DARLINGTON — As the community watches progress on restoration of the 1937 Caboose at the Darlington Depot, a wide variety of workers have been seen. A couple of weeks ago, a team came together to paint it top to bottom with epoxy paint primer. Now color top-coat is being applied. 

The Lafayette County Historical and Genealogy Society is an organization of volunteers with a small operating budget. For a project of this size, they have held fundraisers and sought grant funding and donations. Another way to support the project is to donate time and talent or services which, is what Lindsey Lee did.  

Lee is a professional painter in addition to her day job at Cummins, and she donated her time, expertise, and equipment to spraying the gloss black urethane two-part paint on the super hard places to reach: the undercarriage, wheels assemblies, grated caboose ends, ladders, brake wheels, and grab handles. These parts and the roof of the caboose are now shiny black. 

Lee was aided by a crew that mixed paint batches, moved drop clothes and equipment, fetched new gloves, and water: Jim Bennett, his son James, and Barb Nemec. By the end of the evening, everyone was wearing black paint and cleaning equipment, happy with the results.

There was also support from Danielle Kerl of PPG Paints of Dubuque. She provided great advice in paint selection and provided the paint and supplies at a good cost. She also came out to see the project and consult on mixture and equipment, bringing a can of thinner, a clean-up solution and a donation.

“One of the wonderful aspects of a project like this is seeing the way people in the community give what they can to help it get done,” Nemec said. “The Society is grateful for the community support.”

The next step is the Milwaukee Road Orange paint.