Caboose gets stranded while making its way to new home

By Dwight Dana
Morning News reporter
Published: October 6, 2008

DARLINGTON — Move over “The Little Engine That Could” for “The Stranded Red Caboose.”

Drivers headed down the dirt road portion of Meadowbrook Road in Darlington County will be greeted by a 48,000-pound Atlantic Coast Line caboose that is parked on the side of the trail. It’s headed for a new home at the National Bean Market Museum in Lake City, where it will join a Pullman club car.

The caboose has been parked for the past 15 years on railroad tracks at the corner of Railroad and Palmetto streets. It overlooked Black Creek.

Henry Hodge, the owner, bought it from the Railroad Historical Commission in Florence. He had it moved to Meadowbrook Road by Grant’s Wrecker Equipment — the same company that moved it off

Hodge’s lot this weekend. He had Kirby Grant move it because he winched it out without having to cut down several trees Hodge was determined to save.

“I made what I thought was a ridiculous offer for the caboose,” said Hodge, former owner of Oh Henry’s Cars in Florence. “I couldn’t believe it when they called me about 30 days later and said I was the owner of a caboose.”

Hodge said the red caboose on the side of the road is no comparison to the dilapidated one he bought in 1993. He fixed it up with fancy furniture and hardwood floors.

“That caboose was as rough as a night in jail when I bought it,” Hodge said. “I think homeless people had been living in it.”

Hodge is selling the caboose because he doesn’t use it any longer. He has a little cabin next to it that he might sell after selling his house, a condo at the beach and a lot in an upscale Florence subdivision. He plans to move to Wilmington, N.C.

Briley Altman is the executive director of the National Bean Market Museum.

“We’re thrilled to get the caboose,” he said Monday afternoon. “We’re just sorry that Gene Moore, the founder of the museum, didn’t live long enough to see it moved to Lake City. He died Sunday.”

Altman said the caboose will be moved “very soon.” It will ride down U.S. 52 into Lake City.