Over the years, the Florida Railroad Museum has acquired and restored rolling stock and equipment to operate for the public's enjoyment. We hope our visitors appreciate the sights and sounds of Florida railroading as it existed in the 1940’s and 1950’s. The Museum offers one of the most unique museum experiences in the world. Here you "Ride the Exhibits!" The Museum operates weekend excursions year-round from the Train Station in Parrish, Florida. Special weekend events are scheduled throughout the year featuring themed train rides. The caboose is available to charter for small, private parties or you may charter the entire train for large family or corporate events. The Museum enjoys non-profit status under section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code.

Our mission is to preserve typical examples of railroad rolling stock which served Florida and its railroads; to provide a living experience for visitors through the operation of trains using our collected locomotives and cars; to provide exhibits, including photographs, memoribilia, paper and other artifacts of Florida railroading.

The Florida Railroad Museum, Inc. was founded as The Florida Gulf Coast Railroad Museum with the stated goal of preserving Florida’s railroad history. The Florida Gulf Coast Railroad Museum was born in 1982 with the seven founding members each donating $100.00 to incorporate and open a checking account. One of the founders, Jim Herron, owned a number of Missouri Pacific Cabooses, one of which (the 12070) he loaned to the Museum to act as a starting point for our future. Mr. Herron was a broker of used rail equipment--a number of the MoPac cabooses can be seen in the Tampa Bay Area as Offices or cottages. We repainted the caboose, and Seaboard Coast Line took it to Tampa Union Station to meet the Gold Coast Railroad’s presidential car “Ferdinand Magellan” coming on the rear of Amtrak’s Silver Palm from Miami for the weekend. We ran a joint railroad weekend with the Gold Coast as our first fund-raising event and the kick off of opening the membership to the public. In the late 70’s CSX decided to abandon the “Parrish Sub” which ran from Durant to Palmetto. We negotiated with CSX to buy the line from Durant to Willow. (The lower section from Willow to Palmetto had been sold to FP&L for access to their power plant at Parrish.) CSX wanted $830,000 for the 20.5 miles of line, which was way over our heads. The northern 10 miles was 100# relay rail, that they wanted and was used in the re-build of Rice Yard in Waycross, Ga. We continued to dicker, and finally got them to agree to leave the lower two miles of rail intact for future operation. This section included the through truss bridge over the Little Manatee River. TECO later purchased the 20.5 miles for a future power line right of way. This left a 1400’ strip of right of way between TECO and FP&L, which the Museum purchased. We moved a little 0-4-0 from Lowery Park Zoo there, and later trucked in the BEDT #12, which was donated to us by Ed Ryan. We decided to approach FP&L for a lease on the lower portion of the line. Jim Herron, Mike Meksraitis, Woody Massara, and Bob Wright hammered out an agreement that resulted in a 20 year lease of the line, which serves us still today.