Great news! Our agreement with the city has been finalized
Our partnership agreement with the City of Missoula has now been signed by the mayor.
We’re so excited that we can begin work on the restoration phases we had planned. We’ve been doing some work, largely measuring and assessing and ordering parts, with the permission of Missoula Parks and Recreation, but we had to wait for the agreement to move through channels and get signed before we could fully proceed. Now that we have that actual signed agreement it’s full steam ahead.
This is a thank you note to the community surrounding the 1356. The fact that this is happening is due to your generosity. Donations paid first for promotional materials to document community support, for maintaining a website, then for the 501(c)3 application, and for insurance so our agreement could be approved: basically everything that kept us going. We couldn't have done it without you.
Our target for completing the first phase of the plan is by the end of June. This includes refurbishing the bell, tying in to city electric for lighting, installing a soon-to-be-lighted headlight lens, and more. We’ll provide updates and photos soon!
Thank you again for caring about this historic engine! We hope to see you this spring and summer at Missoula Farmer's Market in Burlington Northern Plaza, in front of the old Northern Pacific depot where the 1356 is on display!
The 1356: A new chapter begins
On the afternoon of December 13, Andrew Skibo, Mike Seitz, photographer Evan Laskowski and I met at Missoula’s Northern Pacific 1356. There, the City Parks and Recreation department issued Andrew a key to unlock the fence that surrounds the engine. Andrew then measured and evaluated for weatherization and stabilization, and wrote up a new working plan. This marks the beginning of Engine 1356’s cosmetic restoration and the first maintenance she’s had in over 20 years.
The next Thursday, December 19th, Mike, Andrew, and I met with folks from Parks and Recreation to discuss a partnership between the City of Missoula and Friends of the 1356 for “fund raising and renovation of an Historic locomotive.” Our partnership agreement is now working its way through channels to the Mayor’s desk, to be finalized in time for actual work on the engine to begin this spring.
On the afternoon of December 13, Andrew Skibo, Mike Seitz, photographer Evan Laskowski and I met at Missoula’s Northern Pacific 1356. There, the City Parks and Recreation department issued Andrew a key to unlock the fence that surrounds the engine. Andrew is a most welcome addition to Friends: he has experience with steam engine restoration and he’s also a licensed contractor, so he can work on site.
Andrew measured and evaluated for weatherization and stabilization, and wrote up a new working plan. This marks the beginning of Engine 1356’s cosmetic restoration and the first maintenance she’s had in over 20 years.
The next Thursday, December 19th, Mike, Andrew, and I met with folks from Parks and Recreation to discuss a partnership between the City of Missoula and Friends of the 1356 for “fund raising and renovation of an Historic locomotive.” Our partnership agreement is now working its way through channels to the Mayor’s desk, to be signed in time for actual work on the engine to begin this spring.
The City of Missoula Parks and Recreation has been great to work with. They wrote some unexpected bonuses into the agreement: commemorative plaques, a kiosk, the right to reserve space at Railroad Park. We’re looking forward to events at the 1356 over the summer.
So begins a new chapter in The 1356’s history. Friends of the 1356 worked hard to assess and engage public interest. We got petitions signed, posted on social media, enlisted City Council, got our not for profit paperwork done and filed, and the 1356 is now on its way to restoration!
Most of the actual work on the engine can’t start until spring. Over time she’ll get a complete paint job, lighting, interpretive signs, bell and whistle restored, and a long term plan to keep the engine maintained. You can read the updated working plan here.
A lot of people have asked about working on the engine: we’re hoping to make that possible. It will have to be off site, and it’s probably not going to happen until next year. We’ll keep you posted. In the meantime there are other volunteer opportunities we’d like to explore, and we’d love your input. One close to my heart is a downtown historical before and after for kids, all about the railroad in Missoula—but that’s a subject for another post, coming up soon.
Friends of the 1356 has agreed to do all fundraising for this project, so we’re also working on that for both the immediate and long-term. We’ll be applying for grants and larger donations, but please know that small donations are both needed and very much appreciated. Thank you again for your support! Friends of the 1356 is a Montana registered 501(c)3 non-profit organization.
Saving a Storied Engine: Northern Pacific 1356
What can be said about a 1902 Class S-4 engine that has seen more adventure than words can describe? Strong? Enduring? Fearless? - Martin Kidston, The Missoulian, July 20, 2014
This blog was created to be a collection of stories and news about the 1356, the Northern Pacific Railway steam engine given to the city of Missoula and put on static display in 1955.
Friends of the 1356 is a group formed for the cosmetic restoration of Missoula’s iconic steam engine, the 1356, which stands on display in front of the old Northern Pacific Depot at the end of north Higgins Avenue. The group has progressed from an idea, to distributing flyers and circulating petitions, to becoming a not for profit entity, and finally to an agreement with the City of Missoula to work together to make this happen.
The 1356 on display in Missoula, Montana, in her present deteriorated condition. Photo from the Northern Pacific Railway Historical Association (NPRHA)
The 1356: Keeper of Story and History
What can be said about a 1902 Class 5-4 engine that has seen more adventure than words can describe? Strong? Enduring? Fearless? - Martin Kidston, The Missoulian, July 20, 2014
This blog was created to be a collection of stories and news about the 1356, the Northern Pacific Railway steam engine given to the city of Missoula and put on static display in 1955.
