Council Bluffs, Iowa: Union Pacific Railroad Museum

File under, "Because Why Not:" This railroad museum has on display the skull cap of outlaw "Big Nose George" Parrott, once owned by the first female doctor in Wyoming and allegedly used posthumously as an ash tray, pen holder, and door stop. The rest of Parrott's skull is on display alongside shoes made of his skin in Rawlins, WY.

The Lincoln Room is part of the Union Pacific Railroad Museum. The Lincoln car silver service and furniture are arranged in a mockup of the railroad car that carried the slain President in 1865.

The Union Pacific Museum is open again in its new home in downtown Council Bluffs, Iowa. Located in the renovated Carnegie Library building on the south side of Bayliss Park, it has all of the old displays, including Tom Horn's gun, and some new interactive stuff too. The high point is a virtual locomotive cab that gives you the feeling of driving "a thousand wheels of freight train doin' 90 miles an hour." I thought the gift shop was kind of disappointing -- it's very small with no postcards and no cool things like train whistles.

While in town you might want to check out the Omni Center mall a couple of blocks north of the U.P. Museum. There is a boy with a boot statue display. It was the centerpiece of the fountain there for quite a few years until he was retired a few years ago. Now he stands high and dry in the hallway.