DeQuincy Railroad Museum

DeQuincy didn't exist before the railroad — the railroad built the town. When the Kansas City Southern Railroad completed its line from Shreveport to Lake Charles in 1897, the track split at this point, one route heading to Beaumont and Port Arthur, Texas. The community incorporated in 1903. The depot came twenty years later, in 1923, Mission Revival architecture — multi-story, urban-scale, built to announce arrival. Urban depots of that era announced themselves with recognizable style, unlike the simpler board and batten structures that served villages. This is one of three such urban railroad stations still standing in Louisiana. The others are the Central Railroad Station in Shreveport and the Texas and Pacific Railroad Depot in Bunkie. All three are listed on the National Register of Historic Places. This one was added in 1983. The depot became a museum in 1974. Inside: railroad artifacts from the Kansas City Southern, Missouri Pacific, and Union Pacific Railroads. Outside: a steam engine, passenger car, and caboose. In 2013, Union Pacific awarded the town membership in the Train Town USA registry, a designation shared with Natchitoches and Bunkie in Louisiana and reserved for towns and cities along the railroad with shared heritage. DeQuincy hosts the annual Louisiana Railroad Days Festival on the museum grounds, second weekend in April. Admission is free. It's thirty minutes north of Lake Charles.