Last spring the Chadds Ford Historical Society opened an
exhibit about dairy farming in the region. The society has followed up with an
exhibit on railroads called “All Aboard for Chadds Ford.”

The exhibit, in two rooms at the society’s Barn Visitors’
Center, features old photos, tools, lights, an old railroad telegraph key and a
working model train.

Sallie Corbishley, who spearheaded the work for the exhibit,
said during the May 21 opening night that railroads changed the face of the
region.

“[Railroads] changed the lifestyle of the people living
here,” Corbishley said. “You could not get to Philadelphia in less than about
five hours. When the railroads came in you could get your agriculture products
to market. You could visit your relatives. You could do a lot of things [once
the railroads came in.]

She added that the rail lines also brought the city dwellers
out to the Chadds Ford countryside and to Kennett Square.

“I think that’s when the tourist business started,” she
said. “The picnic parks brought tourists out.”

She added that people also came out to see the Brandywine
and to look for a summer home.

Corbishley hopes that people come away from the exhibit with
an understanding of “what a great difference the railroads made for the life of
the people out here.”

An exit brochure for “All Aboard for Chadds Ford” includes a
number of unattributed comments from area residents who reminisced about those
old days when train were the means for rapid transportation.

Some mentioned that horseback was the main mode of
transportation in Concord Township while others talked about riding the rail
out to old Birmingham Park.

Cap Weil, a former Historical Society president, reinforced
some of the comments saying he remembers his parents talking about riding the
train into the area from Eastern Delaware County when they were young.

The reason for the train exhibit was amazement over the fact
that Chadds Ford Village had two major rail lines running through it, said
Corbishley. Those lines were the Octorara branch of the Pennsylvania Railroad
and the Wilmington and Northern branch of the Reading Railroad.

“Why would this little burg—if you could even call it
that—have all these rail lines coming through it?” she asked.

Corbishley and the other committee members, including Frank
Mendenhall and former Chadds Ford resident Kathy Wandersee, started working on
the exhibit in January. Corbishley said the committee structure was both
interesting and fun.

“We had a lot of ideas coming together which made it a lot
of fun,” Corbishley said.