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| New Train Station circa 1907 - Historic North Carolina Collection, Archival Edition 1999 Click images to enlarge |
During the summer,
June 8, 1907, Beaufort launched "Gala Week." Banners and bunting were
draped while residents and guests dressed in Sunday best attended a
grand parade and speeches that launched the festivities, all celebrating
Beaufort's new depot and the first train—coming into town engine first.
The
Spanish Colonial Revival six-bay long and two-bay wide train station was
built of frame construction with a steep hipped roof; eaves flared
outward to create an overhang of about ten feet on all sides. It was
covered with red tile shingles and supported by massive sawn brackets.
Walls were built with a weatherboard wainscot with rough-textured stucco
above. The building had Craftsman-style paired sash windows and a bay
window on the Broad Street side, flanked by two entrances. The interior
contained two separate waiting rooms.
Neal Willis, born in 1917, wrote in Beaufort by the Sea, Memories of a Lifetime, "It
was quite an event when the trains came in each day. We would go down
to Railroad Street (Broad Street) and count the cars and wave at the
passengers. The Depot had white and colored sections. In between was the
ticket office. On the west side was the freight room. Mr. Seth Gibbs
was the stationmaster. Mr. Webb was the ticket agent and telegrapher.”
The depot was full of activity for thirty years; the train not only
provided easier transportation to and from Beaufort, it also brought a
new economy, enabling local citizens to more easily ship seafood and
other goods.
By 1938, passenger service ceased when the line between Morehead City and Beaufort was acquired by the Beaufort and Morehead Railroad. Owners of the depot were persuaded to sell the vacant train depot to the Town of Beaufort to use as its library. The 2,570 square foot building required considerable refurbishing. The Beaufort Woman’s Club, under the leadership of Mrs. W. L. Woodard, came to the rescue raising funds for the work. In December 1940 the library moved into the depot and was located there into the 1960s when the leaking roof, termites and the old pot-belly stove provided an inadequate location for a proper library.
Though
there was no passenger depot, the railroad line continued to operate as
“The Route of the Jets” between Beaufort and Morehead City into the
1980s. The railroad drawbridge over the Beaufort Channel at the foot of
Broad Street was demolished in the mid-1990s; the removal of the tracks
down the middle of Broad Street began in 1994.
In
1996 the Beaufort Woman’s Club joined with the Town of Beaufort to
thoroughly and beautifully restore the 1907 Train Depot. With much help
from John and Ginny Costlow, its period displays of early-20th century
railroad memorabilia and old photographs, help the depot remain a symbol
and a reminder of the train bringing the outside world to Beaufort.
Jack Dudley - Beaufort An Album of Memories
Susan W. Simpson – Carteret County Public Library, Beaufort - A Brief History
Neal Willis – Beaufort By the Sea, Memories of a Lifetime
