Council Bluffs, Iowa - Union Pacific Railroad Museum

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 your 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. [Paul Damon, 06/25/2003]