Transportation Tuesday: The B & O Railroad Museum

RL Fifield 2009.

A fantastic collection in an incredible building tell the epic story of the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad. The 1884 Roundhouse that serves as the centerpiece of the museum complex sits on the site the birthplace of American railroading, the ground dedicated to that purpose since 1829. The museum celebrates technology, travel, and business, and its quietness is a memorial to the shrinkage of the passenger rail industry and the shift of freight handling out of the city center.

RL Fifield 2009.

I love the hulking massiveness of the 1930s steam engines in the North Shop, the dinner china, the elegant lounge cars, the scene passing by the window. We threw it all away for the speed of flight and a bag of peanuts.

 

 

 

RL Fifield 2009.

In 2003, the Roundhouse ceiling collapsed under the weight of an ice storm. As several engines and cars sit within the roundhouse, the damage from the collapse was significant. The museum has renovated the ceiling, and those objects that are damaged are fenced off from the public with Plexi-glass walls. Signs with the price tag of restoration sit nearby, with photographs of the objects enveloped in snow from that awful morning.