I’m not yet as tall as the chain-link fence at Herman Park, a green space spanning a city block in the center of Goldsboro. It’s a spring day in the early 1980s. The sprawling magnolias are blooming, their scent carrying on a breeze as warm as breath. It’s my first time standing on the dirt platform that serves as the station for the Kiwanis Special, a miniature train that runs around a quarter-mile track in one corner of the city’s oldest park.
I try to swallow my uncertainty of boarding one of the train cars, but there’s not much time to dwell: The conductor has climbed down from the engine and opened the gate. I take my father’s hand and together, we step forward.
Volunteers like Wally Brown serve as conductors on the latest incarnation of the Kiwanis Special, a miniature train that has thrilled riders since the 1950s. photograph by Chris Rogers
Up close, I’m relieved. The Kiwanis Special is my size, with open-air seats and just enough space to tuck in my legs. If the conductor recites a list of rules, I don’t remember. A stoplight next to the track turns green and the train rumbles to a start, its speed swelling just enough to rustle my hair.
As we enter a tunnel just after the first bend, the world falls dark and everyone around me starts to scream — even the grown-ups. I throw my head back, laughing, and join in the cacophony.
• • •
The train began operating in the summer of 1955 after the Kiwanis Club of Goldsboro purchased it from the City of Whiteville for $8,500. It was one of about 240 like it ever built. Only about 40 still remain. The service organization has been managing it with an all-volunteer staff ever since.
The Kiwanis Special carried its first passengers when my father was just a year old and city streets teemed with shoppers and diners and businesspeople. He grew up on West Grantham Street, an easy bike ride from Herman Park, where the train was as permanent and ordinary as the park’s magnolias that he climbed in summer. Still, train rides were reserved for special occasions, like Sunday picnics. While grown-ups lounged in the shade or peered into the goldfish pond — another of the park’s permanent draws — children clamored for a 10-cent fare that took them to unexpected places: through a tunnel with murals on the walls, across the Grand Canyon (the sign at the bridge said as much), the dark tunnel where you could throw up your arms and scream as loud as you wanted.
Screaming with delight as the Kiwanis Special passes through the tunnel at Herman Park has been a rite of passage for generations of Goldsboro kids. photograph by Chris Rogers
As generations of riders like my dad made countless trips around the track, time and wear took their toll on the Kiwanis Special. By 2021, it had undergone multiple repairs and was nearing the end of its run. That’s when the Kiwanis Club launched an ambitious $125,000 fundraising campaign to replace the well-loved relic. The organization raised more than twice its goal thanks to hundreds of families, like mine, who bought bricks that bear the names of loved ones. It purchased a replica of the Kiwanis Special, which made its first appearance in May 2022, as well as a new train station and brick patio that opened the following spring.
• • •
Seven decades have passed since my dad first rode the train, and now my children stand no taller than that chain-link fence. I watch as they take in the scene before them: a train piled with children and grown-ups pulling into the station. My son, 3, needs no convincing to climb aboard, but I can sense my 4-year-old daughter’s uncertainty.
I tell her how Papa, who has just arrived with a strip of tickets as long as his arm, rode the train when he was a little boy, and how I rode it when I was her age.
“Come on,” I say. “We’ll go together. It’ll be fun.”
Riding the Kiwanis Special is an experience cherished by different generations. photograph by Chris Rogers
Maybe she’s convinced or maybe she just swallows her fear, but she agrees. I find a seat and take her hand and help her in beside me. My dad and son settle in behind us, three generations of passengers aboard the Kiwanis Special.
The train my father rode pulls out of the station and heads for the first bend and the tunnel beyond. In the darkness, I feel for my daughter’s hand. We throw back our heads and scream in delight.
900 Park Avenue
Goldsboro, NC 27530
(919) 273-6416
goldsborotrain2022.com
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