On Saturday, April 20, Dwight Maxey, Colin Mellin, Bruce Davis, Chris Pollard, Polly Cotton, Dannis Hudson, Henry Falko, Abel Erber and Paul Brown learned how to change plans on the fly! Our original goal was to work on our Hi-Rail truck and remove the rear wheels to check on a flat tire. Well, we had all the tools ready, the air compressor fired up and supplying air for the impact wrench, and found out the socket we have is a 12 point and it slipped on the lug nut! Just more of the PRF luck hard at work!

So, change of plans goes into action. Dannis, Henry and Abel were reassigned to spike patrol out on our main running track. They grabbed spike mauls and spent some quality time checking and driving down loose spikes. This is a chore that needs to get done, so it was worth their effort.

Bruce, Chris and Polly jumped on the most important work at the Museum…cleaning up weeds! While this was happening, Dwight and Paul found some Elm tree sprouts and were digging those out. The team got near our fence and found an area of the old fence that needed repaired, so the crew transitioned to that task. While this was happening, Colin was checking some tool stores for a proper wheel lug socket, with no luck. He returned and began doing some equipment maintenance, and assisting with the fence. The fence repair ran well into the afternoon, and resulted in a late lunch break.

After lunch, the crew did some clean up work and looked at a track issue that has developed at the back door to the shop. More on that in the future.

I have included a few pictures of the work that was accomplished today.

– Paul

On Saturday, April 13, volunteers Dwight Maxey, Kendall Crouch, Bruce Davis, Chris Pollard, Colin Mellin, Abel Erber and Paul Brown braved the great weather and accomplished a lot of little tasks. Bruce, Kendall and Abel worked on the D&RGW caboose windows and interior trim, to get things buttoned up on that project. They also worked on installing a crossing sign on our Wig Wag signal. Meanwhile, Chris and Dwight worked on some upgrades to our battery charger cables. After a quick lunch, the entire crew helped work on the Wig Wag signal operations, with some new wires being installed to the magnets inside, and adjusting the bell. There was also some more clean up work done around the yard.

I have included a few pictures of the action today, along with some pictures of some yard cleanup work performed by Bruce Davis on Thursday the 11th. Keep an eye out for more Museum activity in the coming months as we’ll have some larger projects get started, and of course our event schedule grows larger in summer months.

– Paul

Photos by Paul Brown and Bruce Davis

On Saturday, April 6, volunteers Dwight Maxey, Colin Mellin, Kendall Crouch, Bruce Davis, Chris Pollard and Paul Brown braved high winds strong enough to blow your hard hat clean off your head and down the street about a block!! Luckily, our planned work was mostly indoors, but we were not completely spared. Our first work involved cleaning the back area of our shop where we had a slight oil spill from storing used oil in skimpy plastic containers. In addition to cleaning the oil, we cleaned up a lot more junk, dirt and dust from the area, and stuffed the already 3/4 full 3 yd dumpster we have on site. Yes, a little Spring cleaning happened!

After a lunch break, we split up and tackled a couple different projects. Bruce, Kendall and Colin worked to figure out the cupola window problem in our Rio Grande caboose. Though this car looks pretty good, it is old, and thus has problems with moving parts and such. After about an hour of effort, they had the windows operating better, but found even more issues that will need a little attention in the near future. Chris and Dwight did some work to the wiring for a set of connectors on our locomotive battery charger to improve the hook-ups for the jump batteries on the ground. Paul was spotted walking over to the Depot display area to find other problems that will need attention in the future.

Except for the hurricane force winds, we had a productive day.

– Paul

Photos by Paul Brown and Chris Pollard

On Saturday, March 30, volunteers Ron Roach, John McDowell, Jackie Anzlovar, Dwight Maxey, Colin Mellin, Kendall Crouch, Bruce Davis, Chris Pollard, Dannis Hudson, Bryan Tong and Paul Brown were surprised by the number of guests that found their way to our train rides despite the road closure at Victoria and B Street! We had better than 150 guests who took a ride on our train and even got to see the elusive Easter Bunny. The weather was great, BNSF was running plenty of trains, and everyone was enjoying themselves.

I was able to catch a few pictures of today’s activities despite that we were hopping around quite a bit!

– Paul

The Pueblo Railway Museum is excited to kick off our 2024 train ride season with our Easter Bunny Express train rides on Saturday, March 30. Train rides will be available from 11AM to 3PM behind the Pueblo Union Depot. Train ride tickets are $15 for a ride in the engine, and $10 for a ride in one of the cabooses. Children under 2 ride the train free! Cash or check only, please. Train ride tickets can only be purchased during the event. Purchase your tickets at our Gift Shop, a converted caboose behind the Depot, near the passenger boarding area. Trains depart every 20 minutes, including loading and unloading time, so the train ride itself is about 10-15 minutes.

