The California State Railroad Museum

Memories from a pre-covid trip...

Last year I was teaching high school in California and we were sent home to conduct “distance learning” on March 13^th and my old school is still at home trying to teach and learn via the Internet. That’s getting close to a whole year. Now, this post is not about the merits of distance learning or whether students should be in the classroom during a surge in the pandemic. When I decided to share some pictures of the California State Railroad Museum I was reminded that people in professions other than hospitality and travel are having a hard time during this crisis as well. There are a good number of museum workers at home too.

What I’m saying is that there is definitely a crisis for those working in museums and historic sites. Last summer there was an article in Forbes that said that the pandemic could close up to a third of all museums in the United States. Permanently. I was struck by this statistic when I checked in on the California State Railroad Museum’s website and found out that they had been closed completely since November 2020.

I hope that with the increasing availability of vaccines and through our own mitigation efforts, we will be able to travel to historic sites and museums once again. In the meantime, let me share some pictures from a pre-COVID-19 trip to Sacramento when we were able to walk through the museum and look at some trains up close and personal.

The California State Railroad Museum is in Old Town Sacramento, just north of where Interstate 5 and 80 intersect. It’s the historic waterfront of the Sacramento River. We did a blog post about our visit to Old Town Sacramento back before the pandemic. One of the main attractions is of course the railroad museum, but there are many shops, restaurants, and other attractions for non-train enthusiasts (is there such a thing?). In the summer months, you will also find historical reenactors encamped in the state park.

Since Sacramento was the western terminus for the First Transcontinental Railroad, the museum devotes an enjoyable and educational exhibit to this feat of engineering (that would be building a railroad through the Sierra Nevada mountains in the 1860s.) I especially enjoyed the exhibit on the heyday of passenger travel. If I did not make it clear, this museum is full of trains. So you will get to not only see the trains but also climb on them and go inside them. Another exhibit I liked was the homage to toy trains and the vast collection they have on display.

The California State Railroad Museum is a first-class, fun place to visit. Very kid-friendly. It rates a place on my “places I’d go to again” list. While it is currently closed for the pandemic (which has hit California especially hard over the holidays), you can still enjoy the museum online. Visit their website and maybe like their Facebook page, which is full of great pictures. You can still support museums with a cash donation or buy something from the museum store if they are available online (which the railroad museum is). 

Just remember that hard times don’t last. And if we never had it rough, we wouldn’t know when we had it good. But for now, enjoy some pictures of trains.

Our Oregon Field Trip: Fort Clatsop

Map image from NPS

There's a number of reasons to visit Astoria, Oregon. Beautiful scenery, the Columbia River Maritime Museum, maybe go on a Goonies hunt. But for me, a big Lewis and Clark groupie, there are three historic sites to see when you go there. The first is the Lewis & Clark Interpretive Center in Cape Disappointment State Park on the Washington side of the Columbia River. There is also the Lewis & Clark Salt Cairn Historic Monument in nearby Seaside, Oregon. And the third location is, of course, Fort Clatsop just outside of Astoria and part of the Lewis & Clark National Historic Park.

Fort Clatsop was the winter encampment of the Lewis & Clark expedition from December 1805 to March 1806. The Corps of Discovery, as the expedition was called, first sighted the Pacific Ocean from Cape Disappointment. However, the explorers thought they would have better weather on the Oregon side of the river. It was here that they built a small fort. The National Park Service has built a replica fort on the site. The members of the expedition hiked from this location to the beach in today's city of Seaside to obtain salt from sea water. Today, if you are feeling adventurous, you can hike the same trail from Fort Clatsop to the monument in Seaside.

When you visit, come early in the day as this is a popular destination. There is a nice little museum and gift shop in the visitor's center. Bring a jacket, even in the summer. Because Astoria gets on average 86 inches of rain a year, even in June we had a light drizzle in the morning. Also, it is a short walk from the visitor's center to the fort. At the fort you will find docents in period costume to answer questions and give short presentations throughout the day.

The history of the Lewis & Clark expedition is well known and readily available, so I won't duplicate that here. But before you make a pilgrimage, you might want to bone up a little bit. I would of course recommend reading Undaunted Courage by Stephen Ambrose for a thorough and enjoyable background. And check out the Oregon Encyclopedia, a project of the Oregon Historical Society, for some related articles and historical records online.