Arizona Railway Museum tracks yesteryear

The locomotives of the Arizona Railway Museum sit tombstone still now beneath the silent circles of the hawks near Tumbleweed Park.

VIDEO: Tour the Arizona Railway Museum

But each one of these formidable engines, boxy cabooses and streamlined passenger cars once served as part of the nation’s bloodstream, hauling travelers cross-country, moving ore, freight and cattle from supply centers to the hinterlands, and binding a continent together between parallel rails.

Railroads are intertwined with American history. They fueled American expansion, then urbanization. They planted seeds for cities like Chandler, where these cars now reside.

Visitors to the Arizona Railway Museum learn quickly that their trains are more than massive antiques. They are time capsules, whose heavy doors offer passage into different ages: when workers stowed their lunch in the icebox and rode the jump seat between the mines; when luxury was a pull-down bed in a Pullman sleeper car; when executives kicked back in the club car, sipping a drink in the Turquoise Room and watching the world roll by.

Our Web video takes us inside the museum for a look at the iron horses and volunteers who labor to bring them back from the dead. Go to evtrib.com and click on “Tribune Videos.”

ARIZONA RAILWAY MUSEUM

330 E. Ryan Road

Chandler, AZ 85224

Hours: Sat. & Sun. Noon to 4 p.m. (until May 25)

Admission: $2 adults; $5 families and groups

Information: (480) 821-1108 or www.azrymuseum.org