Great Northern John McLoughlin

It has been a slow progression but this beatifying project  on the roof of our heavy weight sleeper, John Mcloughlin is almost complete!   Our goal  has been to completely remove all the old rust and paint off of the flat part of the roof and prime it.   This job has been undertaken by one of our devoted retired members,  Robert Olson of Waukegan, Illinois.  He has diligently been working on the roof for more than 7 months and has recently completed his goal. If you come out to the museum on most any Wednesday you will find him working away on this project.  The other project related to the roof has been the removal, of again, old paint from the hips of the roof.  We have had another four volunteers working on this project.  These folks are still among the younger working class so it has taken a little longer to complete.   Just recently we have completed the priming of all these areas.  These four guys are;  Mark Hoffman, Matt Holtz,  Dale Steichen, and Andy Townsend.    It takes a long time and many volunteer hours to complete a project of this magnitude.   Just prepping the roof for future painting has taken about 250 volunteer hours to complete. It is just part of the big picture puzzle.   Our short term goal is to repair, replace and paint the roof Gloss black.  Along with that goal is the  ultimate goal of repairing and replacing  all areas of badly deteriorated rusty steel for eventual finally painting of the entire exterior.            We would like to operate the John Mcloughlin in our demonstration passenger train some day.  Like many projects at Irm this too is being privately funded thru your donations.    Please consider assisting us in any way possible to continue our exciting progress on this grand sleeper of the past.     Thanks    Roger