Generations of Ozarkers invested their lives in the Frisco Railway, the giant operation once headquartered in Springfield that employed thousands of people along the rails.
That legacy is largely in the past, but a group of dedicated volunteers help keep the story alive through the Railroad Historical Museum, a destination in Grant Beach Park that features photos and artifacts from railroad history, vintage train cars, a replica depot and Frisco Locomotive No. 4524, the last of its kind to be built by the famed railway.
The nonprofit volunteer-led museum is free to visit, although its leaders gratefully accept donations to help cover expenses for upkeep.
Bill Heiss and Dan Dawson help lead the Railroad Historical Museum at Grant Beach Park.
“I want people to leave with the understanding that Springfield grew because of the railroad and it had a great influence on the city itself,” says Dan Dawson, vice president of the Railroad Historical Museum of Grant Beach Park. “If you didn't work for the railroad, you were related to, or you knew someone, who did.”
And even though it’s much smaller than it once was in scope, that railroad history is part of an ongoing story.
“They don't have the people, and trains are getting more efficient, and there's a lot more automation — but there's still quite a big footprint here in Springfield,” he says.
Springfield’s Frisco legacy
Springfield's passenger depot, presumably soon after its construction in 1926. It’s one of several railroad-related landmarks in the city’s past. (Courtesy of the Springfield-Greene County Library District)
While the museum represents general railroad history, it fundamentally ties to the Frisco, an industry that helped make Springfield the city it is today.
“The Frisco was particularly influential to the Springfield, Missouri, area because its operational center was located there for many years,” notes information on the Missouri Secretary of State’s website. “This included headquarters, major assembly and repair shops, and support activities of all kinds.
“The Frisco was the major employer and the key to twentieth century development in the area. Ozarks residents became trades people, office workers, executives, depot workers and operating personnel. Employees relied on the Frisco for employment and local business relied on the Frisco employees for their livelihood.”
In Springfield, that role extended beyond employment. The railway system had its own hospital from 1899 to 1922, and developed some of the city’s first parks.
A variety of historical items are on display at the museum.
The railway was still going strong in the 1950s when Frisco Locomotive No. 4524 rolled – literally – to a stop in the park in 1953.
The once-in-a-lifetime trip came after Springfield requested a locomotive. The giant steam locomotives, once the workhorses of America, had been rendered obsolete after the railway switched to diesel power.
“Old 4524 is all spruced up and is waiting at the Frisco West Shops to make its final run,” noted the Springfield Daily News in August 1953. “Of the latest class operated by the Frisco before the era of diesels, 4524 will be an especially prized gift for Springfield.”
The 10-day trip to the park was a massive undertaking. Frisco-led railroaders used temporary sections of track to inch the locomotive, which was powered by compressed air instead of steam, to the park.
“Weighing over 820,000 pounds, it will be run over tracks laid from the west shops to the park,” noted the Springfield Leader and Press in October 1953 on the engine’s pending trip. “After it rolls over one section of track, that section will be taken up and placed on ahead of the engine.”
Even more change arrived about three decades later, when – after several years of negotiations and approvals – the Frisco was merged into the Burlington Northern railroad system in 1980.
“We first viewed the proposed merger with mixed emotions – just as we view the final approval,” noted an editorial in the Springfield Leader and Press in April 1980 on the merger. “We cannot argue with the decision of management of both the Frisco and the Burlington Northern that certain economies now will be possible that were impossible under the old order. The merger should ensure greater financial stability for both lines.
“We are reluctant to cheer the merger wholeheartedly because we hate to see the Frisco, with its historic past, lose its identity. We truly felt the Frisco was a part of Springfield and Springfield a part of the Frisco.”
Establishing a museum
Displays fill the replica depot and train cars at the Railroad Historical Museum of Grant Beach Park. There are photos, memorabilia, maps and more.
