The Nevada Northern Railway Museum is a railroad museum and

heritage railroad A heritage railway or heritage railroad (U.S. usage) is a railway operated as living history to re-create or preserve railway scenes of the past. Heritage railways are often old railway lines preserved in a state depicting a period (or periods) ...

located in Ely, Nevada, owned by the State of Nevada and operated by a historic foundation dedicated to the preservation of the

Nevada Northern Railway The Nevada Northern Railway was a railroad in the U.S. state of Nevada, built primarily to reach a major copper producing area in White Pine County, Nevada. The railway, constructed in 1905–06, extended northward about from Ely, Nevada, Ely to ...

. Museum activities include restoration and operation of historic railroad equipment and various hands on experiences and a variety of special events including seasonal trains for Halloween and Santa-themed trains for Christmas. This is one of the few places in the world where visitors can actually operate a steam locomotive, but this experience requires some advanced planning.

Location and history

The museum is situated at the East Ely Yards, which are part of the

. The site is listed on the

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the Federal government of the United States, United States federal government's official United States National Register of Historic Places listings, list of sites, buildings, structures, Hist ...

as the Nevada Northern Railway East Ely Yards and Shops and is also known as the "Nevada Northern Railway Complex". The rail yards were designated a

National Historic Landmark District A National Historic Landmark District (NHLD) is a geographical area that has received recognition from the United States Government that the buildings, landscapes, cultural features and archaeological resources within it are of the highest signific ...

on September 27, 2006. The site was cited as one of the best-preserved early 20th-century railroad yards in the nation, and a key component in the growth of the region's

copper mining Copper extraction is the multi-stage process of obtaining copper from list of copper ores, its ores. The conversion of copper ores consists of a series of physical, chemical, and electrochemical processes. Methods have evolved and vary with coun ...

industry. Developed in the first decade of the 20th century, it served passengers and freight until 1983, when the Kennecott Copper Company, its then-owner, donated the yard to a local non-profit for preservation. The property came complete with all of the company records of the Nevada Northern from its inception.

Collection

The museum collection includes three of the railroad's original

steam locomotive A steam locomotive is a locomotive that provides the force to move itself and other vehicles by means of the expansion of steam. It is fuelled by burning combustible material (usually coal, Fuel oil, oil or, rarely, Wood fuel, wood) to heat ...

s, an

electric locomotive An electric locomotive is a locomotive powered by electricity from overhead lines, a third rail or on-board energy storage such as a Battery (electricity), battery or a supercapacitor. Locomotives with on-board fuelled prime mover (locomotive), ...

and several diesel-electric locomotives, as well as a collection of maintenance equipment and numerous historic freight and passenger rail cars. Two of the steam locomotives, #81 and #93, are in operation in regularly scheduled events throughout the year; with #40 currently out of service for an overhaul. Locomotive #40 is the official State Locomotive of Nevada. The museum also maintains an extensive fleet of its original rolling stock, including passenger cars, wood-side box cars, ore cars, and work trains, all dating from the 1910s. It has the oldest operating tank car and the oldest operating coal-fired steam crane on any American railroad. During the

2002 Winter Olympics The 2002 Winter Olympics, officially the XIX Olympic Winter Games and commonly known as Salt Lake 2002 (; Gosiute dialect, Gosiute Shoshoni: ''Tit'-so-pi 2002''; ; Shoshoni language, Shoshoni: ''Soónkahni 2002''), were an international wi ...

, held in

Salt Lake City Salt Lake City, often shortened to Salt Lake or SLC, is the capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Utah. It is the county seat of Salt Lake County, the most populous county in the state. The city is the core of the Salt Lake Ci ...

, the Nevada Northern Railway was part of the ''Olympic Steam Team'', carrying spectators to the Soldier Hollow Olympic venue on the Heber Valley Railroad; with locomotive #93 sent to Utah to participate. The day prior to the Opening Ceremony of the games, #93 joined Heber's two steam locomotives in a triple-headed train, and used to transport the Olympic flame from Soldier Hollow to Heber City, Utah as part of the torch relay. In late October 2020, locomotive #40 was taken out of service for its

Federal Railroad Administration The Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) is an agency in the United States Department of Transportation (DOT). The agency was created by the Department of Transportation Act of 1966. The purpose of the FRA is to promulgate and enforce railroa ...

(FRA) mandated 1,472-day inspection and overhaul. 2-8-0 #81 returned to service in September 2021, after undergoing a boiler test in 2020. Also in storage at the museum is Steptoe Valley Mining & Smelting #3, a H.K. Porter, Inc. steam locomotive which was used at the McGill smelter and had a brief preservation career on the early Niles Canyon Railway.

