For the benefit and enjoyment of the people – that’s why the Saline Depot has been designated as a historic district – the first such historic district in Saline.

Visitors to the Saline Depot Museum can enjoy an 1880s train station office, freight house, caboose, and livery barn. And, if the Saline Area Historical Society can raise $3000, there’ll be an Eclipse windmill alongside the tracks, adding to the historic ambiance.

“We want to recreate an 1880s atmosphere at the depot,” said Wayne Clements, president. “In 1882, there was an 18 ft. windmill on a 61 ft. tower along the tracks. It was a railroad mill, a type that was large enough to pump the water needed by locomotives that steamed their way through Saline.”

Mark Nice, a collector, restorer, and seller of windmills from South Lyon, has an eight-foot restored Eclipse windmill for sale. It’s an original built by the Fairbanks Morris Company in Beloit, Wisconsin. There is also a Fairbanks Morris freight scale in the depot.

The Eclipse was once the most popular of all wooden windmills. It was painted an unusual shade of red and green, colors described by windmill writer, T. Lindsay Baker, as “cow patty green with buzzard blood red tips.” Mark, however, likes to think of his Eclipse replica as “pea green.” On the other hand, Wayne is not concerned with color – he just wants the windmill “to help tell the story at the Saline Depot.”

The windmill will be the first of several new visitors’ attractions planned for the Depot Museum.

“We’re looking for a railroad water tank to go with the windmill and an 1880s outhouse,” said Wayne.

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