Ed DeMuth’s maternal grandfather, Hixon Sproat, worked for the Pittsburgh & Lake Erie Railroad (P&LE). Sadly, Ed’s grandfather passed away when he was ten. That never stopped Ed’s curiosity about his grandfather and his job at the railroad. The railroad called to him. And he eventually began collecting, starting with two signs and a couple of railroad lanterns that belonged to his grandfather. In 2011, his collection truly began with the purchase of a speeder, other railroad items, and, eventually, a train order station.
Ed’s collection is housed in the Millsboro Railroad Museum, located on his property in Millsboro along the Monongahela River. The collection is housed in three buildings – a tool shed, a train order station, and a passenger train station.
The smallest building on the property is the tool shed, built from plans from a B&O building, and using siding from an old garage in Brownsville. Outside of the building, a mostly original 1886 hand cart sits on rails. The hand cart was used in the 1880s to the early 1900s, before it was replaced by speeders, like the 1920s Fariment Speeder just inside the shed; the speeder was one of Ed’s first purchases. The shed also houses a velocipede, used by two people in the 1860s and 1870s. The three items – velocipede, hand cart, and speeder – were used to check track conditions. A variety of railroad lanterns and tools also populate the shed.
The nearby train order station, used to give orders to the passing trains, is an original building. In September 2011, Ed and a crew of helpers moved the building 14 miles from Brownsville, where it had been placed after a series of moves from its original location in the now-ghost town East Rices Landing in Fayette County. East Rices Landing sat across the river from Rices Landing, near East Millsboro.
The building was starting to deteriorate when Ed went to bring it home. “We started picking it up and all four sides started to come apart,” Ed says. “It probably had another year or two before it was ruined.”
Before purchasing that building, Ed attempted acquiring his grandfather’s old office. After a visit, and when he realized the building was still in good condition, Ed negotiated with the current owner for six months. However, he and the owner couldn’t finalize a deal to bring the building home. “When you opened the door, you could smell those old cigars the old men smoked back in the day and the potbellied stove. When I walked through that door, it smelled the same way it did when I was nine years old,” Ed shares.
While lamenting about the failed deal with a friend, Ed’s friend verified how much Ed wanted the building. He knew where one was nearby with a local owner. After a quick negotiation at the owner’s Brownsville home, the building was Ed’s.
The inside of the train order station is set up to resemble the way it would have been when in use, along with other items of Ed’s collection. Everything on the inside is original, including the floors, walls, the windows, and many of the windowpanes. And thanks to a decal, you can look at the window and see the view from when it was in use in East Rices Landing. Ed keeps the most personal items of his collection there – the signs that belonged in his grandfather’s office.
The train order office houses an extensive collection of railroad lanterns, and some are rarities. “One of the first things to do is look at the top of the lantern to see who made it, and then you look to see if there is a railroad marker. The second thing you look at is the globe to see if it is embossed or etched. These things all add value to a lantern,” Ed says as he gently handles a lantern showcasing all those qualities.
In the yard between the two smaller buildings sits Ed’s sign garden. The garden is home to a variety of mostly-cast iron railway signs, markers, and signals. The oldest of the collection is a round sign in the garden. It appears in an 1898 Union Switch & Signal catalog and was originally used for horses and buggies; a bell was added later. The largest sign is a one-piece cast iron ‘eight-footer’ railroad crossing sign that weighs approximately 350 pounds.
Ed also has one-piece six-foot and four-foot signs, two-piece cast irons signs, cats-eye reflector signs, whistle signs, and both kerosene and electric switch signals. One of the most unique signs in the group is the coal picking prohibited sign, used to dissuade locals from collecting coal from the tracks to heat their homes. This practice was common during the Depression and in poor rural areas like Appalachia. Ed also has a collection of rare wooden signs kept inside the train order station.
The largest building on the property is the replica train passenger station. “After I retired, I didn’t have a place to work. I needed a workshop and decided that if I was building something, why not incorporate it into something else?”
The building – a replica of a passenger station in Van Meter – was built using recycled materials from an original floor plan. While the build is new, the pieces that make up the building are not. Like the tool shed, the exterior siding was repurposed from an older building, an 1870s house in Connellsville. The beautiful Queen Anne stained-glass windows on the passenger station were recovered from an old mansion in Uniontown before it was torn down.
On the platform of the passenger train sit two cast-iron bridge supports from the old Millsboro railroad bridge that was torn down and a wooden baggage cart from approximately 1870. Ed’s workshop occupies the end portion of the passenger station.
Inside, the station is divided into two rooms that house the majority of Ed’s collection. The outer room is a replica of a freight master’s station, including an original 1880s freight master’s desk. A telephone switchboard from Brownsville’s Union Station sits nearby. It’s also home to a collection of clocks, signs, antique toys and more – including a metal pedal car that once belonged to Ed’s wife, Jeannine.
The smaller room opens into a larger room, with a ticket station on one end. Passenger benches from various railroads divide the space, including one possibly from a Washington & Waynesburg Railroad passenger station. Near the ticket station a mannequin greets visitors dressed in an authentic conductor’s uniform. Another mannequin, the assistant train master, sits behind the ticket booth. To the right of the entry, in the corner, sits a wooden phone booth. Close the door, and the operational lights and fan turn on.
A collection of streetcar memorabilia and historical items, additional model and toy trains, an antique shoeshine station, Jeannine’s collection of railroad silver, and a streetcar destination sign that lists area stops and lights up (still using an original light bulb!) are also housed in the main room.
Before retiring, Ed owned DeMuth Florist in Connellsville. DeMuth Florist was founded in 1865 by Peter R. DeMuth and is the fifth oldest florist in the country. Ed was the fourth generation to have owned and operated the flower shop. He keeps a collection of memorabilia, photographs, and signs from the flower shops history in the passenger station. His wife Jeannine is a retired teacher and principal for Connellsville.
From almost the very beginning, Ed planned to provide the public access to his collection. “My intent is to share it with everyone,” Ed says. “People identify with it, whether they have an interested in the railroads. They identify with the collection.”
The Millsboro Railroad Museum is open to the public by appointment only. To make a reservation for a tour, please call Ed at 724-366-4963. Donations are welcome. Step back in time with a visit inside a Victorian-era railroad station!