Missouri Model Railroad Museum opens for National Train Day
INDEPENDENCE, Mo. — A new museum in Independence is opening its doors for the first time on May 11 to celebrate National Train Day.
The Missouri Model Railroad Museum is in the former Waggoner-Gates Milling Company Building which used to hold the National Frontier Trails Museum.
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“We want school kids to come in here and learn about the trains and the history of transportation in the state of Missouri,” said President and Executive Director Dale Shipman. “How it changed Missouri and how we grew from the railroads.”
That’s why Shipman and a team of volunteers have been working around the clock for weeks to put up large temporary exhibits for visitors this weekend. The museum will be open each Saturday from 10 am to 4 pm and will be closed during the week for volunteers to construct a larger permanent display.
The museum will let model train enthusiasts find what they enjoy while using trains as a jumping off point to relay the history of the region.
“Let’s tell about the history of the trains in the state of Missouri,” said Shipman. “It’s not told anywhere so I said, ‘Let’s do it,’ and we all decided what a great opporutnity to show case Kansas City, Independence. We’re the number two rail center in the United States, why not?”
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Much of what is on display belonged to Elvon Van Dalsem’s massive collection of model trains and railroad artifacts. Van Dalsem passed away in 2023 and his family donated much of what was in that collection to the museum.
“We cleaned it up, it just had some dust becase it hasn’t been used in a while, and we got it back running so that the kids can see it all run as Elvon would have wanted it,” said Volunteer Keith Mercer.
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The museum will be open both Saturday and Sunday, May 11 and 12, for the first weekend and each Saturday after that from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.
