Honoring BF’s Rail Heritage

By Bill Lockwood
THE SHOPPER
BELLOWS FALLS, Vt. – It was no surprise last summer when a large crowd turned out for the celebration of Amtrak’s Vermont return to Bellows Falls after its year-and-a-half long suspension due to the Covid pandemic. It remains the only passenger train that stops here, once daily in each direction, continuing a long and storied rail history in the village. This month, the Bellows Falls Historical Society has been featuring a window display at their location on Westminster Street near the Square. The windows feature two large oil paintings by local artist Charlie Hunter that depict local rail scenes. One is of the Westminster Signal, a signal used widely from the 1920s to the 1980s, a signal that is still in use here. The other, a 36-inch by 72-inch painting, is a snow scene of the Bellows Falls Depot in February.

There are many other photos of rail scenes and trains taken over the years that have been donated from various collections, and there are also artifacts that include oil cans, wrenches, and meal signs on display in the window and inside the building.

Bellows Falls is located at the narrowest point on the Connecticut River for miles, which made it the logical place for trains to cross the river. Local folklore suggests that in the early 1900s more than 100 trains came through this rail center a day, trains that connected Boston, New York City, and Montreal. Historical Society member Larry Clark, who donated many of the old train photos from his own collection, said he couldn’t confirm the number of trains, but said that there were certainly quite a few, including multiple milk trains each day, chugging out from the old Bellows Falls Creamery and transporting that milk to Boston. Trains also served the paper mills that once operated here. Clark did refer to Lyman Hays’ history of Rockingham, which gives Jan. 8, 1849 as the date of the first train to cross the Cheshire Bridge into Bellows Falls. It documents 1844 as the date that Cheshire Rail Road first connected Boston to Claremont on the New Hampshire side of the river. New rail lines of many companies came after that, and many photos were taken over those years.

President of the Historical Society Cathy Bergmann says the big display and associated celebration “sort of morphed” from an idea that came up when the Rutland Rail Road Association held their annual convention at the Bellows Falls Moose Lodge, about a block or two away from the Historical Society’s building. Bergmann said, “We had a big window display on Hetty Green practically forever. We are a railroad town historically. We wanted to pay homage to the railroad while the convention was here and maybe draw some visitors downtown.” She and others at the society feel that the response they got from both locals who donated their photos and memorabilia, and the visitors who saw it, was a “smashing success.” She says that “Once the ball started rolling and word spread through the community, donations of photos and memorabilia started coming in.” She names Aaron Bridge, Jerry Hebda, Paul Patraska, and Shawn McGinnis as key to the donations, and Annette Spaulding and Eliza Zimmer of the society as important in assembling and promoting the display.

The Historical Society’s next big event will be June 11 from 1–3 p.m. at their Grist Mill Museum. It will include the dedication of their new trailhead kiosk at Riverside Park, mill and trail tours, bird observation at their deck on Cold Spring Pond, and music by David Deacon.

Interested parties can contact the Historical Society at [email protected] and find out more about Charlie Hunter’s rail paintings at www.charliehunter.art.