The Unadilla Valley Railway Museum now owns its depot in New Berlin, New York, thanks to the generosity of an anonymous donor.

The donor sent a bank check to the museum on the last day of 2003, and the sale of the depot was finalized a few days ago, according to George Wolfangle of Pittsfield, the museum's vice president.

"We were trying to buy the depot on a land contract, but it was difficult to come up with the more than $1,000-a-month," he said Tuesday.

The museum was attempting to pay off the $50,000-plus-interest price of the building in five years.

Last August, the museum's officers appealed to its 70 or so members for donations so it would not default on payments.

Then last fall, the donor met with a museum member who disclosed the financial problems in New Berlin, Wolfangle said. Within months, the check had arrived and the pressure was off.
"We've been in this building about 31/2 years, and we wanted to start restoring it, but that made no sense until we owned it," said Wolfangle, a retired conductor who worked on the Port Authority Trans Hudson rail line.

Now plans for the depot, which is approximately 125-feet long and 35-feet wide, are being made, he said. Artifacts from several different railroads, including those that directly served the Unadilla Valley, are on display in showcases. Telegraph keys, signs, switches, tools, and many photographs adorn different rooms.

The museum also owns half a railroad coach it would like to move onsite and restore, and members want to install tracks alongside the depot to show off rolling stock, said Wolfangle.

The depot, which belonged to the Ontario and Western Railroad, was built in 1869, he said. It is built on stone piers and at one time had a slate roof. Structurally, the building is sound, and the original layout, including the gentlemen's and general waiting rooms, is still apparent.

In the large freight section, the museum has set up a model railroad that shows how track and railroads were configured in New Berlin years ago.

The original Unadilla Valley Railway depot in New Berlin was razed years ago and most tracks in the area were uprooted in about 1960, but the railway for which the museum is named had a proud history, Wolfangle said.

An Internet site about the railroad, www.trains-n-planes.com, states that "by the 1880s, the New York, Ontario & Western had built a branch to New Berlin. The Delaware, Lackawanna & Western had built a branch line to Richfield Springs, the line running through Bridgewater and north.

..."Col. Nehemiah Pierce formally put forth the idea of a Unadilla Valley railroad, which would tie the DL&W in the north to the O&W in the south. After ironing out many difficulties, work began in 1889 at Bridgewater," the site states.

"By August of 1893, the rails were laid as far as Leonardsville, and the DL&W was running two trains a week to the hamlet. A financial panic in that year once again halted work, but by March of 1894 the financial markets had stabilized enough that work once again began, and by September of that year, the railroad had reached West Edmeston. As a celebration, and to re-assure local investors, an excursion train was run out of West Edmeston; 645 people crowded onto the excursion train, and rode north.

"By November of 1894, the railroad reached South Edmeston. In January, the railroad was renamed the Unadilla Valley Railway Company; the name it would keep for nearly 70 years, until the line was finally dismantled.

"In the summer of 1895, the railroad finally reached New Berlin. On July 25, 1895, the railroad officially opened, amid much fanfare, celebration, and merriment; the population of New Berlin nearly tripled for the occasion."