The Sierra Blanca Railroad Museum recently received a rather large photograph from Talley Davis, taken many years ago, of a get together of local aviation enthusiasts on the Steeler Ranch. Ole Sag was among those who had assembled to practice searching for a downed airplane. Gene Steeler had placed some pieces of corrugated metal roofing to resemble an airplane crash in a remote location on the ranch, and each pilot was assigned a section in checkerboard fashion to search. Of course, the picture triggered memories of our flying days, and it will be a treasured part of the museum’s collection.
And speaking of the museum, the reason it is called the Railroad Museum is because it is located in the old railroad depot building that was originally built between the tracks of the two railroads that met in Sierra Blanca in 1881. Almost exactly 100 years later, modern technology had rendered the depot unnecessary for the operation of the trains, and, indeed, it was actually in the way of planned track renovations. At that time, a small group of farsighted local folks, headed by Tom D. Ellison’s sister, Julia Jenkins, purchased the depot. The price was $1, but the sale was conditioned on the building being move off of railroad property. This proved to be a daunting operation, but the little group forged ahead with their aim of preserving Hudspeth County history and raised the money to hire a moving contractor, who cut the large wooden building in two and moved it over to where it sits today, next door to the post office.
Hudspeth County owes a great debt of gratitude to Julia Jenkins, who organized the Hudspeth County historical commission, which serves in conjunction with the Texas Historical Commission. She also organized the Hudspeth County Historical Society, a non-profit group that operates the museum and is made up of citizens from Dell City, Fort Hancock and Sierra Blanca. Julia put in countless hours over the years gathering Hudspeth County artifacts covering a wide range of interests, including the railroads, World Wars I and II, Indian artifacts and the history of local ranching families.
She was also instrumental in bringing a famous caboose to the museum. Some of our readers may recall seeing a caboose passing through in 1976 that was painted red, white and blue, in honor of our Bicentennial celebration. If you looked closely at that caboose, you could see that the serial number on the side was 1776. After that year, the caboose was repainted normal railroad colors, and it is the exact same one that stands proudly beside the museum today for the benefit of locals and museumgoers alike.
If you have not had the privilege of visiting the museum, there are many interesting exhibits besides railroad artifacts. There are pictures of the old fort at Fort Hancock, pictures of Fort Bliss in El Paso circa World War I, pictures and memorabilia from local folks who served in World War II and an expansive collection of Indian artifacts that were collected by Mike Burns. Mike served with the health department in the 70s and 80s, and his hobby was hiking over local ranches looking for arrowheads and anything else left behind by ancient Indian tribes. You can also learn of the exploits of Gen. Patton when he was stationed in Sierra Blanca as a lieutenant and marvel at a large collection of well-worn and sweat-incrusted hats that were worn by ranchers and lawmen in days gone by. There are many other interesting things to see in the museum, but we mention these in the hope of engendering interest in the old depot and the exhibits on display there.
To the best of our knowledge, the redwood shingles on the old depot are the original ones that were nailed in place in 1881, and as you may imagine, the roof is in very poor condition. In the warehouse portion of the building, blue sky can be seen through the shingles in several places, and the roof covering all of the artifacts is almost as bad. A section of the upper deck overhang covering the upstairs apartment has been blown away by the wind, and any re-roofing will require some repairs to the substructure of the roof, especially the rafters that extend beyond the outer walls.
The board has been struggling for a number of years to raise the necessary funds to repair the roof on this historic building, but is still far short of what is needed. One of the fundraising efforts involves the sale of bricks with family names, birth and death dates or any other information the purchaser would like to have inscribed on them. These bricks will be placed in a permanent display around the flagpole in front of the building.
Should any of our readers be interested in helping to preserve this testament to the past, they may write to the Sierra Blanca Historical Society at P.O. Box 411, Sierra Blanca, Texas 79851, or call Tom Neely at (915) 986-2407.
Stay happy until next week
Until then: “The church can preach, the school can teach, but the home must convert sermons and lessons into a way of life.”– Abraham Lincoln
