The Friends of the Galion Big Four Depot will hold a special event in celebration of National Train Day on Sunday, May 18. Mark J. Camp will be the featured speaker. Camp serves as a National Director of the Railroad Station Historical Society supporting one of his main interests: railroad history.
The celebration will be held at the First Lutheran Church, 127 South Columbus, Galion begininning at 2 p.m. with doors opening at 1:30 p.m. There will be a book signing following the event.
Camp maintains the website for the railroad historians of the Railroad Station Historical Society and rail fans. He is the author of five Arcadia books on local history: Railroad Depots of Northwest Ohio, Railroad Depots of West Central Ohio, Railroad Depots of Northeast Ohio, Railroad Depots of Central Ohio, and Railroad Depots of Southwest Ohio. He has photographed depots across the states and provinces of North America, many of which have long since been removed.
The Big Four Depot is located at Harding Way East and Washington Street, 127 N. Washington Street, Galion.
According to “Remarkable Ohio,” an Ohio Historical Society project, the “Big Four Depot” was dedicated on December 27, 1900 and served as division headquarters for the Cleveland, Chicago, Cincinnati, and St. Louis railroad, commonly called the Big Four.
The text of the project reads: Peak passenger usage occurred during and after World War I when 32 trains stopped there daily. Railway Express serviced as many as 20 trains a day into the 1950s, and Galion became a “whistle stop” for presidential campaigns with speeches from the train platform from such candidates as Al Smith in 1928, Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1932, and Dwight D. Eisenhower and Richard Nixon in 1952. In 1929 the New York Central acquired the Big Four, which moved the division headquarters west to Bellefontaine in Logan County. The ticket office remained opened until 1964, but all railroad offices closed in 1969. The Depot was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1974.
At the event there will also be raffles and merchandise on hand with proceeds going towards future depot restoration and preservation projects. Light refreshments will be provided.
The depot is owned by the city of Galion and restoration began in approximately 2005. For further information, please call 419-468-2944 or e-mail at friendsofthebig4depot@gmail.com. Information can also be found on Facebook at www.facebook.com/FriendsOfTheGalionBigFourDepot.
Mark J. Camp is an associate professor of geology at the University of Toledo (UT), a position he has held since 1976. He has a Ph.D from the Ohio State University and a M.S. and B.S. from the University of Toledo. His early research has been in the area of nonmarine malacology of Quaternary lacustrine deposits and he is responsible for assembling a large reference collection at UT. In later years his interests have focused on the history of building stone and brick use in Ohio. In geological circles he is perhaps best known for his popular books; Roadside Geology of Indiana, Roadside Geology of Ohio, and Ohio Oil and Gas.
