On the milk run. The Turner Centre Creamery Attendant loads cans of raw milk aboard the company reefer car as the WW&F morning mixed pauses briefly at tiny Alna Center Station. The train is bound for Wiscasset, some 7 miles to the south, where the creamery will turn this raw milk into the dairy products needed by the residents of the Sheepscot Valley. Prior to 1930, scenes like this were commonplace in southern Maine, where highways and trucks were not yet fully reliable means of transportation, and 2 ft. gauge railroads brought people and materials to and from the rural farmlands to connections with mainline railroads along the coast.
This re-creation was made possible by the volunteers of the Wiscasset Waterville & Farmington Railway Museum. The replica Turner Centre Dairy Car was built with volunteer labor and wood cut from the museum's own ROW. Construction began in December of 2011 and the car was literally completed days before this photo special run was made. Acting as our "Milk Man" this morning was Stewart Rhine, a museum volunteer who was heavily involved in the building of this car. In the background, Engineer James Patten can be seen doing some real-life servicing on old, reliable Number 10.
For a look at the new reefer on a photo freight click here.
