The Lincoln Funeral Train

The only thing that could draw me from my beloved balloons would be a train.

Until I looked at the prices. Especially this beauty:

By April 1865, the Union had prevailed over the Confederacy, and the Iron Horse connected towns and cities across the nation and its territories. The Nashville, a 4-4-0 American-type locomotive built by the Cuyahoga Steam Furnace Company during the 1850s, was a stalwart on the Cleveland, Columbus & Cincinnati Railroad.

After Lincoln was shot at Ford’s Theatre in Washington, D.C., Secretary of War Edwin Stanton took charge of arranging Lincoln’s funeral, and for the body to be transported back to Springfield, Illinois. Though Mary Todd Lincoln, the president’s widow, was insisting on a simple and direct burial, Stanton’s plan evolved into a national journey involving numerous elaborate ceremonies. 

On April 21, the remains of the president and his son Willie, who had died in 1863, were placed in the United States for a journey that roughly retraced the inaugural train trip four year earlier. Of the approximately 20 different locomotives that would carry the father and son home over 1,600 miles of track, the Nashville, which pulled the funeral consist over the CC&C’s rails in Ohio, would become the most famous.

With the assistance of Wayne Wesolowski, Retired Director of the Benedictine University Lincoln Train Project, Lionel now offers this important train with full mourning decoration in 1:48 scale as part of the Heritage Series of 19th century steam locomotives. 

All yours for a mere $799. Plus $299 for the two additional cars below.

Gulp.