The Colorado Railroad Museum is acquiring a former California Zephyr dome car, a long-desired addition to the collection focusing on the history of railroading in the Centennial State. The Silver Rifle was built by Budd in 1948 for the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy, one of three railroads to operate the famed California Zephyr. 

The car was previously part of the Golden Gate Railroad Museum collection and was on loan to the Western Pacific Railroad Museum in Portola, Calif., for many years. In early September, the car was sent east to Ohio for restoration, and once that is complete, it will go to Golden, Colo., for permanent display. The museum plans to restore the car to its as-delivered appearance, and its original mechanical systems will remain intact. The museum has not shared a completion timeline. 

CRM is already home to the Dome Car Monument, a unique stone masonry arch originally erected in Colorado’s Glenwood Canyon near the site where an Electro- Motive Division general manager conceived the idea of the modern-day railroad dome car. A year after the streamlined California Zephyr’s 1949 debut, the Denver & Rio Grande Western, together with General Motors, came together to memorialize the dome car’s original idea by erecting this unique, stone monument along the train’s route. In the 1980s, the Dome Car Monument stood in the path of Interstate Highway 70 construction. It was carefully moved to CRM, where it remains on exhibit today.