By Staff
June 21st, 2021
BURLINGTON, ON
Friends of Freeman Station, the not-for-profit charity in Burlington (Ontario) run by volunteers working together to preserve a 1906 Grand Trunk Railway Station, have added a caboose and a box car to their rolling stock.
The boxcar is believed to have been in service when Burlington farmers would take their produce down to the station to be loaded on to trains and delivered to Toronto and Montreal.
First to arrive was the Boxcar – Canadian Pacific #404109. Weighing in at LT WT 43,000, it is green in colour with white lettering.
Boxcar – Canadian Pacific # 404109.
The wooden walls are in excellent shape as is the steel roof.
Then CN caboose #78188 arrived. Built in October 1929, records indicate it is AAR class NE Caboose type M930 built of wood by CN Transcona.
Until recently both railcars were on display at Memory Junction in Brighton Ontario, a railway park for visitors at the site of the old Brighton Railway Station.
CN caboose # 78188
Brighton is located between Cobourg and Trenton and sits on the CN and CP lines originally laid in the 1850s and are still used daily.
Memory Junction had to close in 2020 due to various reasons and all the displays were removed at auction in October 2020.
Prior to Brighton – these cars were on display in Trenton Ontario. Before that, the caboose was displayed at Doon Pioneer Village in Kitchener in the 1990s.
The cars will be placed on the new track that has been laid immediately to the north/west side of the Freeman Station building.
Brought into the Freeman Station by a team of horses pulling a wagon to be loaded onto boxcars for delivery to Toronto and Montreal. Some of the better produce was transported to Europe.
After some work is done inside and out the cars will be open to the public to visit. These cars give the charity more much needed room to display the artifacts and stories they have accumulated.
Once the COVID restrictions are lifted visitors can see the city’s newest tourist attraction joining the Joseph Brant Museum, Ireland House and the Pier – must see Burlington locations.
Funding for the acquisition, transport and set up of the cars was provided by member donations as well as a large donation from one of their sponsors.
In the 1960’s I worked at Jackson’s on King Street in East Hamilton. Sweet cherries were one of the main crops and I can remember putting wood lids on the baskets just like in the pictures. They were shipped from the CNR station on James Street North in Hamilton to Max Botner and Sons in Montreal.