Atlanta, Georgia has always been a railroad town. Unlike almost every other major city east of the Mississippi, it has no major river and is nowhere near the ocean. Like its smaller inland neighbor, Birmingham, its location and founding was based on the intersection of railroads.
But in many people’s minds, the biggest railroad story in Atlanta is one that took place not in, but near Atlanta, over 150 years ago: A Union Army raid that seized a locomotive and headed up the rail network, destroying track and communication as it went, aimed at cutting off supplies to Confederate armies.
That chase, known to historians as the Andrews Raid and to moviegoers as The Great Locomotive Chase, included the locomotive Texas, which rebel supporters used to chase and eventually capture the Andrews raiders. The Texas, rescued from scrap years later is the centerpiece of the museum’s railway exhibits.
After the Civil War, Atlanta again became the railroad center of the South—Atlanta-bred friends of mine used to say that “It doesn’t matter if you’re going to Heaven or Hell, you have to change trains in Atlanta”—and it is still a major freight center, even though the great stations of the past (above) were both demolished in the 1970s. In Atlanta today, the limited Amtrak service stops at as former commuter station away from downtown.
JJonahJackalope/Wikimedia Commons
