Gaithersburg’s Community Museum has New Logo, New Hours

PHOTO | City of Gaithersburg

The Gaithersburg Community Museum is extending its hours and showing off its new logo on the side of the city’s newly restored caboose.

Located at 9 S. Summit Avenue the museum has new extended hours: Tues. – Sat., 10 a.m. – 3 p.m.

“We felt like there was an audience for the extended hours. We have a lot of families that come through the day,” said Program Coordinator Karen Lottes.

The Museum offers a Freight House with exhibits now on a General Store and the Civil War through January. The exhibit includes information about the goods sold in general stores as well as a bank area and school room from the era. The Caboose offers  a learning center where kids can learn about the different kinds of jobs there are on a railroad and try on clothes representative of those jobs, according to Lottes. They can build a train set and play with it, and there are activity and coloring sheets for them to do as well. Additional history exhibits and interactive exhibits are in the works.

“The museum is a mix of history exhibits and learning centers,” Lottes said. “There is a lot for young children to learn about the different roles you have working on the train.”

The logo is relatively new and now marks the side of the caboose. It was designed in-house in a collaborative effort headed by the city’s Public Information Office graphic designer.  It was painted on the caboose by First Floor Graphics of Baltimore.

“This is the first time it has been trotted out in view in public,” Lottes said.

The Museum complex also includes the BUDD CAR, the Steam Locomotive, History Park, and the Train Station. The BUDD Car has undergone restoration and should be opening to the public with exhibits on commuting in Gaithersburg and community exhibit cases this fall, Lottes said.

About Krista Brick

Krista Brick is a multi-media journalist with Montgomery Community Media.

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