In downtown Battle Creek standing along the river with the same name as the city is this fantastic old train depot. The railroad tracks are gone now and the last passenger train left the station in the 1980’s. I can imagine the in its heyday the passengers coming and going thru this station on their journey looking up at the clock tower to see if they are on time. Trains no longer use the station but it is still used as a restaurant. It also has a Michigan Historical Marker with a sign that reads:
The Michigan Central Railroad Depot opened on July 27, 1888. Rogers and McFarlane of Detroit designed the depot, one of several Richardsonian Romanesque-style stations between Detroit and Chicago in the late nineteenth century. Thomas Edison as well as Presidents William Howard Taft and Gerald Ford visited here. The depot was acquired by the New York Central Railroad in 1918, Penn Central in 1968 and Amtrak in 1970. The depot was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1971.
A much as I like driving around the state I have always wondered what it would be like to travel the state by train, I guess I was born a little late for that.
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