KANSAS CITY, Mo. — It took more than 50 years and a trip to Kansas City to solve the mystery behind a missing railroad boxcar.
In appreciation for the United States’ role in World War II, France gifted several “merci train” boxcars to the US, including one to New Jersey in the 1940s.
As the trains were paraded around in celebration of the end of the war, some of the boxcars disappeared and historians speculated destroyed.
The United Railroad Historical Society of New Jersey runs the Boonton Yard, about 30 miles west of New York City. Researchers there were able to track the missing boxcar from the 1940s to a location on Long Island in the 1980s, but weren’t able to keep track of where it went after that.
In the 1990s, an old rundown boxcar was found in Tennessee. That same boxcar eventually wound up at the National World War I Museum and Memorial in Kansas City, Missouri.
Researchers took a closer look at the boxcar in Kansas City and discovered it was the long-missing boxcar from New Jersey.
“Items like this don’t just pop up - it’s literally like finding lost treasure,” Kevin Phalon of the United Railroad Historical Society told NBC4 New York. “It’s rare something this important disappears then reappears.”
Historians in New Jersey want to bring the boxcar back east. They’ll need to raise $20,000 to transport the boxcar back, but rail historians there are excited about the possibility.
“We’re gonna bring it back and restore it,” Phalon said. “We’re going to make it beautiful like it was. It’s incredibly significant.”
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