At the Throttle

by Natasha Bettis, Buildings and Grounds Manager As we accomplish more here at the Nevada Northern one thing becomes clear; we need more space. More space to work on locomotives and cars, more space to safely and

by Marty Westland, Chief Mechanical Officer “But didn’t you just rebuild 40?” I’ve heard the question dozens of times when visitors see the locomotive in the shop for repairs. So I thought that this might be a

For the past eight years, the Nevada Northern Railway Museum has hosted a winter photo shoot that we call the Winter Steam Spectacular. Photographers from around the world come to Ely to photograph the railroad in the

If you think you were born one hundred years too late to witness the glory of steam railroading, then I have good news for you: you weren’t. There still exists a place where time stopped. Steam locomotives

There is this myth floating around that the museum has an “off” season; nothing could be further from the truth. Various projects are under way year round, not all of them are directly tied to railroading, but

At the time Joan and I started restoring combine 06, we had mistakenly assumed that we were working on combine 05. A combine is a railroad passenger car that combines both a passenger section and a baggage

When my wife Joan and I first started as volunteers at the Nevada Northern Railway Museum in 1999, we discovered a wooden combine car squirreled away in the back of the enginehouse. Someone had started to restore

The day started very early in the morning, as do most days around the museum. This was going to be a busy day for us as there were four Polar Express® trains on the schedule. In addition

Our railroad heritage is facing a very serious threat: it is disappearing, leaving nothing for the future. The skills and the know-how to keep the steamers steaming are in danger of becoming extinct. If we do not