Railway Museum. Photo: A. Usonienė |
Railway Museum. Photo: A. Usonienė |
Railway Museum. Photo: S. Saveljevo |
Railway Museum. Photo: A. Usonienė |
Railway Museum. Photo: Tomas Kapočius
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Railway Museum. Photo: Tomas Kapočius
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Railway Museum. Photo: Aleksas Pielikis |
Railway Museum. Photo: Aleksas Pielikis |
Railway Museum. Photo: Tomas Kapočius
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railway Museum
Contacts
Address: Geležinkelio g. 16, LT-01047, Vilnius.
Tel.: (+370 ~ 5) 269 37 41.
E-mail:
muziejus[at]litrail.lt;
v.lapeniene[at]litrail.lt;
Director – Vitalija Lapėnienė.
Information for Visitor
Tuesday to Friday 9–17, Saturday 9–16.
Closed on Sunday, Monday, National Holiday Eve, the last Friday of the
month.
Admission:
adults – 1,20 €
pupils, students and OAP – 0,65 €
excursion – 9 €
groups (up to 5 persons) – 4,50 €
child under 7, disabled, ICOM member – free.
Exposition
The purpose of the Railway Museum
is to collect, preserve and
promote the museum’s valuables related to the history of railways and
the activities of Lietuvos Geležinkeliai (Lithuanian Railways).
The Railway Museum is located on the second floor of the Vilnius
railway station, a historic building built in 1861. The museum
occupies three halls. These are three main visitor-oriented areas:
information (exhibition hall), cultural (exhibitions) and educational
(models hall).
The exhibition in the main museum hall
is arranged according to themes: travel, communications, road
construction, rolling stock, railway signalling, builders and
workers.
The beginning of the exhibition
acquaints visitors with the history of railway stations. There
are photos of first railway stations in Lithuania and authentic rail
travel attributes: trunks placed on authentic shelves from diesel
train D1, signs of luggage porters who worked at stations, dishes
from passenger carriages of different periods, an old ticket safe and
other related exhibits.
The history of railways is closely
related with the history of communications, which is reflected
in the Morse telegraph apparatus of 1916 and 1923, and bimetallic
wire from the Kaišiadorys-Liepoja railway section (1871) telegraph
line. Wire telegraph connecting railway stations was installed after
building the railway in Lithuania in the 19th century. Turmantas,
Dūkštas, Ignalina, Švenčionėliai, Vilnius, Lentvaris, Kaunas,
Virbalis and other stations had telegraphers as soon as in 1865. The
telegraph service also took care of telephone communications at the
stations. Telephone communications were established on the railways
at the start of the 20th century. Local battery telephones, a
telephone switch, a telephone hub, a postal correspondence stamping
(marking) machine (1957) and other authentic exhibits capture the
attention of visitors.
The history of railways is primarily the
history of railway construction reflected in old tools of
railway workers: a pickaxe, an axe for hewing sleepers, tongs for
lifting sleepers and hammers. Surveying instruments – an old
theodolite (1912) and a dumpy level (1940) – are standing next to
them. Visitors can “try” a manual saw machine and a manual drill
machine. Track fasteners – screws and elastic springs, spikes (and a
spike hammer-puller) and other track fasteners as well as markers
indicating the year of laying sleepers (1909-1965) – are arranged on
glass shelves. This year, Algimantas Norvilas, a March 11 Act
signatory, presented the Railway Museum with a collection of
fragments of railway tracks including exhibits dating back to 1870.
The collection is exhibited on rubble next to a railway handcar
standing on rails.
The main facts of the history of
Lithuanian railways are recorded in a 20-metre timeline.
Events are illustrated by copies of photographs and rolling stock
exhibits arranged on a stand. These are an old steam engine buffer, a
helical carriage connecting mechanism, handmade locomotive engineer’s
toolboxes, grease boxes, a locomotive engineer’s bag, which is more
than 100 years old (it was used by three generations of one family of
railway workers). A fragment of the narrow gauge railway track of the
Kaunas fortress and other authentic exhibits are interesting as well.
The history of the rail transport
signalling system can be studied interactively. During a
demonstration of the operation of crooked staff system (1949–1958) and a
switching mechanism, visitors become “signalmen and switchmen” and
can contact a “post duty officer” using a local battery telephone in
a level crossing controller’s house.
Information on railway builders and
workers is provided by uniform insignias, uniforms and their
elements, railway workers’ honours and education documents of
different periods. The chief’s office containing exhibits of
different railway history periods adds variety to the exhibition.
The smallest museum visitors will enjoy
the models hall with three operational railway models. We will
teach them to control one of them according to signalling rules. The
other two will help to learn about the railway structure: railways,
bridges, tunnels, buildings, signalling and rolling stock.
Educational programmes for pupils are conducted in this hall.
The exhibition hall hosts various
exhibitions, book presentations, film shows and various cultural
events.
Exhibitions
The museum arranges occasional exhibitions dedicated to Lithuanian railway
history.
Cultural, educational activity
Organizing competitions;
Organizing occasional events.
Other
news
The museum was founded in 1966. The founder of the museum is Georgijus
Žemaitis, the railway man.
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