North Little Rock exhibit a salute to city's railroad roots

Christmas train tree part of display

Sandra Taylor Smith, executive director of the North Little Rock History Commission, cleans the tracks of the Union Pacific Credit Union Train Tree on Friday. It is part of the “North Little Rock Railroads: Building a City” exhibit that opens today at the North Little Rock Heritage Center.
Sandra Taylor Smith, executive director of the North Little Rock History Commission, cleans the tracks of the Union Pacific Credit Union Train Tree on Friday. It is part of the “North Little Rock Railroads: Building a City” exhibit that opens today at the North Little Rock Heritage Center.

An exhibit detailing North Little Rock's beginnings and growth as a railroad town is the result of a year's worth of research, planning and construction of a 12-foot-tall Christmas tree that has a train running through it.

"North Little Rock Railroads: Building a City," which opens today, details how the coming of railroads "turned a flood-prone swamp" across the Arkansas River from the state's capital into a major hub of America's rail system, connecting with Texas and points west.

The exhibit in the North Little Rock Heritage Center at 506 Main St. is free and open to the public. Its grand debut was scheduled to coincide with North Little Rock's annual Christmas parade, but the parade was rescheduled from today to next Sunday because of rain in the forecast.

The railroad display will be open from 2-4 p.m. today and next Sunday. Regular hours will be 10 a.m.-4:30 p.m. weekdays.

"The purpose of the exhibit was just to show how the railroad had a lot to do with the growth and development of North Little Rock," said Cary Bradburn, staff historian for the North Little Rock History Commission, which is on the second floor of the Heritage Center.

The exhibit contains photographs, articles and materials connected with railroads -- everything from a conductor's hat, winter coat and pocket watch to a Lionel model train with a smoking locomotive and train sounds. There are railroad spikes, model trains, posters and interpretive panels telling of the history of railroads in the city.

The rail yards, depots, shops and related industries provided jobs to generations of families. Union Pacific Railroad remains one of the city's major employers.

A unique feature in the exhibit is the Union Pacific Credit Union Train Tree, a Christmas tree with a Lionel model train that winds through it.

The idea for the train tree came from Karl Krebs, a retired engineer who saw a photo in a railroading model magazine last year, said Suzanne Jackson, North Little Rock History Commission chairman.

Krebs oversaw volunteers from the Arkansas Regional Innovation Hub in North Little Rock to build the framing for the tree and assemble it inside the Heritage Center.

"That was kind of the impetus for us," said Jackson, who oversaw the entire project as a volunteer. "We'd always thought about doing an exhibit on North Little Rock's railroads because they were such a factor in the building of the city."

Bradburn, author of a book on North Little Rock's history, wrote a narrative of the city's railroad history to use as a guide for the exhibit. The railroad exhibit itself took from June through last weekend to complete, Jackson said.

"Cary did a wonderful job writing a summary history of the city's railroads," Jackson said. "We took it from there and broke it down into sections and started looking for photographs and information to put on the panel boards."

Bradburn and History Commission Executive Director Sandra Taylor Smith credited Jackson for the major work on the exhibit, along with her son, Jake, a professional artist, and several other volunteers.

"Suzanne spearheaded this thing, spending countless hours working on it and pushing us along," Taylor Smith said. "She worked weekends, she was running errands. She's been an amazing force with this commission."

Railroad companies began working about the mid-1800s on a route from Memphis to Little Rock that would then extend into Texas and out west, Bradburn said. The Civil War interrupted progress before Argenta, the present-day downtown area of North Little Rock, was platted in 1866. The plat was filed in circuit court in 1871, Bradburn said, and "people began buying lots and the railroads started coming in."

The town "really grew fast" in the 1870s and 1880s, Bradburn said, leading neighboring Little Rock to annex the north side of the river in 1890 because the city was "interested in the railroad tax base." North Little Rock broke free from its neighbor in 1904 to become its own city.

"That's sort of how the town began," he said. "The city developed because of the railroads, and the railroads were coming because Little Rock was the state capital and was a throughway to Texas and points west. We mention up to 12 railroad companies in our exhibit. There were more than that if you ran down all the short lines."

The History Commission sponsored a preview of the exhibit Thursday evening, drawing many retired railroad employees.

"Nobody really ever recognized their importance and their contributions to the city," Taylor Smith said. "You could see it in their faces that night. It was long past due, and I think they felt honored to be recognized."

Metro on 12/04/2016

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