Though he was a “self-proclaimed curmudgeon,” Thomas T. Taber III’s impact on local history and the history of railroading will keep his name alive for years to come.
Gary Parks, executive director of the Thomas T. Taber Museum of the Lycoming County Historical Society, remembers Taber as a benefactor who was unafraid to speak his mind.
In the late 1990s, the museum launched a capital campaign in the hopes of raising $1 million for improvements to the building. The campaign got close to that goal, but the museum still needed more money.
“So Tom Taber, bless his heart, rode up on his bicycle from Muncy,” and handed over a check for $1 million, Parks said.
The museum had a “great need” to expand, he said.
With the money from Taber and the capital campaign, the museum was able to expand to add more exhibition and meeting spaces.
“We were so very grateful for him,” Parks said.
So, they named the museum after the man that made it what it is today.
That’s not to say everything was peaches and cream. Taber was quite vocal with his critiques of the museum, but Parks doesn’t hold any grudges about that.
“We really appreciated his dedication to the museum,” Parks said.
Taber wanted the museum to be the best that it could, Parks continued.
Parks said he visited Taber on his birthday this year, and even in his old age, Taber still enjoyed talking about railroads to any and everybody who would listen.
Taber was an “expert” on railroads, Parks said.
He said that recently, a college friend of Taber’s called Parks to talk about Taber. Parks said that it’s amazing that people who knew Taber decades ago still remember him.
“He really had a heart of gold,” Parks said.
Another that can attest to Parks’ assessment of Taber is Kurt Bell.
Bell worked at the Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania from 1991 to 2009, specifically curating Taber’s extensive collection there. Bell said that Taber wrote him two or three letters a week in his nearly 20-year tenure there.
Taber was “quite an interesting personality,” Bell said.
Taber’s father, Thomas T. Taber II, was “one of the pioneering railroad buffs” in the U.S., Bell said.
Over 60 years, Taber II took about 30,000 negative photographs of trains, Bell said.
“The railroading bug kind of rubbed off on [Taber],” he said.
Taber II grew up around the Lackawanna Railroad and did a lot of research on it. Taber II died in 1975, and Taber finished and published his research in 1981, Bell said.
Taber “had an intense fascination with trains,” Bell said.
His fascination was so strong, Bell said, that Taber started his own research at 14, and soon found himself hanging out with the Lackawanna Railroad crew.
Taber “felt more comfortable around blue-collar workers,” Bell said.
Taber’s early research started with land deeds — he would ride his bike to courthouses to achieve that. Eventually, Taber realized he wanted to major in mechanical engineering, so he did just that at the Stevens Institute of Technology in Hoboken.
Taber accepted an apprenticeship with the Northern Pacific Railroad in Montana. He joined the U.S. Amy and was placed in the U.S. Army Transportation Corp at Fort Eustis, Virginia. His work took him to Canada to test diesel-powered trains, Bell said.
Taber began researching Climax locomotives, which led him to the former lumber capital of the world. Taber found himself settled in Muncy in 1959 and started publishing books. He became involved in the Muncy Historical Society, the Muncy Public Library and local hospitals, Bell said.
“The railroads were his primary interest,” Bell said.
Taber began to research the “po-dunk” railroads in the area, Bell said.
Taber, with the help of some friends, wrote and published a 13-volume series, “Logging Railroad Era of Lumbering in Pennsylvania.” The project involved interviewing more than 900 lumbermen, Bell said.
“Tom was really known as a local historian,” Bell said.
In fact, Taber retired as vice president of the George E. Logue Company to dedicate his time to research, Bell said.
In the 1980s, Taber bought a photocopier. He would write on a typewriter, Bell said, and then photocopy the pages, bind them together and sell them.
Along with research, Taber was also a collector of everything railroads.
“Tom’s house was a veritable history of railroads,” Bell said.
From artifacts to lithographs to photos, Taber had it all.
So, the Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania began “courting” Taber to display his collection, Bell said. Taber eventually agreed, provided that the state set up a trust fund. Due to some administration shifts, though, that ended up not panning out, and Taber had no problems telling Bell about his displeasure.
Bell, however, didn’t mind because Taber’s collection was “really wonderful.” The collection is still on display at the museum in Strausburg.
As it turns out, Bell and Parks weren’t the only ones hearing about what they were doing wrong. Bell said that Taber wrote to curators at railroad museums across the country about how they should run their museums.
Taber’s reputation as a curmudgeon wasn’t absolute, though. Bell said that he would always answer questions people had about railroads on his website.
“He was really something,” he said.
When Taber eventually moved to a retirement center, he hung up railroad lithographs in his room, Bell said.
“He was just one of those really interesting, cantankerous people from the past,” Bell said.
Thomas T. Taber III was born May 22, 1929, in Madison, New Jersey, a son of Thomas II and Margaret (Gantt) Taber. He married his wife, Barbara, in 1962. Together, they had one son, Thomas T. Taber IV, who survives with his wife and two children in Chicago.
He published about two dozen books in his lifetime and donated large amounts of money to the Lycoming County Historical Society and the Williamsport Hospital.
He died Aug. 13, 2022, at 93.
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