The caboose at the Burlington-Northern Railroad train depot has a new look.

Located on the corner of Hudson and Clay streets in Wellsville, the caboose was painted green and yellow to match Burlington Northern’s colors and added decals that were made by Snappy Graphics. Wellsville’s zip code, 63384, is also painted on the caboose. The project was started last fall and was finished during the summer.

“We researched it,” said Wellsville resident Paula Adams, a member of the depot committee. “All of those cabooses were the same design, but they were painted differently. Each railroad painted them a different color. That was a Wabash caboose that we bought. So we painted the Burlington Northern colors, which were green and yellow.”

The depot committee bought the caboose in the Kansas City area years ago after finding out it was going to be demolished. The caboose was red before it changed colors.

“It’s back to what it would have looked like if it was a Burlington Northern caboose,” Adams said. “There was quite a bit of controversy because everybody thought that it should be red. That wasn’t the color for Burlington Northern, so we didn’t do that. Now that it is finished, they liked it.”

Adams said a Wellsville resident painted the caboose. He sandblasted it last fall.

“Then, the wind and everything got so bad that he couldn’t paint it,” Adams said. “So he waited until spring and summer to paint it.”

The depot has been in Wellsville since 1981. It was moved to its current location along Highway 19 from Wellsville-Middletown R-I School so it can be used as a museum and a meeting place for clubs and organizations.

The depot hosts events on Halloween and Christmas every year. Adams said the depot is open for tours.

“The school tours it,” Adams said. “There are a lot of people who go through it throughout the year. But we got it cleaned up. It’s ready to go.”

Now, the committee is looking to hold a fundraising event to raise money to put a loading dock on the depot.

“We were going to do something in the fall (of 2022),” Adams said. “We had a ham and bean dinner for one year. They called it a hobo dinner. But it (the weather) has been so hot that we haven’t done anything about it. We just mostly depend on donations. We requested a couple of grants, but we haven’t heard from them yet.”