Newborn, toddlers and travelers at Alna museum’s picnic weekend

SUSAN JOHNS
Mon, 08/13/2018 - 3:00pm
With help from mother Jennifer Moore, Chicago's Gus Moore, 3, cover his ears as they and Gus’s brother Harry, 8, witness a train being prepared for a run. SUSAN JOHNS/Wiscasset Newspaper
Conductor Bob Cavanagh hands passenger Helen Glickenstein of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania a paper towel for the train car seat. The seats were damp from overnight, he said after handing out the towels during boarding. SUSAN JOHNS/Wiscasset Newspaper
Liam Aarons, 2, of Woolwich rides a toy train while his mother helps with a yard sale-fundraiser. SUSAN JOHNS/Wiscasset Newspaper

    As his father Thomas McLennan held him up Sunday, Mason McLennan, 2, watched with mouth open while steam billowed from a black train against a gray sky. It was day two of Wiscasset, Waterville & Farmington Railway Museum’s annual picnic weekend.

    Helping a reporter interview her son at Sheepscot Station, Abby McLennan asked the Spruce Head toddler what he liked best about coming to Alna. "Going on train rides," he answered. He has been on trains many times, at the Cross Road, Alna nonprofit and elsewhere, she said.

    "And this is our newest," she said about Nora, 3 weeks, sleeping in a pink baby carrier vest her mother had on. Sunday's train ride was going to be Nora's first, her mother said.

    Nearby, Chicago's Gus Moore, 3, covered both ears as he, brother Harry, 8, mother Jennifer and her parents, David and Holly Collins, who live in Dover, Massachusetts and have a summer home on Barters Island, watched the train.

    "I think it's pretty cool," Harry said.

    "It's wonderful," said his grandmother, who visited the museum years ago with another grandchild.

    Texan Michael Ross, a life member of the museum, said he came to beat the heat in the Lone Star State. It reached 110 F there, he said after he and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania’s Erik Greene helped Alna’s Roger Whitney work the turntable officials said gets the locomotive facing north.

    Near midday, the museum's archivist, Wiscasset's Linda Zollers continued to welcome shoppers to a yard sale benefiting the archives. More than $1,000 had come in already, she said. Her goal for the picnic weekend and the $1 per bag sale from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. this Saturday, Aug. 18 and Sunday, Aug. 19 was $2,000.

    "We're more than halfway there," she said. Between the tables of books and other sale items, Liam Aarons, 2, of Woolwich rode around the floor on a red-painted, wooden train. His mother Sarah McGuigan was helping with the sale.

    Museum spokesman Stephen Piwowarski said Monday, 293 tickets were sold for the weekend that again this year included a World War I encampment at Alna Center.

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