Forney Museum of Transportation — Attraction in Denver

Having traveled from Fountain (90 min. away), got faked out when we learned that the Natural History Museum was actually the Museum of Nature & Science. My (now 12 y.o.) son and I had already been there at least twice and I really wanted to go some place new. While in the lobby of the Nat. & Sci. museum, I Goog'ed others museums and spotted this one. Was "medium" intrigued, but my son, no. We went anyway.

As we pulled up, it didn't look that exciting compared to the aforementioned big daddy museum. Parking lot probably held 30-40 cars. Tried to remain optimistic. Walked in, saw only a lobby/gift shop. Walked to an adjacent small room with model cars and other vehicles. For a moment, I wondered if that was it! I used the restroom and thought if there's not much more, I'm asking for a refund.

Eventually found the entrance to the main exhibit and all my concerns vanished. Firstly, I could see that it was far larger than appeared from the street. But with that and a quick visual scan came the understanding that there were some seriously impressive vehicles from Mankind's history.

If I had judged it by its exterior, I would've guessed it had 20-30 vehicles max. Oh no. Over a hundred, I'm sure. So much that with the 2.5 hours we knew we had 'til closing, we knew we had to manage our time in order to see everything, enjoy it, and yet not feel rushed.

How fascinating it was to see so many of the vintage vehicles in great, yet unrestored condition. To see their age and the history, the wear of the upholstery from 100+ years ago, knowing that it was the result of years of everyday use of people who've long since passed. To know that these cars, bicycles, motorcycles, helicopters, steam engine tractors, and the "Big Boy" steam locomotive (an absolute monster) was at one point the state of the art mode of transportation or equipment...was tremendously impacting. I asked my boy how he felt about leaving the Nature & Science museum and going to the Forney Museum when we first left on a scale of 1-10. He said it was a 1. I then asked him how he felt after we visited it. He said it was about an 8.5. I asked him because I already knew what he'd say...it was obvious when we were there that we was diggin' it.

All were either in very good unrestored condition or what appeared to be ultra low miles original condition. Never cared for the AMC Pacer or Gremlin when I was in Jr High when they first came out. But now, to see them as if I was transported back to 1978...awesome. To see a fully intact, unrestored motorcycle from 1933, of which had obviously lived a lot of good life in a world that no longer exists; a very unique feeling. Or the my dream bike when I was in high school, the 6-cylinder Honda CBX, looking just like it did when I drooled over it back then. Or a covered wagon from the "Old West" days, in person, fully intact, just as it was as it took all of a family's possessions across country by horse...phenomenal.

Photos, no matter how high-res are good. But the brain ingests a far greater depth of Man's achievements, his and her (one of Amelia Earhart's cars is exhibited) desires, creativity, progress, innovation, etc., etc. when we see these things up close in real life. It's there right in front of us and we know it. No 2D image will ever compete.

I'm sure museum-goers share that sense of wonder and attraction to dreaming; what it was like for those who designed and operated these incredible machines. What stories they could tell if they could whisper to us where they've been, what experiences the people had in or on them. How they felt the first day they fired them up. Or the little boy who got his first trike in 1890.

What a precious thing it is to be taken back through time when the world was so very different. There's something invaluable about standing next to a vehicle made long ago that tells us so much about them. And in turn, it's hard to not see ourselves differently on a...

I liked the museum. It had a number of classic cars, truck, buggies/stagecoach/carriages, motorcycles, bicycles, trains, and a few aircrafts and helicopters.

Some of the trains were renovated and staged as they would have been back in the time and you can walk inside some of them and see up close the various rooms set up (sleeping quarters, dinning, bathrooms, kitchen, caboose, engine room, etc.). Very cool. I wish those trains were still in service. So nostalgic.

They also had other unique items that were my favorites such as classic fire trucks, Ford truck, dump truck, school bus, glacier national park bus, milk truck, mail truck, tank truck, state patrol car, snowmobile, a purposefully unclean speedster, huge train track snow plow, train maintenance vehicles/equipment, a restored elitch bumper car, and restored Denver trolley/cable cars with a map showing the tramway routes in Denver! What?! I never knew Denver used to have trolleys going through the city. So cool. Denver should get them back in service and get rid of the 16th street free mall shuttles! :-). They also had old timey pictures of downtown Denver with the trolleys. I've lived in LoDo for 20 years, so was very cool to see this.

The bicycle section going through the times with the very old bicycles was really cool too. And liked how they also included Denver's now defunct B Cycle program (that sadly got replaced by the now stupid/annoying/dangerous scooters all over the city).

And the huge matchbox collection was cool to walk through as well and especially liked the more unique items in the collection.

All the signs explaining each item were great and informative, that included the unique qualities/features of the item, the price at the time and in today's dollars, the history of the item, etc. One example of a random feature explained for one of the vehicles was how the adjoined front seats reclined all the way flat to match the back seats to convert into a bed inside and families supposedly didn't let their daughters date a boy who owned one. Too funny. But I would buy one of those cars today with that feature for ease of exploring and camping!

They also included original advertisements for some of the vehicles which were cool to see and nostalgic as well.

All the staff and volunteers I encountered were so friendly and informative. They were passionate and knowledgeable about the items they were speaking about. But not sure if all the volunteers are there on a regular basis however.

I spent three hours there, but I was reading a lot of the signs and asking the volunteers questions.

Overall, it was a fun, different, and informative museum to go to and experience.

They have parking there which was so nice given these days where parking is a nightmare everywhere and parking lots seem to be a thing of the past around here.

BTW, I want the "bugeye" car that was for sale that they had...

Planes, trains and automobiles - and motorcycles and bicycles and lots of great history. I wasn’t sure what to expect of my visit to the Forney but I can tell you it can exceed your wildest expectations. There are lots of things to see and capture your interest regardless of what age group you fall into.

We arrived shortly before opening on a Friday. There was plenty of parking and no crowd to speak of. Truth be told, I was a little put off by the window dressing at the entrance. I worried that we were walking into a souvenir shop instead of a museum. That concern was immediately put to rest as we walked through the doors to the exhibit area. It is almost overwhelming as the immense showroom is crammed with well maintained exhibits. We slowly wandered through the collection with an admitted childlike amazement. The shear size of the trains inspires the imagination. Then you get to see small three wheeled vehicles that bring you back to earth.

I didn’t know that there was going to be a whole room mostly motorcycles and bicycles. Seeing a pristine example of my first motorcycle (a Honda 175) from the 1970’s brought back fond memories.

I highly recommend the Forney for well spent time building...