Soup Supper Fundraiser, annual meeting held last Thursday
Snow and blizzard winds changed the date of the Soup Supper Fundraiser to restore the Great Northern Caboose on the tracks at the Heritage grounds, but the doors to the Welcome Center were open to friends and supporters on Thursday, February 4. And the soups – chili, green bean and ham, cheesy vegetable with bacon, chicken wild rice, cheeseburger, chicken noodle and borscht – warmed the soul. A free will offering was collected.
The fundraiser was the kick-off to a full evening that included entertainment by Aaron and Nikki Petersen of Mountain Lake, a bake sale and annual meeting .
Heritage Village Board members include President Mike Nelson (who replaced the late Alvin Dick last year), Erland Braun, Bill Baerg, Jim Crawford, Curt Fast, Harvey Buller, Jim Dick, Marilyn Feil, Martin Quintero, Betty Lou Ratzloff, Geneva Stoesz and Miranda Stoesz.
The Soup Supper Fundraiser is one of the venues through which the Heritage Village Board is raising monies to continue with the “Restore the Caboose” project. It began last summer with the sale of pins featuring a photograph of the Village’s Great Northern Caboose.
Once upon a time, the “Little Red Caboose” was the traditional “end-of-the-line” for every freight train traveling the tracks. Estimates for the restoration are approximately $10,000. Matching funds/grants for the project will also be sought.
“Back in the day,” the caboose provided shelter for crew at the end of a train, who were required for switching and shunting, and to keep a lookout for load shifting, damage to equipment and cargo or overheating axles. Designs were originally modified box cars or flatbed cars carrying a cabin, but later became specialized vehicles, with projections above or to the sides of the car so crew could observe the train from shelter. The car also served as the conductor’s office, and on long routes, included accommodation and cooking facilities.
Cabooses were used on every freight train until the 1980s, when safety laws requiring the presence of cabooses and full crews were relaxed. Developments in monitoring and safety technology, such as lineside defect detector and flashing rear-end devices (FREDs), combined with the desire for railroad companies to save money by reducing crew numbers resulted in the phasing out of caboose cars.
The Great Northern Railway caboose on the tracks at Heritage Village weights 20 tons. It served the Burlington Northern Railroad for many years and was moved to its home at Heritage Village in 1978. The local “Little Red Caboose” was listed in the Minnesota Railroad Guide in April 2001.
It sits in a perfect setting adjacent to The Depot – the original Mountain Lake Depot that was once located just south of First Avenue – and the railroad tracks – and near 10th Street.. When the Northwestern Railroad closed its southern Minnesota route in 1973, the City of St. James wanted to purchase the building for use as a depot. The Heritage House Board, however, believed the depot should remain in its home city of Mountain Lake. A trade was negotiated, and a depot from Amboy, which was heading to Mountain Lake, was instead moved to St. James. The Mountain Lake Depot indeed remained at home – albeit just shifting location a bit south and east to the site of Heritage Village.
Following are a couple photos from the Soup Supper Fundraiser:
