By Pauline Masson –
A small-by-any-measure wood building that now stands near the front of the Engelhart Farm flower/pumpkin/produce stand on West Osage was once the busiest structure in Pacific. After two separate lifetimes, it was set to be demolished recently when history buff Harry Engelhart thought it was worth saving.
“Historic means old and worth remembering,” Mr. Engelhart said. “I just couldn’t see it demolished. It was part of the history of the town.”
So here is the story.
As early as 1860 the Pacific freight depot stood at the east end of the passenger depot, flanked by multiple rows of tracks that citizens had to cross to get to arriving and departing trains. Both buildings were shared by the Pacific and Frisco railroads.
It is unclear when the 9-1/2’ x 24’ freight depot was built after the railroad arrived here in 1853, but between 1870 and 1916 – the heyday of railroading – it was arguably the busiest building in town.
“It was built at the railroad shops, narrow like that, so it could be set on a flatcar and moved over to the depot,” Mr. Engelhart said.
Although passenger trains were the lifeblood of America, for railroad operators they were an inconvenient necessity. The money making business of railroading was freight, according to Pacific railroad guru Jim Schwinkendorf.
Passenger trains were often money losers. They cost more to operate than could be recovered through the cost of passenger tickets, and were labor intensive with cleaning crews, conductors, pullman porters and food servers.
The record mileage achieved in 1916 (254,037 miles) could rightfully be argued as the industry’s apex. At that time, electric trollies, motor trucks, and the ubiquitous Ford Model T offered alternatives to train travel.
It would be impossible to exaggerate how much and how fast life changed in the little frontier town of Pacific as goods began to arrive at the freight depot from far away places.
Cheap train rides may have made frequent travelers of small town citizens but it was cheap freight that refined the lives of former rural citizens, bringing all the luxuries enjoyed in New York, Chicago and even Paris, France.
Recall the Wells Fargo Wagon coming down the street in the movie the Music Man, heralded in song for carrrying maple sugar, a gray macinaw, grapefruit, a bath tub, curtains, dishes, and a double boiler.
In Pacific in the early day of railroading, freight trains brought fine leather shoes, jewelry, mirrors, lace curtains, silverware, toys, furniture, sewing machines, stoves, flower seeds, whiskey from Kentucky and wine from France. Every symbol of refined living poured into Pacific to be picked up by citizens or store owners at the freight building.
After Parcel Post was instituted in 1913 and the U.S. Mail would transport packages that weighed up to 50 pounds, manufacturers and wholesalers advertised mail order goods in the Pacific Transcript.
“The mail was off-loaded in the freight building,” Mr. Engelhart said. “If you ordered anything through Parcel Post that’s where you went to pick it up.”
Railway Express and Wells Fargo shipping services added to the wonders that could be shipped by train. Pianos and fully assembled buggies arrived in Pacific.
“It’s accurate to say that freight brought the railroads far more money than the passenger trains,” Mr. Schwinkendorf said.
The location of the freight depot was meant to make it easy to move goods from freight cars into the depot. It was always too close to the passenger depot, which required three or four sets of tracks on each side of the depot, that caused at least one death and no small amount of safety concern. __________________________________________________________________________________________
This created a death defying obstacle course that passengers and freight customers had to cross on foot to meet arriving or departing trains or pick up their packages.
In the early 1900’s, of the 35 trains that stopped at Pacific each day 14 were mail and express trains and five carried only local freight, according to the railroad time tables published in the local newspaper. Freight cars were shuffled onto a side track next to the through tracks that carried moving trains for both passenger and freight trains. Mail and freight were both off-loaded into the small depot building.
It is unclear when the freight building was first erected but by 1899 it was starting to crumble and local carpenter Hans Howe was contracted to install new sills and shelves as the old ones were badly rotted.
When former mayor A. H. Brown fell while attempting to cross the tracks to get to the passenger terminal on December 9, 1904, he was run over by a slow moving freight train, severing both his legs. He died the following day from his injuries, prompting the editor of the Transcript to publish a call for action.
“Is it not about time for the management of the railroads to think of some measures regarding service of this place,” he lamented. “Our people are obliged to cross three or four tracks to reach the depot from either side, and the common practice is to sidetrack two or three freight cars, while some of the passenger trains are passing.
But the little building remained at the east end of the passenger terminal until the MoPac (Union Pacific) and Frisco ended railroad operations in Pacific.
When the railroads discontinued regular passenger service in 1961, Pacific’s passenger depot stood empty for another 16 years. The handsome brick structure was demolished in 1977 – “at 4:00 a.m.” said local history authority Sue Reed, “So they wouldn’t be bothered by protesters.”
Vernon Borcherding, a retired Missouri Pacific Railroad signal man was allowed to haul the little depot building to his farm where he used it as a workshop and storage building. After his death, and the death of his son Brian, it was decided to demolish it.
Mr. Engelhart acquired the building for posterity. He made several attempts to find a group to move it to the downtown area as part of the current revitalization effort, said he plans to keep the building at his farm and residents will be able to see it.
“We’re going to restore it to look like it did when it was is in operation,” Mr. Engelhart said. He plans to leave it near the parking area of his flower and produce stand on West Osage for history buffs and the curious to visit.
