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The Sea View Railroad Station  Name changed from Littletown to Sea View Aug.20 1873.
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®Sometime in the fall or winter of 1938 I heard the train whistle blow just after I was put to bed. I went to the window and lifted the green shade and looked across the field beside the Sea View railroad station. I could see the lights of the passenger train going south. The lights were blinking on and off. Later in life did I realize the lights were not blinking, the trees along the side of the tracks made them appear to blink!
Sea View Railroad Station
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Track-side, looking East.
The trains did not stop at this station anymore and it was boarded up. The Nicholson family lived in the apartment above the station, and Sherman was my friend, 12 years my elder. Sherman showed me how to put coins on the tracks and have them flattened by the train! This must have happened early 1939 — I was 5. My mom gave me 2 pennies and let me go with “Sherm” to the tracks. He placed a nickel on and I put my pennies down.
My flattened pennies.
I never heard or saw the train that flattened my pennies. The next day we went to the place where we put the coins and found nothing! Sherm searched up and down and finally found his nickel and my pennies. They were flat! I kept those flat oval shaped penny for years.
Passenger Train stopped in Marshfield
The trains were discontinued that year. The tracks were pulled up about 1942 A huge crane on a flat car would lift a length of track, swing around to a flat car behind it, and lower it down. Two men would unhitch it then scramble down to hitch up another. A small “donkey ” locomotive would haul it off, filled. This was quite of an event for a 6-year-old.
The last train to pass through Marshfield 1939
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by Ray Freden
Originally published in the Marshfield Mariner, April 9, 2008
Revised 11/24/2020.