SEE AND HEAR MORE TO ACCESS an audio slideshow of Boothbay Railway Village, go to: www.pressherald.com.
ABOUT THIS SERIES MAINE: SEE IT LIKE A TOURIST offers a sketch of some of the state's tourist spots, many of which Mainers recommend to out- of-state visitors but never visit themselves. THE SERIES WILL RUN through the summer in the Maine Sunday Telegram.
At Boothbay Railway Village on a recent afternoon, my two older granddaughters -- Brigit and Maeve Ratliff, ages 8 and 11, of South Portland -- thoroughly enjoyed themselves, but not necessarily in the way I had expected they would.
But this working museum lets you have fun in a great many ways, and can accidentally make you learn a little bit at the same time.
Ideally we would have gone to the Railway Village on a different day. Thomas the Tank Engine was visiting the day we were there, and Thomas is aimed at preschoolers. But with busy schedules, it was a day that worked for all of us.
We could ignore Thomas. We just had to share the village with what Maureen Stormont, administrative assistant for the Railway Village, said were 1,500 visitors for Thomas instead of the normal weekday summer attendance of 150 to 200 people.
The first thing the girls did when we entered the village was climb into the two inflated bounce houses on the grounds. Stormont said the bounce houses were there as part of the Thomas visit.
But they left there quickly and started enjoying the village. And the key word is village.
We wandered the way people would wander a safe, quiet New England village anytime during the age of steam locomotives, between 1850 and 1950.
Boothbay Railway Village began in the 1960s when George McEvoy needed a place to put his collection of railroad memorabilia.
"They were getting rid of the old Freeport train station, and he bought that," Stormont said. "They moved that here in 1964, in five sections, if you can picture that coming up Route 1 over the old Bath bridge. And that is how this place started."
The museum is now a nonprofit organization, run by volunteers, with a mission of preserving items from the age of steam locomotives.
First the girls headed off to the one-room schoolhouse, which is a replica building rather than an antique building moved to the site.
Brigit was convinced she would not have enjoyed the one-room school. No computers or electricity.
Next Brigit and Maeve spent some time swinging at the school's playground. My initial unspoken reaction was that they could use swings anywhere, but I kept quiet, looked at the schoolhouse and waited for them to join me.
We walked up toward the place where you board the steam train and headed into the antique engine display room for a minute. Brigit showed some interest in the old equipment, but Maeve found it dull. She did enjoy looking at the goat in the pasture, however.
We had just missed the train taking off, so we checked out more of the village. The girls could not believe banks were ever like the 1925 Canal Bank, with bars separating tellers from the customers. The hats in the millinery shop caught their eyes, but they never stopped.
The working dioramas, however, were a lot of fun. They would push a button and watch small figures snore on a park bench, split wood or rock in the parlor. Stormont said she was told that those dioramas used to travel in an old-fashioned carnival.
All three of us loved the antique auto and truck display. Brigit has a friend whose father owns a Model A Ford with rumble seat, and she first searched for similar cars, finding a couple. I was stunned by the 1957 Lotus XI Le Mans race car right at the entrance, just a gorgeous bit of metal.
I waxed nostalgic – and the girls politely listened – about the 1957 Ford Thunderbird. A high school classmate's father had a 1956 Thunderbird, and that had been the car of my dreams until reality hit after I graduated from college and got married.
We talked about a bit of Maine history, looking at the Stanley Steamers, which were built in Mechanic Falls by the Stanley brothers of Kingfield.
Stormont said the museum has had six or seven of the cars donated, but the rest are on loan from collectors who...
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