Giving thanks for the chapel car

The Halloween Storytelling Train is an engaging family outing, but it also represents an annual gathering for the Hodgins Family to visit chapel car 5 Messenger of Peace and remember their father, Arthur Halleck Hodgins, 1910 – 2005.  


The chapel car had served the elder Hodgins as a cabana adjacent to the family home, first in Snohomish, and later near Grayland.  His son Hal recently recounted, ‘one day back in 1971, dad was out walking and noticed the signs indicating that highway 2 was going to be widened.  He asked what was going to happen to the old rail car that had served as a roadside diner, and was told it would be demolished.  He asked if he could have it and was told that he could buy it for a $1. Very soon after it was in our backyard in Snohomish.  

Arthur lovingly cared for the chapel car, maintaining its unique Terne metal roof, and keeping fresh paint on the car’s exposed exterior.  The car was a part of family gatherings and events for more than 30 years, and became important to them, too.  Sadly, Mr. Hodgins passed away in October 2005 at the age of 95.  

In 2007 the Hodgins Family donated the chapel car to the Northwest Railway Museum.  It was moved from near the town of Grayland on the Pacific coast to Snoqualmie that same year.  It was successfully nominated to the National Register of Historic Places in 2009, and secured a Save America’s Treasures grant later that year.  Major rehabilitation work began in 2011 and the substantially complete car is now on exhibit in the Train Shed exhibit building in Snoqualmie.  


On 27 October 2019 the Hodgins Family traveled to Snoqualmie for their annual gathering in the  chapel car.  As part of this year’s gathering, the Museum was delighted to unveil a plaque in the car recognizing the importance of Arthur H. Hodgins in preserving the chapel car.  Sons Art and Hal were on hand to acknowledge and pose for a photo.