A 32-foot caboose, built in 1929, that worked the Pennsylvania Railroad, Penn Central, and Conrail lines before being retired in the mid-1980s, is tracking toward Cobleskill and its forever home at the Fairgrounds.
Its arrival, later this summer and in time for the 147th Sunshine Fair, will help the Schoharie County Model Railroad Association mark its 50th anniversary in 2025.
And that’s where it will be housed—alongside the Railroad Association’s museum and exhibit, said John Bollentin, president of the SCMRA, whose connection to local railroading goes back nearly as far.
Mr. Bollentin found the caboose on Facebook after just a month-long search; he and other SCMRA members were looking for some way to celebrate their half-century anniversary.
“We’re beyond thrilled to have found this,” Mr. Bollentin said. “It’s going to be a great showpiece and draw a lot of attention to the Fair.”
The caboose will be coming from Salamanca, south of Buffalo in western New York.
His first online search, Mr. Bollentin said, turned up an old passenger car, and though he reached out, he quickly realized it wouldn’t be a good fit.
“I told the guy, ‘I’m actually looking for a caboose,’” he said. “And he told me ‘I have one of those I’d be willing to let go.’”
He’d found his caboose.
The Cobleskill Agricultural Society—the Fair Board—is buying the caboose; the Model Railroad Association will be covering the cost of flatbed transportation and restoration and donations for all of it are welcome.
Mr. Bollentin has photos of the steel caboose at different points in its use on different railroad lines.
Before it was retired in the mid-1980s, it served as a maintenance caboose for Conrail, he said, essentially an office for track repair crews out on jobs, and so it’s in Conrail paint.
“So yes, it needs restoration,” he said something that won’t happen before this year’s Fair. Right now, we’re just working on getting it here.
“There’s such a rich railroad history in Cobleskill. We’re hoping this will spark people’s memories and interest and stories.”
Mr. Bollentin’s history in the Railroad Association goes back more than 40 years to when he was 13 and started attending meetings with his dad, Bob, even though they lived in Perth.
“My dad was a toy train collector and I got more and more into it,” he said. “For 15 years, we never missed a Thursday night meeting. It was a great group of guys.”
That ended in 1998 when his dad died—until just a couple of years ago when Mr. Bollentin, who now lives in Burnt Hills, ran into his railroad friends, who encouraged him to stop by.
He did.
“It just felt right,” he said. “It was like I never left.”
Members were in the process of renovating their space at the Fairgrounds when, lending a hand, Mr. Bollentin found a box of notes in his dad’s handwriting, and well, “I took it as a sign,” he said.
“Cabooses were my dad’s thing.”
Less than a year later, he was elected the Railroad Association’s president and given the go-ahead for the caboose.
“Everyone’s really excited—if a little apprehensive,” he said. “But I told them: we can do this.”
The caboose will eventually be dedicated in memory of his dad and other longtime Railroad Association members.
For more information on the project or to contribute, email Mr. Bollentin at photognycap.rr.com or call him at (518) 788-1192.