Depot building

The ''East Ely Depot'' served passengers on the Nevada Northern. The Mission Revival style depot was designed by Frederick Hale and built in 1907. It reflects a standardized vernacular that borrows primarily from the

Mission Revival The Mission Revival style was part of an architectural movement, beginning in the late 19th century, for the revival and reinterpretation of American colonial styles. Mission Revival drew inspiration from the late 18th and early 19th century ...

style, as well as from

Renaissance Revival Renaissance Revival architecture (sometimes referred to as "Neo-Renaissance") is a group of 19th-century architectural revival styles which were neither Greek Revival nor Gothic Revival but which instead drew inspiration from a wide range of ...

. The two story depot is set on a stone foundation. The ground floor is rusticated stone, separated from the upper level by a painted stone belt course, with a

stucco Stucco or render is a construction material made of aggregates, a binder, and water. Stucco is applied wet and hardens to a very dense solid. It is used as a decorative coating for walls and ceilings, exterior walls, and as a sculptural and ...

ed second story. The gables are curvilinear in the accepted Mission Revival style. The well-preserved interior retains separate men's and women's waiting rooms, with baggage and express rooms. Offices are on the second floor. The depot was a significant location on the Nevada Northern as the chief embarkation point for the

copper Copper is a chemical element; it has symbol Cu (from Latin ) and atomic number 29. It is a soft, malleable, and ductile metal with very high thermal and electrical conductivity. A freshly exposed surface of pure copper has a pinkish-orang ...

mining region of White Pine County. The location of the depot was a matter of controversy between the railroad and residents of Ely, who successfully sued the railroad to change the depot's name from Ely to East Ely to reflect its distance from the main townsite. The railroad, originally owned by the Nevada Consolidated Copper Company, was transferred to the Kennecott Copper Company in 1933 when it took over Consolidated's mining operations. Passenger service on the Nevada Northern stopped in 1941, and the depot was used for Kennecott offices until 1985. The state of Nevada acquired the depot in 1990 for the museum. The East Ely Depot was listed on the

in 1984.

Heritage Railroad

The museum & Ely City own the entire original Nevada Northern Railway route, however only a small segment from Ruth to Ely is currently in use by the railroad for the tourist trains; plans to reopen the line to McGill were announced on October 14, 2021, by way of a $10 million federal grant. Another isolated segment connecting to the Union Pacific mainline at Shafter, Nevada is used for car storage.

In popular culture

The depot building was used for scenes in the 2001 film, ''

Rat Race A rat race is a metaphor used to describe an endless, self-defeating, or pointless pursuit. The phrase is sometimes used to relate the human life to that of rats attempting to earn an ultimately pointless reward when Mortality salience, death ...

''. The museum appeared in a 2010 episode of '' Modern Marvels'', titled "Super Steam." The museum also appeared in six episodes of '' American Restoration'', and was referenced in a 2017 episode of ''

The Big Bang Theory ''The Big Bang Theory'' is an American television sitcom created by Chuck Lorre and Bill Prady for CBS. It aired from September 24, 2007, to May 16, 2019, running for 12 seasons and 279 episodes. The show originally centered on five charact ...

''. The Railroad's locomotive #40 was featured prominently in the 2017 J-pop music video "Black Train" by artists Tsuyoshi Nagabuchi
with the artist riding the front of the locomotive while singing
In 1987, Number 40 appeared in the Made-For-Television movie: Once Upon A Texas Train starring country singer Willie Nelson which was broadcast on the CBS TV network in early January of 1988, Albeit in the opening & closing credits. Over the Years, some of the equipment at the museum was shown in several episodes of the History Channel's Reality Show: American Restoration. In 2019
the railroad's shop cat "Dirt"
went viral after photos of him were posted online by professional photographer Steve Crise. Born in 2008, the cat has been named the railroad's mascot. Dirt passed away on January 10, 2023. The museum announced the cat's death publicly the following day along with plans to place two bronze statues of Dirt on site, with one near the cat's grave site, and one in the machine shop where the cat lived.

References

External links

East Ely Railroad Depot Museum websiteNevada Northern Railway Museum website
{{authority control 1905 establishments in Nevada Buildings and structures in White Pine County, Nevada Great Basin National Heritage Area Heritage railroads in Nevada Historic districts on the National Register of Historic Places in Nevada Museums in White Pine County, Nevada National Historic Landmarks in Nevada National Register of Historic Places in White Pine County, Nevada Railroad museums in Nevada Railroad-related National Historic Landmarks Railway stations in the United States opened in 1905 Railway stations on the National Register of Historic Places in Nevada Transport infrastructure completed in 1905 Rail infrastructure on the National Register of Historic Places in Nevada Former railway stations in Nevada