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The
Shelburne Falls Trolley Museum is a small
railroad museumA railway museum is a museum that explores the history of all aspects of rail related transportation, including: locomotives , railway cars, trams, and railway signalling equipment.See List of railway museums...
in
Shelburne FallsShelburne Falls is a census-designated place in the towns of Shelburne and Buckland in Franklin County, Massachusetts, United States. The population was 1,951 at the 2000 census. It is part of the Springfield, Massachusetts, Metropolitan Statistical Area...
,
MassachusettsThe Commonwealth of Massachusetts is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States of America. It is bordered by Rhode Island and Connecticut to the south, New York to the west, and Vermont and New Hampshire to the north; at its east lies the Atlantic Ocean. As of the 2010...
,
United StatesThe United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
.
The museum (SFTM) is dedicated to preserving and operating car number 10 of the former
Shelburne Falls and Colrain Street RailwayThe Shelburne Falls and Colrain Street Railway was a rural trolley line that operated in the western Massachusetts towns of Buckland, Shelburne and Colrain from late 1896 to late 1927...
. This is a combination passenger-baggage
trolleyA tram is a passenger rail vehicle which runs on tracks along public urban streets and also sometimes on separate rights of way. It may also run between cities and/or towns , and/or partially grade separated even in the cities...
car built by the
Wason Manufacturing CompanyThe Wason Manufacturing Company was a maker of railway passenger coaches and streetcars during the 19th and early 20th century. The company was founded in 1845 in Springfield, Massachusetts by Charles Wason and Thomas Wason ....
of
Springfield, MassachusettsSpringfield is the most populous city in Western New England, and the seat of Hampden County, Massachusetts, United States. Springfield sits on the eastern bank of the Connecticut River near its confluence with three rivers; the western Westfield River, the eastern Chicopee River, and the eastern...
, in 1896 and is the last known trolley car from the Shelburne Falls & Colrain Street Railway.
In 1992 Marshall Johnson donated car number 10 (which his father had bought and saved when the Shelburne Falls & Colrain Street Railway shut down, decades earlier!) to a small group of people who restored the car back to working order.
The museum also has a small assortment of equipment that is not related to the Shelburne Falls & Colrain Street Railway like an ex-Central Vermont
cabooseA caboose is a manned North American rail transport vehicle coupled at the end of a freight train. Although cabooses were once used on nearly every freight train, their use has declined and they are seldom seen on trains, except on locals and smaller railroads.-Function:The caboose provided the...
, a Central Vermont
handcarA handcar is a railroad car powered by its passengers, or by people pushing the car from behind. It is mostly used as a maintenance of way or mining car, but it was also used for passenger service in some cases...
, and other railroad and trolley equipment.
The Shelburne Falls Trolley Museum is located in the old Buckland Freight yard.