The Dennison Railroad Dept Museum is preparing to add the last two railroad cars to the Museum facility as they complete the final portion of a sixth phase of development. For over a decade, the Museum has been expanding and the addition of a Pullman Bed & Breakfast and Business Car will complete the expansion. Attention by Depot staff will then turn toward renovating the Museum’s six excursion coaches.
Eighty-percent of the funding for these cars is in hand, and museum officials are working to raise the final required 20% match on this Transportation Enhancement Project.
To raise the required construction dollars, the Museum is offering Window Sponsorships in the cars. Sponsors can put enlarged photographs of their loved ones in the railroad car windows.
Museum Director Wendy Zucal shares that the Museum began the process of adding photographs to the windows as they restored the cars because they wanted the cars to look lively and attractive to visitors that drove by the Museum. They have been placed in the windows to appear as passengers aboard the train. She and museum board members never realized how popular the photographs would become and the regular inquiries they would receive to put photographs in the windows.
Zucal added that the original car plans were to fill the windows with all WWII soldiers and Canteen volunteers because of Dennison’s rich Canteen History. However, they decided while that was a very important piece of Dennison’s history, that the Dennison Depot represented many different groups, all who have contributed to its success, and that each should be represented in the windows.
Current photographs include not only the 1940s soldiers, but also railroaders, Polar Express volunteers, even Santa, Mrs. Claus, local leaders who started the Depot Project and many who have been pivotal along the way. Zucal says “there are photographs of volunteers from many different museum groups in those windows.”
The photographic passengers have become a draw in themselves.
At the end of Phase V, the sponsorship of photographs was cut off due to space. Now, with the work being done on the new cars, a limited number of new windows will be available.
Participation requires an appropriate photograph of good quality that can be enlarged.
Enlargements are done by Celuch Photography and photographs are fitted to window size and installed by Museum Acrylics, both of New Philadelphia. Cost to sponsor a window is $500 per window, and will be accepted on a first come, first serve basis.
To sponsor a Train Window, contact the Dennison Depot at 740-922-6776, or depot@tusco.net.
The Pullman Bed & Breakfast will feature 7 bedrooms in original Pullman rooms and the Business Car, which mirrors and original Business Car on the Depot Platform in the 1900s, will provide a much needed dining and meeting area for groups. All will be used for school tours to share the many different aspects of railroad cars. Naming Rights on the Cars are also available.
