The latest exhibit at Yesterday’s Memories & Truck Museum is on track and chugging along. The fully functioning model train display created by Michael D. Johnson and his wife, Ann was introduced at an Open House at the Museum on December 18.
Johnson, a 1963 graduate of Sanborn High School who now resides in West Des Moines, was on hand for the Open House. He answered questions about the display and reminisced with guests about his years growing up in Sanborn. Johnson said he can still picture in his mind the way Sanborn’s Main Street looked when he lived here and where all the businesses were located.
The display consists of three train sets, one streetcar and multiple active backgrounds. It features a town setting with homes and a business area. This is where the streetcar runs. The rural farm setting includes farmland and livestock as well as homes and businesses. These sections, with the trains moving through, mirror Sanborn’s past as a railroad town. Then there is an amusement park setting with numerous rides recalling days spent at Arnolds Park Amusement Park. You can even hear the sounds of the amusement park from that section of the display.

Train New Exhibit

Train 1 Johnson

Train 2 Youngsters

Train 3 This Busy Area

Train 4 A Farm Setting

Johnson was born into a railroad family. His father, Wm. M. “Bill” Johnson started out as a brakeman with The Milwaukee Railroad then spent the majority of his career with the railroad as a conductor both in Sanborn and his last 15 years prior to retirement in Rapid City, SD. Two prior generations before that, Michael’s grandfather J. F. “Frank” Johnson, and great-grandfather M. M. “Mike” Burns, also worked for the Milwaukee in Sanborn. Michael himself worked on the section gang during the summers, on his way to becoming an insurance adjuster in the Des Moines area. He retired in 2010, setting the stage for the steady development of the display that can now be seen in its entirety at the Museum.
The Johnsons wanted their personal multi-train display to be available to a larger group than just immediate family and friends to view and enjoy. They will also not miss the undertaking it had become to set up the display in their home each fall. Said Michael, “It was time to set it up one last time and leave it somewhere it could stay and not have to be disassembled every year, and what better place than Yesterday’s Memories & Truck Museum in Sanborn, the town where I grew up.”