Whenever my three-year-old son is in the car, I always know when we’re approaching a railroad crossing. He announces it in a loud voice: “TRAIN TRACKS!” He loves trains and train tracks. In fact, when my wife and her mother took our kids to the children’s museum in Galesburg, he kept wanting to go outside to see the trains whenever he heard the crossing signal start to ding.
So today I took him (along with his oldest sister) to the Railroad Fair, and he was in hog heaven:
I have to admit, it was pretty fun for me, too. It’s not every day you get to see these engines up close. Plus, you can learn a little something about railroads from the nearby information tables. There’s also face-painting for the kiddies, although my kids were more interested in climbing on and around the engines. We had a good time.
The Railroad Fair continues tomorrow from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Pioneer Parkway at the Kellar Branch rail line, next to the parking lot for Barrack’s Cater Inn. Check it out!
I travelled on the Rock Island from where River Station is now many times as a child. I loved riding those trains. We’ll have to visit it tomorrow.
Just to let you know we had a great Railroad Fair 2008. We met hundreds of people. Even our own Diane Vespa came and enjoyed. Great to meet you Diane. The children had a great time. I think CJ had as much fun as his kids. You should have seen the grin on his face the whole time. We had the opportunity to introduce many to the importance of trains in our current economy and to erase many myths. We thank all the generous donaters. Every one was so kind. We hope to do this annually. In the meantime a great big THANK YOU to all those that attended and we hope you thoroughly enjoyed it. IPRRF Crew
SD – couldn’t resist the chance to meet my Republipal David P. Jordan. You were a bonus 😉
I suspect blog entries such as this one, Billy’s brought a number of people to the railfair Saturday and Sunday. And it was great to formally meet Merle Widmer and Diane Vespa. Made some new friends on Sunday so the project, conceived just this spring, was well worth it.
You know it just occurred to me that to “some people” all of you who attended the Railroad Fair in Peoria,Il and not something a bit more “progesssive” like an Indonesian Gay/Lesbian forum in San Francisco or a Japanese saké tasting in Portland, might be considered “white trash”.