75-Year-Old Waite Park Boxcar Comes Home to Join Train Display [VIDEO]

WAITE PARK -- A piece of Waite Park's past has finally returned home.

A 75-year-old boxcar built in Waite Park in 1941 and rebuilt in 1961 will be placed along Third Street North where it's journey began.

Ron Euteneuer is the Treasurer of the St. Cloud Area Rail Legacy Museum and says they bought the boxcar just as it was ready to become scrap.

"This railroad boxcar of Great Northern Heritage was available because it was going to be recycled, which means cut up for scrap," says Euteneuer.

The 40-foot, 30,000-pound boxcar was hauled from Minneapolis to Kimball Railcar Services who sandblasted, repaired and painted it back to its former glory, which cost about $14,000.

Clarence Butkowski used to paint boxcars and says it looks almost as good as when he painted them.

"The only thing I see different about it is the lettering where it says Great Northern, I never remember painting it red I always painted it white," says Butkowski.

Euteneuer says they plan to add a locomotive to the display this summer and one day the old paint shop building, which sits behind the train.

"It's our objective here to acquire the paint shop, the building north of us and was constructed in 1890, to have that given to the city of Waite Park and have that become our railroad museum," says Euteneuer.

The railroad industry played a large part in shaping the community of Waite Park and residents who remember are happy to have these pieces of history return home.