By that time, things had changed in other ways, too. Vandalism and age had come to the locomotive landmark. That reality – perhaps combined with post-Frisco sentiments – led to action.
Locals, still many whose lives and families were intertwined with the Frisco, decided something needed to be done: The locomotive was moved to another part of the park, restored, and a museum established.
“As old as we’re getting and the way things are going with the railroad in this town nowadays, we’re probably the last group of railroad men who’ll ever try to get this thing done,” said Gail Summers, a former railroader, in the Sunday Leader and Press in 1986. “And if we don’t get it done, this old engine will probably rust away and there never will be a railroad museum in Springfield.”
Thankfully, his prophecy came to pass. The locomotive was restored, security increased, and a museum did officially open. Later, a Burlington baggage car, a Chicago and Northwestern bilevel commuter car and a Burlington Northern caboose were also added.
It was about 30 years after Summers said those words when I made my first visit to the museum in 2015. There I met Max Jahn, a museum volunteer who had a career with the famed railway from the late 1940s to 1985.
I asked him about his story and memories of working for the Frisco, a journey that began in St. Louis before taking him to Springfield in the early ‘50s as a clerk secretary to the master mechanic.
“It was just a proud thing to work for (them),” Max told me of the Frisco, and he said that the salary rate, insurance and hospitalization were substantial benefits.
It was such a great place to work that when employees were laid off (a term which, according to Max, originated with the railroad), many simply took part-time jobs while waiting to be rehired. “The minute the railroad called them back, they jumped at it,” he says.
“Once they see it, they just can’t believe it,” he told me about the train museum. “It’s amazing how many people don’t even know it’s here. (They) live in Springfield and have lived here for years, and they don’t even know we’ve got a museum.”
Max Jahn is remembered as one of the museum’s leaders
Max died in September 2015, just a few months after our conversation. I was glad I got the chance to visit with him, and it made me smile when I went back to the depot a few weeks ago and saw the photo I took of him on display as one of the museum’s former leaders.
Visiting the museum today
The Max Jahn Depot, a replica of a depot in the Ozarks community of Ellsinore, was completed in 2017.
In the decade since my last visit, work has not stopped. Even though the volunteers change as railway employees pass away, the group – which spans folks with direct Frisco connections to general railroad enthusiasts – has continued growing the museum.
“We have a lot of families come through here because of our interactive museum,” Dawson says. “You get up in a locomotive, you could pull the levers and everything, ring the bell beside the train, all that kind of stuff.”
In 2017, the Max Jahn Depot opened to visitors. Built based on depot design in Ellsinore, a small community in Carter County, Missouri, it shows visitors what a depot would have looked like in years gone by.
Between the depot, cars and locomotive — which visitors can see up close — there are many items on display: From Frisco-branded memorabilia to photos and artifacts like date nails.
“When they replace the ties — that the rails would sit on — they would take a date nail and hammer it into the end of the tie and show the date that the tie was placed,” says Heiss, the museum’s president. “It was a way to keep track of when the ties need to be replaced again.”
They also have visitors from outside the area who are coming through looking for things railroad-related to see and do.
“We have people tour the country that see us in magazines or other ways we tried to get the word out, and they come here,” Dawson says, giving an example of a recent visit of a handful of guys who made an appointment to see the museum. “People like me who like trains, whenever you go someplace, you check out all the ‘rail’ things.”
Today, volunteers open the museum most Saturdays between May and October between 2 and 4 p.m. They also host birthday parties and events for a modest fee.
While it’s free to visit, museum leaders gratefully accept donations to help cover its expenses and keep the story going – a mission not unlike that of the people who started the museum years ago.
“The railroad may not be a big part of Springfield in years to come,” noted one man in the 1980s via a Springfield newspaper article. “But we all have children and grandchildren, and we want the next generations to realize that this once was a great railroad town. We’re proud of our roots…”
Want to learn more?
Connect with the Railroad Historical Museum of Grant Beach Park online or via its Facebook page.
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