Chesapeake Beach Railway Musuem
P.O. Box 783, Chesapeake Beach MD 20732
[on waterfront, south side of marina]
(410) 257-3892
(301) 855-6472

--Hours  <<1995>>
May-Sept: 7 days/wk, 1pm-4pm
April,Oct: weekends, 1pm-4pm
all other times by reservation

Events <<1996>>:
    Bay Breeze Summer Concert
	June 13, 7:30pm
	July 11, 7:30pm
	August 7, 7:30pm

    Antique Auto show
	May 19, 10:30am-3pm

    Day hike of the former ROW 
	April 6, 9am

--Admission
Free, donations welcomed

--Features
Only known surviving CB equipment: two locomotive cabs and 
half of the parlor car "Dolores" (under restoration).
(to get there, you take MD Rt 260, which is the former ROW,
"the only straight road in the county").

The museum is the 1898 former CB terminal station. The museum 
is also concerned with the former resort at Chesapeake Beach
which was tied to the railroad.

"Build a lavish resort town on the shores of the Chesapeake
Bay, with reliable and convenient railroad service from
Washington and Baltimore.  that was the vision of Otto Mears, 
an independent, short line railroad builder from Colorado.

In the late 1890's, Mears and a group of Denver associates
designed Chesapeake Beach as a resort town complete with 
beachfront hotels, a race track, casino, bathhouses, and 
beaches.  A 1600-foot boardwalk was built over the water, 
supporting vairous attractions: a band shell, a carousel, 
a dance pavillion, a roller coaster, and many entertainment
booths.  A mile-long pier was built to receive passengers 
arriving daily by steamer from Baltimore in the summer months.

Construction of the railway began at the same time, and on
June 9, 1900, the first train arrived at Chesapeake Beach 
with much fanfare and a full load of passengers.  The 
one-hour excursion, nicknamed the "Honeysuckle Route," 
carried passengers and freight daily through the Southern
Maryland countryside.  Like the trip itself, however, the
train to Chesapeake Beach wasn't destined to last very long.
Financial hardship caused by the Great Depression of the 
1930's and the increasing popularity of the automobile 
brought on the demise of the railroad.  On April 15, 1935, 
the final train chugged away from the Chesapeake Beach 
station with its last passengers.

Today, thanks to the work of local preservationists and the 
Calvert County Historical Society, the old railroad station
can take you further than ever, because now it guides you
on a journey through time.

The Chesapeake Beach Railway station, fashioned into a 
museum in 1979, recreates memories of the bayside resort
of nearly a century ago.  The museum offers visitors an
audio-visual presentation featuring the history of the
Chesapeake Beach Railway [and newsreel footage of the CB 
from the 1930's], as well as artifacts, photographs, and 
exhibits portraying resort life and transportation in the 
early 1900's."

--Related
The second carousel of the resort, a Dentzel machine erected 
on the boardwalk in 1929, operated (on shore) until 1962?72?
It is now in operation at Watkins Regional Park in Largo, MD.
Watkins Park also has a 2 ft gauge train that operates on a 
dogbone track. The locomotive is dressed as a 4-2-4, but is
really a gasoline powered Climax-style.  
FWIW, The Chesapeake Beach resort had a 2 ft gauge 
true-steam train on the mile-long pier, but I doubt that 
this is the same track.
Watkins Park is coincidentally just 2 miles from the CBRy ROW.