Former mayor John Engen called the 1356 a “keeper of story and history, community and magic.” Reporter Martin Kidston wrote that the engine is “a memorial to decades of steadfast service and dedication, by a locomotive and its Northern Pacific crews.”
The 1356 is a public icon, a keeper of stories. There are many threads of community and history that the 1356 represents and weaves together. Some of these stories are about how Missoula grew from 300 people in 1883 to a city of 12,000 by 1920 as the railroad helped grow stockyards, a sugar beet factory, wholesale grocers, and more. They are stories about grandparents coming to visit, sons and daughters going off to school and war, the engine’s 1943 wreck in the Bitterroot River.
And of course there’s the story about what was probably the most dramatic incident in the engine’s million-mile career, when she pulled a train through one of the biggest forest fires in U.S. history. In 1910, the Big Burn raged from Idaho into Montana, destroying over 3 million acres and several towns. The 1356 was one of the rescue engines that brought people from Idaho to safety in Missoula.
One of the goals of this website is to tell these stories and preserve them, before they are lost to the passage of time, and to reconnect the 1356 to her community.
As one of the founders of the restoration project, I’ll start this blog off with a little bit of my 1356 story. Some of it is family history. In 1955, at the advent of diesel, the 1356 was scheduled to be scrapped. My father, photographer Ron V. Nixon, was one of the people instrumental in saving her and seeing she was given to the city of Missoula for permanent display. (There was a celebration with speeches, a band and cheerleaders, but I was a babe in arms and I don’t remember that.)
For me, however, the family connection goes back further.
In the photo below, the man driving the wagon is my great grandfather, Peter Peterson. My grandmother, Elizabeth Nixon, is on the horse, and the little boy is my uncle Maynard. It’s about 1916 because Maynard was born in 1913. My great grandfather worked for an ice company hauling ice out of Rattlesnake Creek in Missoula. He and his family lived in various houses in the lower Rattlesnake, which was very much a working man’s, railroading community in those days. The image was taken somewhere in the Rattlesnake.
Missoula, Montana, about 1913; photograph by Stella Peterson
I rediscovered this photo when I was going through old family albums. My first thoughts were, wow, what a cool old Missoula shot, what a great horse, and good for my grandma that she didn’t let her best Sunday dress get in the way of getting on it. As if she would have. My grandmother loved horses like my father loved trains.
My great grandfather was living in Missoula during the Big Burn. My father was born a year later, in 1911. His father was a station agent for the Northern Pacific Railroad. He and his brothers visited their grandparents in Missoula often. There is no doubt that their grandparents told them stories about the great fire and the rescue trains, and the help people got when they arrived. Many of them fled with just the clothes on their backs, and the community rallied around them. (Here’s a link to an August 10, 1922, Missoulian story about the fire.)
My dad would follow in his father’s footsteps, working for the Northern Pacific. He was a telegrapher, dispatcher, wire chief in the Missoula depot. When he wasn’t working his day job he was chasing trains to photograph them. It was his goal to shoot every engine ever made. He started at the age of five; some 70 years later 20,000 photos from his collection ended up at the Museum of the Rockies in Bozeman, Montana.
One of my dad’s favorite trains was the 1356. I’m guessing part of that was because of the stories he heard from his grandparents about her.
So some of my story is, of course, an interest in preserving my father’s legacy. But thinking about that photo, and my great grandparents’ lives here, underlines for me how deep the stories go: how far they go back, and how interconnected we all are with Missoula’s railroad history. As I talk to people I keep hearing those common threads—parents who worked in the depot and the roundhouse, journeys taken, railroading families. So that is my interest in this 1356 project. I’m not too well informed about steam engines or trains in general—not what you might call a “foamer.” My interest is in story and community.
In 2009 then mayor John Engel issued a proclamation declaring May 9, 2009, as Missoula 1356 Day. In it he wrote, “Trains are magical for adults and children alike, and the 1356 still has plenty of magic, though its fires are out. The 1356, this keeper of story and history, community and magic, needs to be preserved for our children.”
Part of that reconnection involves restoring her to some of her former glory: fresh paint, lighting, maybe even some bells and whistles.
If the 1356 is going to be saved, she need help. That’s the goal of Friends of the 1356. The engine hasn’t been maintained in 20 years, and things are looking pretty grim. She has pigeons roosting in her cab, her paint is down to bare metal, her lettering and numbers are peeling away. She needs to be brought back to what she should be, a proud icon of Missoula’s railroad history.
Please join us in the effort to save her! You can send your story to stories@missoula1356.org. Or, you can help us keep the fires burning this winter. We need, and very much appreciate, your support. A small donation of $5 will keep the lights on (and this web page up and running). $10, $20, or more helps us get a sign—as of now there is no signage at the engine whatsoever—or evict the pigeons from the cab. If you can commit to an annual contribution, that would be great: it allows us to budget for the future and plan in-kind donations for grant writing. Friends of the 1356 is recognized in the State of Montana as a nonprofit organization, but the federal 501(c)3 process takes a few months. When we receive our exempt status, donations received while the application was pending may be treated as tax-deductible contributions retroactive to the date of Friends of the 1356 forming.
Thank you for visiting!
73s
Jeannine Nixon