117-year-old steam locomotive finds permanent home at N.S. museum

Ever since the Middleton Railway Museum Society was formed in 2017, volunteers have been going full-steam ahead on propelling the project forward.

The museum is already home to CNR 1274, the steam locomotive that was found at the now-defunct amusement attraction, Upper Clements Park.

But now, there’s a new train in town that’s one year younger.

Last month, a 1906 steam locomotive that was in storage at the Nova Scotia Museum of Industry in Stellarton was brought to the museum and carefully lowered by crane onto its tracks.

“She switched trains every day that came to Middleton,” says museum volunteer John MacDonald, a former CP rail employee who heads up the site’s acquisitions team. “And when trains from Middleton went to Bridgewater, this locomotive took them apart to send cars east west north south wherever they needed to be.”

The steamer was built in 1906 for the Intercolonial Railway of Canada, which later became a part of the CNR linking the Maritimes with Montreal.

The move to Middleton marks the locomotive’s return to southwest Nova Scotia.

“She's gonna need a little love, she's gonna need a bath,” laughs MacDonald. “We’re gonna give her a new paint job.”

The steam engine doesn’t run, but soon, a miniature version of the 104-ton machine will travel on much smaller tracks inside the museum.

That’s where more than a dozen volunteers have been painstakingly creating a model railway layout which replicates the route of the Dominion Atlantic Railway through communities in the Annapolis Valley on a 1:87 scale.

The layout includes 350 feet of track winding through well-known landmarks, such as the historic church at Grand-pré

Tiny figures can be seen hiking among tiny trees as the tracks pass by an old graveyard, and even through a miniature gypsum mine.

Trains are controlled on the tracks by a complicated series of switches controlled by computer.

Middleton railway museum layout manager Neil Hunter says skilled and passionate contributors have all helped put the layout together so far.

“Ten people average, twice a week, three hours at a time, for two years,” he says.

Trains ran through Middleton from 1890 until CP abandoned the line in April 1990. Passenger service operated through the station until VIA’s service ended earlier that same year.

Hunter says the end goal is to create a place that will honor Middleton’s place in history as a transportation hub at the height of the days of rail travel.  

“What we really want to do as an organization is to have this place be an experience,” he says.  

The museum’s train station, originally built in 1917, is now undergoing major renovations, with efforts being made to use local products such as wood shingles as much as possible.

The Middleton Railway Museum Society hopes to have some the work completed in time for the upcoming summer season.

But its outgoing chair says support is needed to secure the museum’s future vision.

“I think there's a great future here,” says Dianne Hankinson Legard. “So I’m asking people to become members, become volunteers, certainly would be great if you could make a donation, so we could continue on.”