Photo by Richard Bauer, via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY 2.0)
Upcoming Events
No ticketed events are currently listed for Ellis Railroad Museum. Many heritage operators publish schedules seasonally or run on regular open hours instead of dated events.
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About Ellis Railroad Museum
Small railroad museum in Ellis with restored Union Pacific depot and a 1/2-scale miniature train (Smoky Hill, Pacific & Western) that gives short public rides on weekends in summer. Old standalone URL is dead; content lives on the City of Ellis site.
History
Ellis owes its existence to the railroad: the Kansas Pacific Railway built a water station on the site in 1867, laid out the town in 1873 — establishing a depot, a hotel, and a few shops — and drew workers from Syracuse, New York, and Louisville, Kentucky, before the town spent the late 1870s as a cowtown shipping cattle herds from the south. Founded in 1994, the Ellis Railroad Museum keeps that heritage alive with items and photographs from the town's railroading past, displayed in a restored Union Pacific depot, plus a 5,000-square-foot model train exhibit. Outside, a miniature railroad circles a one-mile loop track known as the BK&E — the 'Buddy King and Ellis Railroad,' named for its primary donor, Francis 'Buddy' King, a former Ellis mayor who died in office in 1994 — and the half-scale train offers short public rides on summer weekends.
Nearby
Ellis sits on Interstate 70 in northwestern Kansas, 13 miles west-northwest of Hays on the western edge of the Smoky Hills, where a dam on Big Creek forms the long, narrow Big Creek Lake running through town. The town's other claim to fame is automotive: Chrysler Corporation founder Walter P. Chrysler grew up here, starting out as a machinist's apprentice in the local railroad roundhouse, and his preserved boyhood home now operates as the Walter P. Chrysler Boyhood Home and Museum.
Where to Stay
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