Thursday, October 1, 2026
Before Gary Farkash, 59, the current president of the Baldwin Historical Society, started volunteering at the Baldwin Historical Museum, he was already 21 years into service at another seminal museum, the Oyster Bay Railroad Museum (OBRM). Now as trustee and corporate secretary for the OBRM, he is coming up on his 29th year of service there. As a mover and shaker at both organizations he plans for four new tracks to be laid down in time for the railroad museum’s Spring reopening, allowing for more organization and space to be freed up for possible newer additions in the future.
In April 1993, Farkash made a wrong turn driving home because of construction detours, and this circumstance would leave him face to face with the steam locomotive #35, the very last steam locomotive to operate on Long Island.
“It’s one of only three left throughout the United States, this is Nassau’s locomotive,” he said of the iconic commuter passenger train, previously in Eisenhower Park. He then founded the non-for-profit “Friends of Locomotive 35,” which later became what is now the OBRM.
“I’ve been about history since I was a kid, I’m all about the history and mechanics,” Farkash said of why he decided to join the railroad museum, where every Saturday he and dedicated volunteers work to restoring and touching up the pieces of transportation history.
Outdoing themselves each coming year, last year’s big attraction was the working Oyster Bay Turntable, a device used to reposition incoming and outgoing trains. It was fitted with safety measures and now acts as an interactive attraction at the museum.
The turntable was one of the bonuses of the location of the museum. “I think we are the only railroad museum in the United States that does regularly scheduled turntable rides [as an attraction],” Farkash asserted.
For the reopening happening this Spring, the volunteers are coming together with contractors to lay down as least three tacks to reposition various trains. Track one will be fitted with their GS-1 Switcher #397 “Dashing Dan,” previously used in the back shop of the LIRR for shuttling other locomotives and lovingly called “dinkys” by railway workers. Once track one is laid down, track two will have both the #398 “Dashing Dottie” GS-1 Switcher and N52 Caboose #12, used in the rear of freight trains.
The third track will have the iconic G5S Locomotive Engine #35 secured onto the track with parts of the boiler, frame, body and wheel sets assembled together. Lastly, track four will be laid down with their P54 Ping Pong Coach, a previous commuter train you can feel the hours spent bouncing around Long Island. In addition, the two LIRR simulators will be moved, and PS-1 Freight Box Car and FA-1 Cab Unit will be placed together creating a cohesive semi-box car.
Farkash said that “every year is going to be different” to make the museum innovative and exciting to new and old viewers alike. Currently in Riverhead, a new addition of the BM-60 Baggage Mail Car #738, last running in the mid-70s, will soon make its way to the museum in the future.
The OBRM wrote of Farkash’s dedication to the preservation and acquisition of the antique trains on their Facebook page, “His dedication of time and energy remain unmatched, and he sets a standard that’s difficult to match. Any time there’s a question, about pretty much anything, Gary has remained the go-to guy for answers.” The museum will be tentatively opening the third weekend of April.
