Tuesday morning, the trolley was packed to capacity
MARQUETTE -- It's called a ride down memory lane.
Tuesday morning, 27 passengers were welcomed aboard a trolley ride of the exact route of the Presque Isle and Street Railway in the 1890s. The tour began at the Marquette County History Museum on Front Street. It then made a loop around Spruce, Arch, and Hewitt Avenue and continued to Presque Isle.
Back in the early 1900s, the street car provided a way for people to get to work.
"It was really our first public transportation for the everyman," said Tiina Harris, Museum Educator of the Marquette County History Museum. "So the people that we're going to meet, some are well to do, but there's nobody famous that we're meeting on this streetcar."
Two actresses, Fran Darling and Iris Katers, were picked up at the Marquette Co-op, acting like visitors to the area. And they did their homework, tailoring their story to a woman who really did live in the area during the late 1890s and early 1900s.
"We're playing cousins who are visiting from Milwaukee,” said Darling. “And in reality, Mary Brighting, the character that we are discussing, was from Milwaukee as a German worker person that worked in the mines."
For some passengers, the ride was a way to bring the experiences of past generations a little closer to the present.
"My husband's grandmother always talked about taking the trolley out to Presque Isle,” said trolley passenger Carolyn McDonald. “And so I thought this would kind of be reminiscent of her trolley ride.”
And many organizers believe that experience is important to the future of the city.
"It's very important that all of us know our background, why we do things, some of the mistakes of the past,” said Katers, “so we hopefully don't repeat them.”
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