The diners looked up, startled, as the train they had just disembarked from to have breakfast sputtered to life and chugged out of the station – without even the crew, who was dining with them.
The conductor chased after it on foot, but he couldn’t catch it as it roared full steam ahead, even if that just meant a speed of around 15 miles per hour.
A model railroad track is part of an exhibit about the Great Locomotive Chase currently on display at John B. Gordon Hall in LaFayette.
Photo by Katie Ward HamiltonAnd thus begins the story of Andrews’ Raiders and the Great Locomotive Chase. A new exhibit at John B. Gordon Hall in LaFayette takes viewers through all the twists and turns of the ill-fated scheme to help capture Chattanooga.
“This exhibit is to try to help people understand how the Great Locomotive Chase went down,” said Walker County Historical Society member Ron Underwood, who helped put together the exhibit complete with a circular model track with replica trains. “The actual General is at the Atlanta Cyclorama and Civil War Museum now.”
The exhibit runs through the end of April. In May and June a new exhibit about the Battle of LaFayette will be shown.