Stolen train station collectibles found left on railroad tracks

Written by Columb Higgins Tuesday, 07 February 2012 10:52

TUCKAHOE – Officials said this week that $2,200 in collectibles that were stolen from the Tuckahoe Train Station earlier this month were found left on the railroad tracks Saturday.

Doug Longenecker, president of the Historical Preservation Society of Upper Township, said resident Larry Migliaccio discovered the items on the railroad tracks a mile and a half south of the train station on Saturday morning. Migliaccio travels through that area every day, Longenecker said, and didn’t see the collectibles there Friday morning. This leads him to believe the collectibles were dropped there sometime Friday afternoon or night.

“Probably after the sun went down,” said Longenecker. “We went down and checked everything out. The items were undamaged, though they are all pretty old, they can’t really be damaged. We loaded them up into a pickup truck and brought them to the train station.”

Longenecker contacted the Gazette last week regarding the stolen items. Burglars cut the padlock and broke into the train station’s new speeder shed on Jan. 3. They stole a railroad crossing sign, semaphore signals, a railroad spike hammer and long handle tongs used to put down rail lines, and a large box usually kept in cabooses filled with flares and fuses.

The items were donated to the Historical Preservation Society of Upper Township over the years. Many of them are heavy and made of cast iron. The total value of the stolen collectibles was estimated at $2,200.

State Police initially asked Longenecker not to alert the media, he said, but after several weeks they gave him the OK to talk to newspapers. He said he thinks the burglars must have read the article in last week’s Gazette and decided to part ways with the stolen items.

“They were dropped two days later, I think it’s obvious they saw the article in the paper,” he said. “I don’t know what they wanted with them to begin with.”

Longenecker said he hopes fingerprints taken from the items will lead to an arrest. The historical preservation society board has discussed installing a security system at the train station to prevent future break-ins, he said.