Winnipeg Manitoba - It's time to celebrate Railway Days at Winnipeg's original transportation hub, the Winnipeg Railway Museum in VIA Rail Union Station, on 19 and 20 Sep 2015.
 
Come and see the "Countess of Dufferin", the very first steam locomotive on the prairies.
 
She arrived here by barge in October, 1877 to help begin construction of a railway line south to Minneapolis for supplying hardware to build the Canadian Pacific Railway.
 
After that, Winnipeg became a terminal for the Canadian Pacific, the Canadian National, and the Great Northern, among others.
 
The Canadian National occupied the area now known as The Forks when they built the East Yard for freight-car sorting and to store and maintain passenger coaches.
 
The museum features a collection of locomotives and cars that worked in the area, transported people from far away, and shipped local produce to be marketed around the world.
 
Along with the "Countess of Dufferin" is a restored colonist car, the coach that introduced many new arrivals to a bright future in Manitoba, as well as an outside-braced box car, a wooden workhorse that carried merchandise to the newly settled farm country and returned with grain for shipment overseas.
 
The museum is located on VIA tracks 1 and 2 in the station concourse from 10:00 to 17:00.
 
Admission to Railway Days is by donation.
 
Join us!
 
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