This month’s Daytrippin’ takes us to Winnsboro, to visit the South Carolina Railroad Museum. The museum offers self-guided tours of railroad rolling stock and railroad memorabilia. They also offer train rides on the Rockton, Rion, and Western Railroad. The Rockton and Rion Railway was a Class III shoreline railroad operating in Fairfield County serving the Anderson Quary shipping sand and gravel until 1981. The railroad owned 12-mile of track; 5 miles of track was rebuilt by the museum to operate the tour trains. The museum renamed the railroad the Rockton, Rion and Western Railroad and operates numerous train throughout the year.
The museum has a nice selection of railroad cars to explore, the cars are in various stages of restoration. There is a beautifully restored 4-6-0 steam locomotive from the Hampton and Branchville Railroad, The Hampton and Branchville Railroad and Lumber Company was chartered in 1891 the railroad changed its name to the Hampton and Branchville Railroad in 1924. The H&B aquired its first diesel locomotive in 1951 and retired their last steam locomotive in 1958. The Hampton and Branchville operates freight services to Canady’s from a CSX connection at Hampton, a distance of about 40 miles. In addition to the steam locomotive, the museum has a number of passenger cars from the Ringling Brother Barnum and Bailey Circus, Cabooses, and a Diesel Locomotives. They also have a museum building that is filled with railroad lanterns and a replica office from the Branchville Depot and a model railroad that shows the current museum train line. One of the tours include a number of railcars; there is a passenger car, postal car, and baggage car that are open to walk through and interact with the exhibits.
While we were there, they were running a Halloween Train called the Pumpkin Patch Express. This was a 3-mile train ride to the pumping patch located along the rail line with a layover for the children to explore the pumpkin patch. The museum was offering a train each hour for the tour using 2 of there passenger trains. Other tours are also scheduled during the year including a Valentine Dinner Train, Easter Bunny Train, Memorial Day Train, Saturday Summer Train, Santa Clause Train, and BBQ Trains. The museum is free to tour but the train rides are an additional fee and a reservation is recommended.
Winnsboro is a very easy 102-mile drive from Walterboro. For hours of operation and train schedule, see their website at wwwscrm.org.
