The exterior of the Colfax Railroad Museum, which is housed in the village's former train depot, which was built in 1915. (Photo by Tom Giffey)

It’s tempting to call a place like the Colfax Railroad Museum a hidden gem, but that’s not exactly accurate. It’s a gem, certainly, but not hidden: For one thing, it’s right off Main Street in the Dunn County village of Colfax, about 18 miles from Menomonie. For another, the museum has been around 25 years and the former train depot that houses it is more than a century old.

And while the museum has been a destination for train buffs and history lovers for a quarter century, it’s drawn even more attention this year thanks to an appearance on the popular History Channel series American Pickers.

Herb Sakalaucks, the museum’s founder, says visitors range from young children who may have never seen a train to 90-year-olds who worked with some of the equipment preserved there.

A Porter 2-6-2T steam engine is among the exhibits. (Contributed photo)

“The best way to say it is we get kids of all ages,” says Sakalaucks, a lifelong lover of trains. He remember his father returning from the Korean War with a toy train set and bringing him to watch the rail yards in Philadelphia when he was 5 or 6.

On a recent summer afternoon, Sakalaucks offered tours of the museum and its collection while other volunteers promoted the museum at the Northern Wisconsin State Fair a few miles away in Chippewa Falls.

The nonprofit museum officially opened in 1999, but the depot – a sandstone structure emblazoned with the word “Colfax” – was built in 1915. Originally, Sakalaucks explained, the building was larger, but it was damaged by the deadly tornado that struck Colfax in 1958. The twister hit the freight house on the building’s west side, which wasn’t rebuilt, although stones were used to fix the exterior wall of what was then the women’s waiting room. (Yes, women and children were segregated from the swearing, smoking, and carousing of the menfolk.)

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... A LOT OF THEM ARE WORKS OF ART, WHEN YOU GET DOWN TO IT.

HERB SAKALAUCKS

MUSEUM FOUNDER, ON WHY TRAINS INTRIGUE HIM

Inside the historic depot in downtown Colfax you’ll find an eye-popping collection of railroad memorabilia such as lanterns (including some made to burn whale oil), typewriters, a telegraph, paperweights, playing cards, photographs, maps, and much more. The “much more” includes 2,000 pieces of dining car china, the largest publicly displayed collection in the world. It includes about 600 of the roughly 950 patters ever cataloged in the United States. Sakalaucks proudly points out specific pieces, like nearly 200-year-old pieces used on the Baltimore & Ohio (the nation’s oldest railroad) to those from numerous countries around the world.

Inside the former depot is a massive collection of railroad memorabilia. (Photo by Tom Giffey)

These “service plates” frequently had ornate designs unique to an individual railroad, and they were used to mark spots in a dining car. However, they were never actually eaten off of, Sakalaucks said; instead, they were whisked away once a passenger’s order arrived on a different plate.

Outside, alongside railroad tracks once use by the Soo Line – and still used for freight by the Canadian National – is where visitors’ imagination really gains steam. Whatever your age or familiarity with trains, it’s hard not to feel a surge of wonder and nostalgia stepping into the 1911 Soo Line caboose (complete with bunks and even passenger seats for passengers), a 1914 Fowler-design boxcar (full of vintage tools and other artifacts), and a 1911 Soo Line passenger car (complete with a display of railroad uniforms and seats).

An Omaha route mail car, which was used for years as a house in Altoona. (Photo by Tom Giffey)

Other artifacts can be admired outside as well, including an authentic 1911 steam engine, a Soo Line diesel engine, a Northern Pacific coach car, and even a mail car that was used as a house in Altoona until it was relocated to the museum and restored.

Last summer, the museum was visited by a crew from American Pickers TV, who ended up recording a segment and buying some excess memorabilia. The episode aired last spring on the History Channel, and the publicity has helped raise the museum’s profile, spurring a boost in visitors and donations, Sakalaucks said.

A crew from the History Channel TV series "American Pickers" filmed a segment at the museum in 2023. (Submitted photo)

That’s good news for those who work to promote this not-so-hidden gem and promote the love of trains.

“You have so many different things there that you can look at, concentrate on, between the steam and the diesel and the electrics,” Sakalaucks said when asked why trains capture his imagination. “But a lot of them are works of art, when you get down to it.”

Colfax Railroad Museum, 500 E. Railroad Ave., Colfax • colfaxrrmuseum.org and on Facebook • (715) 962-2076 • open 11am-4pm Wednesday-Sunday, May 1-Oct. 31 (or by appointment) • adults $10, youth (ages 7-14) $5, children (ages 2-6) $2, children under 2 free • miniature train rides on first and third Saturdays for extra fee