerdahl (left) and J.P. Stienne, the curator of the Back on Track exhibit. Photo: Bill Metcalfe
Tom Carr of Maple Ridge (right) representing the Great Northern Railway Historical Society, presents a plaque of appreciation to Touchstones Museum executive director Astrid Heyerdahl (left) and J.P. Stienne, the curator of the Back on Track exhibit. Photo: Bill Metcalfe

The exhibit emphasizes the pivotal importance of trains in the history and economy of the area and also acknowledges, in a posted statement, that “railway workers worked long, dangerous hours with crude equipment and little regard for safety standards,” and that Indigenous communities were displaced and marginalized.

The museum’s archivist J.P. Stienne, who curated the exhibit over the past four years, said the exhibit, and Nelsons’ hosting of the conference, was warmly received by the conference participants.

“There were a lot of happy people in the room,” he said.

READ MORE:

History of railways exhibit is right on track at the Nelson Museum



bill.metcalfe@nelsonstar.com

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The Back on Track exhibit features a speeder from the Nakusp Rail Society that operated as early as the 1940s out of Nelson. Photo: Bill Metcalfe


Bill Metcalfe

About the Author: Bill Metcalfe

I have lived in Nelson since 1994 and worked as a reporter at the Nelson Star since 2015.
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