Fort Smith Trolley Museum

The museum was established by the Fort Smith Streetcar Restoration Association (FSSRA), formed in 1979 to preserve and display transit history relating to Fort Smith. That the organization uses Streetcar in its name but named its museum a Trolley museum is a reflection of the fact that, in American English, the terms streetcar and trolley are used interchangeably. ==Streetcar line==

Streetcar operation at the museum was inaugurated on May 19, 1991, using ex-Fort Smith Light and Traction Company car 224, a Birney-type streetcar built in 1926 by the American Car Company. The initial line was about one-quarter mile long, using ex-Frisco freight tracks, along which FSSRA volunteers had installed trolley wire and support poles. It connected the carbarn, at 100 S. 4th Street, with the Fort Smith National Historic Site. This extension, from the line's east end, more than doubled the length of operational track, making it about . This short extension included a crossing of Rogers Avenue, and the city council funded the cost of the crossing installation, citing the line's value as a tourist attraction. The first extension since 1996 was opened on November 24, 2002, starting with a curve just before the previous terminus at Garrison between 3rd and 4th streets and running along the south side of Garrison Avenue, to 2nd Street. This is within the West Garrison Avenue Historic District, which is also listed on the NRHP. At the other end of the line, a very short extension in May 2005 took the track across Wheeler Avenue to a new terminus at 7th Street, making the line about in length. A much longer extension from there was planned, which would take the line north along 7th Street. The line's first extension since 2005 opened on May 21, 2016, bringing into use newly laid track and trolley wire along 7th Street. The line's new eastern terminus is on 7th Street at Rogers Avenue, and the approximately 750-foot extension made the full line about long. Schedule Operation of the streetcar/trolley takes place year-round, running seven days a week from May 1 through October 31 and on weekends during all other months. Hours of operation are 10:00–5:00 on Saturdays and (when operating) weekdays, and 1:00–5:00 on Sundays. A wheelchair ramp was constructed at one stop in 1997. ==Vehicles==

Streetcars in 1997 car 9 in 1966, at the former Trolleyville USA museum. It is being restored by FSTM. As of 2016, the museum has two fully restored and operational streetcars: Fort Smith car 224, which was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1994 and Hot Springs Street Railway Company car 50 (built in 1904 by the St. Louis Car Company), which operated in Hot Springs, Arkansas, until 1939. Car 50 entered service in May 2016, after 16 years of restoration work, but Birney car 224 remains the primary streetcar that the museum uses for normal service (because one-man operation is more practical with it). Although restoration work has been under way on other streetcars at the museum for several years, car 224 was the only operational car for the first 25 years of trolley operation at the museum – until car 50's restoration was completed in 2016. The Fort Smith and Veracruz cars are all single-truck cars, but in 1992 FSSRA acquired the body of Hot Springs Street Railway Company car 50 (St. Louis Car Company, 1904), a double-truck car which once operated in Hot Springs. Locomotives in 2008 Of four locomotives owned by the museum and kept on public display, three are listed on the National Register of Historic Places (NRHP): • Frisco 4003, a USRA Light Mikado steam locomotive built in 1919 – donated to FSTM in 1998 and listed on the NRHP in 2004. • Maumelle Ordnance Works Locomotive 1, a Vulcan gasoline-mechanical, 35-ton switcher built in 1942 – donated to FSTM in 1988 and listed on the NRHP in 2006. • United States Air Force Locomotive No. 1246, a General Electric diesel-electric, 44-ton switcher built in 1953, which was listed on the NRHP on the same date as Locomotive No. 1 (shown above), September 20, 2006 (ref. no. 06000840). It was acquired by FSTM in 1992. Also in the collection are three cabooses, a passenger car and various items of non-passenger railroad rolling stock. Buses As of 1997, the museum owned three vintage motor buses: A 1939 ex-Little Rock Twin Coach R-23, a 1954 Fort Smith General Motors TGH-3102 bus, and a 1951 ex-Oklahoma City GM bus. The original Fort Smith bus, No. 285, was used in the 1988 movie Biloxi Blues. ==See also==