Funds to transform the baggage car into a museum are being raised by Midwest Rail Rangers, a nonprofit based in Barron. A 400-page book about the Mark Twain Zephyr's history is scheduled to go on sale in September — at MarkTwainZephyr.com — with purchases helping to pay for museum car displays.I was not aware of the connection between the Rail Rangers, who publish a series of mile-by-mile guides to what's outside the train window, and these might be the people who conduct historic talks on the South Shore Line.
The restoration will not re-create the look of the Mark Twain Zephyr down to the last tile, said [director of passenger development Robert] Tabern, but it will be a faithful re-creation. The goal is to finish by fall 2021.
"This is a pretty big project for us," Tabern said. "When you see the Zephyr in the Museum of Science and Industry it looks great, but it's a museum piece. This one in a year's time will be running right here in Wisconsin."
As far as Budd's historic streamliners, there are two other shovel-nosed trains, the Pioneer Zephyr in the basement of Chicago's Museum of Science and Industry, and the Flying Yankee, itself the subject of abortive restoration efforts over the years, in New Hampshire. In addition, the Nebraska Zephyr, which initially had a shovel-nosed power car, is operable at the Illinois Railway Museum. Because of its original fabric seats that are difficult to keep sanitized, it's closed up for the duration of the coronavirus lockdowns.
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