My Old Kentucky Dinner Train

The dinner train departs from Bardstown station, built in 1860 by the Bardstown and Louisville Railroad and notable as the only railroad station in Kentucky constructed of dry-stone. The Louisville and Nashville Railroad purchased the line's assets in 1864, and on February 1, 1888 the route was extended to reach Springfield, Kentucky. The L&N ended service to Bardstown in 1953, demolishing the station's passenger section, and in 1987 CSX — which had absorbed the L&N — sold the old Bardstown line, station included, to the R.J. Corman Railroad Group, a Nicholasville-based short-line operator founded by Richard J. Corman in 1973. Corman put the Bardstown Line back to work as a freight short line and launched My Old Kentucky Dinner Train, which made its inaugural run in 1989. The train takes its name from My Old Kentucky Home State Park, where Stephen Foster is said to have found the inspiration for his famous song, and a waiting-room addition restored passenger amenities to the historic stone depot in 1992.