Travel Collections: Merci Train Boxcars
The Merci Train, or Gratitude Train, consisted of 49 box cars given by French citizens to each state in the US as thanks for assistance rebuilding their country after World War II. Read about it and it will warm your heart. We like to visit the ones that are still in existence when our travels permit.
Visited (35)
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November 2017 and June 2022, McCormick-Stillman Railroad Park, Scottsdale The boxcar is in great shape after undergoing restoration in 1989. |
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November 2019, American Legion Post #41, Helena The boxcar is in great shape after undergoing restoration led by an Eagle Scout. |
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October 2022, Fresno Federal Post 509, Fresno The boxcar is in great shape but is missing its shields. |
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April 2018, American Legion Nanticoke Post #6, Seaford The boxcar is in great shape. |
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May 2021, Old Idaho Penitentiary, Boise The boxcar is in great shape. |
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September 2019, National Veterans Memorial Shrine, Fort Wayne Previously visited exactly one year earlier in September 2018 but didn't get to see the inside of the building housing the boxcar. Visited again in 2019. The boxcar is just starting to be restored. |
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November 2016 and August 2023, Antique Acres, north of Cedar Falls This was the first boxcar we visited. It didn't occur to us to photograph the other side until we had visited several other boxcars, so we went back nearly seven years later to find it in the process of being freshly restored, with a larger shelter to protect it. |
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July 2018, Veterans Memorial Park, Holly Hills The boxcar is in great shape. We saw it again when we happened to drive by in September 2021and got sunny pictures to replace the cloudy ones from our first visit. |
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April 2020, Veterans Memorial Park, Hays The boxcar is in great shape. It has a large box attached to one end. |
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March 2021, Kentucky Railway Museum, New Haven The boxcar is in good shape. |
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September 2021, Old State Capitol Museum, Baton Rouge The boxcar is in good shape. It is stored on the grounds of a museum and we didn't go in, so we weren't able to get a picture of the back. |
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September 2021, Railway Village Museum, Boothbay The boxcar is in great shape. |
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September 2021, B&O Railroad Museum, Baltimore The boxcar is in rough shape but appears to be completely original. Most shields are intact. |
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June 2021, The Forty & Eight Society, Lansing The boxcar is in great shape. It had been restored in 2005. |
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July 2019, Camp Ripley, Little Falls The boxcar is in great shape. There is a small exhibit inside. |
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November 2019, The old Gulf, Mobile, & Ohio Railroad Depot, Jackson The boxcar is in great shape. The shields on each side were not the original wood. Instead, they were images printed on something like plexiglass. We saw many like this after visiting this one. |
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November 2021, Sedalia The boxcar is in immaculate shape. |
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May 2021, Fort William Henry Harrison, Helena The boxcar is in great shape. |
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November 2021 and June 2022, Boulder City The boxcar is in great shape. We didn't get a picture of the other side so we went back again seven months later. |
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September 2021, Manchester The boxcar is in great shape. |
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April 2020, State Fairgrounds, Albuquerque The boxcar is in great shape. This is the only state that has two boxcars, having used an additional purchased boxcar for restoration and leaving the original unrestored. |
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April 2018, Oneida County 40&8 Club, Whitesboro, New York The boxcar is in great shape and the other side has a ramp so that it is completely accessible. It appears that the boxcar can be opened, so there's probably a display of some sort inside, but we didn't investigate further. |
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May 2021, North Dakota Heritage Center, Bismarck The boxcar is in great shape. |
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September 2019, Camp Perry The boxcar is in great shape. The other side is not visible because the boxcar is placed against the back wall of the shelter it is in. |
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February 2023, J.D. McCarty Center for Children with Developmental Disabilities, Norman The boxcar looked freshly repainted. There are no shields on the back. |
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August 2023, Simpson Park, North Bend, Oregon The boxcar is in great shape and protected by plexiglass. |
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April 2021, Fort Indiantown Gap The boxcar is in great shape, but none of the shields are present, so it may be undergoing restoration. It has a large box attached to one end. |
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September 2021, Museum of Work & Culture, Woonsocket The boxcar is in great shape and is displayed in a room dedicated to it along with several gifts from the boxcar. |
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September 2021, Memorial Park, Bishopville The boxcar is in good shape and has a full gallery of displays inside. |
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May 2021, Near State Fairgrounds, Huron The boxcar is in great shape. |
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February 2023, Texas Military Forces Museum, Camp Mabry, Austin The boxcar is in great shape. |
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May 2021, Sarg Hubbard Park, Yakima The boxcar is in great shape. |
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April 2021, Veteran's Park, Welch The boxcar is in great shape. |
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November 2016 and February 2021, American Legion Post 6, Cheyenne The boxcar was in the process of being restored the first time we visited, since none of the traditional markings were on the outside of the box car. Instead, they were stacked neatly underneath. Restoration was completed in 2017 and we visited it again in 2021. |
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February 2021, Union Station Museum, Ogden The boxcar is intact but has lots of peeling paint. It is on display outside the museum so we were able to see it even though the museum was closed. |
Not Yet Visited (8)
| State | Future Travel Notes |
| Alabama | Huntsville |
| Georgia | In a museum near Atlanta |
| Hawaii and DC | Ewa, Oahu - as of 6/2021, boxcar is partially disassembled for restoration |
| North Carolina | Spencer |
| Tennessee | Bristol |
| Vermont | Colchester - museum was closed when we visited in 9/2021 |
| Virginia | Newport News |
| Wisconsin | Ashwaubenon, near Green Bay |
No Longer In Existence (6)
| State | Notes |
| Colorado | Missing |
| Connecticut | Destroyed by fire |
| Illinois | Missing |
| Massachusetts | Missing |
| Nebraska | Missing |
| New Jersey | Destroyed by fire |
Copyright © Deborah Schilling/Thomas Bundy