Our Easter-themed “Bunny Hutch” will be open for viewing, and we will have a special circus train on display, both free of charge.

There is no admission fee to attend the event itself. The charge is only for the train ride.

The latest event schedule can be found on our Events Page. To receive updates about our upcoming events, follow our blog. Enter your email address on the bottom of this webpage, and click the “follow” button.

On Saturday, March 23, volunteers Dwight Maxey, Colin Mellin, Kendall Crouch, Bruce Davis, Dannis Hudson and Paul Brown worked to get Engine 104 started and checked out for next weekend’s event. After setting up the jump batteries, and following Dwight’s work to charge those batteries several times earlier in the week, we had a successful start on the locomotive. While waiting for the engine to warm up, the group worked to remove batteries from Engine 103. We are in the process of replacing batteries on engine 104 and two of the batteries on Engine 103 are pretty new and will be used as part of the replacement set. Engine 103 will be out of service for an undetermined time, so it was best to remove all the batteries for now. The group then moved Engine 103 onto another of the shop tracks to keep it out of the way for future operations this season.

The crew took a quick lunch break, and then got back to work cleaning up the batteries that we scattered all over, and then did some minor work on Engine 104, including replacing a brake shoe on the number 3 axle and working on the bell. Then we spent some time running the train set around on our running track and checking out equipment operation.

I have included a few pictures of today’s work.

– Paul

On Saturday, March 16, volunteers Dwight Maxey, Colin Mellin, Bruce Davis, Chris Pollard, Kendall Crouch and Paul Brown started by setting up the battery charger again on our jump battery set to get them ready to use. We then went to work on our cabooses to make sure they are ready for our first event in two weeks. We made sure we had wood to burn for heat, and that things were cleaned up inside. The C&W caboose got some extra attention, as we prepare to rebuild cupola seating into this car, making it a little more passenger friendly. We checked on the battery charging and found that the jump set showed 100% complete, so we set the charger up to hit the batteries onboard Engine 104. We then took lunch.

We spent the afternoon looking over some of our other equipment, and catching a few odds and ends tasks that we came across. We checked on the battery charger for a second time and found that it had completed its charge cycle on Engine 104. As it was getting late in the afternoon, we tied up for the day.

I have included a few pictures of Saturday’s action, as well as some photos of some excellent cleanup work done by Bruce Davis on March 12.

– Paul

Photos by Paul Brown and Bruce Davis

On Saturday, March 9, volunteers Dwight Maxey, Colin Mellin, Bruce Davis, Chris Pollard, Dannis Hudson, Polly Cotton and Paul Brown worked on several projects, the first being one of the most important jobs at the Museum, cleaning up blown in tumbleweeds. While it doesn’t seem important, it greatly improves the looks of the Museum grounds. While that work was being done, we were also charging the locomotive batteries in hope that we can start Engine 104 come the end of the month for the Easter event. When the weed cleanup was completed, we did some work on our Hi-Rail truck, and then took a lunch break.

After lunch, we decided to take a look at our Wig Wag Crossing signal and see if we could figure out why the bell wasn’t very loud and the target wasn’t swinging fully. A few volunteers were able to get up to the mechanism to clean dirt and bugs out of the housing, adjust the gong bell so it now rings louder, and find a way to adjust a pair of contacts to allow for a larger swing arc for the target. We wrapped up the day by doing some measuring in the C&W Caboose for some future work.

Here are a few pictures of the crew in action.

– Paul

On Saturday, March 2, volunteers Dwight Maxey, Colin Mellin, Kendall Crouch, Bruce Davis and Paul Brown dug in and cleaned out a few thousand cubic feet of blown in tumbleweeds from the collection area by Union Depot. Mother Nature’s wind is always nice to the Museum and drops off the weeds and manages to get them wedged in the most unbelievable spots under and around our freight and passenger cars! The crew stopped for lunch after the morning spent cleaning up.

After noticing that the lock hasp on our portable toilet still had not been repaired since the holiday events in December, we decided it was high time to get that fixed. Back in December, someone decided the lock hasp looked better removed from the door of the unit, and luckily the parts were all still there. We can once again lock up the toilet so unwanted visitors don’t trash it.

Lastly, it was reported to us that the C&W Caboose #3 cupola windows were about ready to fall out. After a little investigating, it was found that they were quite easy to remove for repairs, and we found some material to slide into the window frames to cover the holes. We will be working to repair the window frames and get things back to normal as fast as we can. The crew wrapped up work around 5:30 and headed home.

Here are a few pictures highlighting today’s work.

– Paul