It is National Volunteer Week and here is one of our volunteer highlights:

When he saw the brass object on a nearby shelf, Jim Steuer did a double take.

The Pinecrest Historical Village volunteer was in a meeting at the museum’s McAllister House Welcome Center. “I was sitting at the table (in the library) and I looked up. I said, ‘It still does exist.’”

Following the casting, Jim Steuer set up a lathe to begin machining of the rough main body casting. June 1970.

Steuer was surprised to see the cast brass train whistle and couldn’t believe this was the first time he had noticed it in his nearly seven years of volunteering there.

The last time he had laid eyes on the whistle was more than 50 years ago as a student in Lawrence Bohn’s metals class at Lincoln High School in Manitowoc. The class was assigned to make the whistle for Pinecrest’s 1880s steam engine.

Bohn, who had an interest in trains, introduced the project to the class, which was then located in the Industrial Arts Building at the end of Green Street. The building was later torn down to expand the high school’s running track.

Steuer, 70, was a senior in the class of 1970 at the time. “I knew I wanted to do something with my hands and the trades because I was not going on to college,” he said. “I wasn’t cut out to sit at a desk.”

The train whistle became a class project that students like Steuer also volunteered to work on after school hours.

Bohn “had the knack of latching on to the kids who really wanted to be there and went the extra mile for them. He really spent extra time with the students who were very much interested in it,” Steuer said.

Amid core boxes, patterns, and cores, Steuer helped pour the casting for the bronze base of the whistle and then helped machine its parts.

“To put the pieces together and see them come together for the end result is probably the most satisfying,” he said.

Coincidentally, the historical society recently received a batch of black-and-white 8-by-10 photos of Steuer, his teacher and other students working on the project. Steuer has been helping identify the people in the photos.

He never did get to hear the train whistle blow, Steuer said.

The whistle, used to alert people that the train was approaching, attaches to the steam engine. When a cord is pulled, the valve opens and allows steam to escape for a whistling sound.

Pinecrest’s whistle, which is stored inside for safekeeping, is often demonstrated for visitors.

Metals class teacher Bohn, who died in 2018, was instrumental in bringing the train to the historical village. He was a member of the Clipper City Model Railroad Club and a Pinecrest volunteer.

In 1967, Robert Miller of Miller Compressing Co., Milwaukee, donated the 44-ton locomotive and coal tender to the Manitowoc County Historical Society. The Clipper City Model Railroad Club worked on restoring the locomotive in a stall at the Manitowoc Roundhouse made available by the Central & Northwestern Railroad.

A flat car, used for hauling freight, was donated by the Allis-Chalmers Co. of Milwaukee. The locomotive, tender and flat cars were moved to Pinecrest in 1975.

Meanwhile, Steuer graduated from Lincoln and landed a carpenter’s apprenticeship with A.C.E. Building Service in Manitowoc. He worked there for 44 years and eventually became part-owner.

He retired in 2014 and not long after was convinced by a friend to volunteer at Pinecrest in buildings and grounds maintenance. He likes working on small projects like doors, windows, porches, and walkways, he said. “I enjoy seeing the older buildings out here. I very much enjoy the place. I enjoy the people.”

And, come late spring, when Pinecrest opens to the public, he hopes to hear the sounds of that train whistle.

Written By Suzanne Weiss, Manitowoc County Historical Society Volunteer

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