Capac's Early Railroad Depots/The Fourth Capac Depot
In 1870 the Port Huron and Lake Michigan Railroad Company, later the Grand Trunk Railroad, opened a rail line and depot in Capac. Judge Dewitt C. Walker, Capac’s founder, later recalled that “the shrill noise of the locomotive whistle that first rang out upon the frozen air and re-echoed through the trees that surrounded the village … heralded the advent of prosperity for this place.”
The Village of Capac was incorporated in 1873. By 1880 the community had a population of 544 people. Such local goods as timber, barrel staves, and grain were shipped on the railroad. The first depot was built north of the tracks, burned down in 1880, and a second, brick depot was built south of the tracks. It was declared “unsafe” and replaced by a third depot north of the tracks in the 1890s.
After Capac’s third railroad depot was destroyed by fire on January 9, 1914, the Grand Trunk Railroad Company built this wood-frame station north of the tracks, just south of Railroad Street. Opened on October 17, 1914, the station provided passenger and freight service. Its telegraph office brought the latest news to the village.
The depot closed on October 8, 1973. In 1987 the Capac Community Historical Society bought the depot for one dollar under the condition that it relocate the building. On October 21, 1988, the society moved the depot in two parts to this site, about three-fourths of a mile northeast of its original location, and began rehabilitating the station for reuse as a museum. The depot reopened as the Capac Community Historical Museum in 1994.
site number: L2292
era: Civil War and After (1860-1875)
year listed: 2017
year erected: 2017
