Folsom celebrates visionary Judah on his 200th birthday, railroad's 170th anniversary

Historic Folsom took a giant leap back in time Wednesday to honor a man and the vision he turned into reality. The city threw Theodore Judah a party on his 200th birthday while honoring the 170th anniversary of the completion of the Sacramento Valley Railroad, on which he served as the chief engineer. Folsom and Sacramento city councilmembers, along with Assemblyman Josh Hoover, Sen. Roger Niello and Sacramento County Supervisor Rosario Rodriguez, hopped aboard a Light Rail train in Sacramento on Wednesday morning and rode the original route to Folsom "so they could understand the history of the railroad and its impact on the region," said Chuck Spinks of the Placer Sierra Railroad Heritage Society. Folsom City Councilmember Sarah Aquino told The Folsom Telegraph a Light Rail car was decorated for the occasion and, "It was kinda like feeling the anticipation of those people from 1856 getting to ride a train for the first time, so pretty fun." Along the route, docent Paul Helman offered tidbits of information for the guests. While the riders boarded at the Sac Valley Station, Helman noted it wasn't originally part of the route; the route started at R Street in Sacramento. The guests played trivia on board, and the train stopped along the way to pick up special guests. "Judah was a visionary for his time," Aquino said. The celebration picked up as the group arrived in Historic Folsom just after 10 a.m. They stepped off the train and into a crowd that included Folsom Historic District Association ambassadors dressed in attire from the era – historical figures Constable Bugbey and Mark Hopkins Jr. in tuxedos and top hats and the women in long dresses and bonnets, including Kathy Cole and City Councilmember Barbara Leary. Ambassador Nancy Cowley noted her dress – "Isabella's Work Dress" – featured 1850s freshwater mussel buttons from Mississippi. Her petticoat had layers of fleece to help the skirt "balloon out," she said. "I'm a lower-class woman so the clothing buttons up the front instead of the back because I don't have a maid to dress me," she said with a smile. "The fabric was a very popular pattern in the 1840s." Speaking to the crowd, Aquino said, "On February 22, 1856, George Washington's birthday, a group of residents took the train from Sacramento to Folsom. They danced all night long, till 5 o'clock the next morning, then they got on the train and went back to Sacramento." Guests also were treated to a demonstration of the turntable, with officials turning the rails around. "We don't turn the turntable very often," Aquino told the gathering. "Locomotives were mainly designed in one direction, forward. We're recreating that today." Later, Helman, Spinks and Christine Pifer-Foote delivered presentations on the railroad, Theodore Judah and his wife, Anna Judah, and miniature donkeys from the Folsom Zoo Sanctuary appeared. Historical items on display included Theodore Judah's original draft map of the town site and a painting by Anna Judah of the Sierra Nevada landscape "to help Congress visualize how a transcontinental railroad could go through that route," Aquino said. There was also a birthday cake in Judah's honor. "Folsom is proud of our railroad history and with the help of a lot of people over many, many years, we've done a lot to preserve that history, to celebrate it, to honor it, and that's why we're here today," she said.