The Whistle Stop / Monon Connection Museum

Everything was very good except the wait for food...shouldn't take 45 minutes to cook a burger, I don't care how big it is. The restaurant wasn't that busy so no excuse (probably forgot to put the order in). Otherwise very nice place with lots to see.

Great salad bar, great food, great service and friendly staff... We had the catfish nuggets, salad bar, side salad, Mac&cheese, sweet potato fries AND the best peach and cherry pie we have had for awhile... Kids and adults will love the overhead trains that are running while you enjoy your time there... Highly recommended... Would also recommend the gift shop and taking a guided tour though the train museum!

Wow, what a great surprise this restaurant was. We were taking country roads back to florida and passed this place. Made husband do a u-turn to go back. So glad we did! Great salad bar, husband loved his burger. Great menu with lots of options. Would definitely stop in again if ever in the area. Was sad the museum wasn't open. But did get to look at some things inside on the way to restroom.

My Young Beautiful Bride and I visited the Francisville town wide Yard Sales this morning, and afterwards, we decided to find a place for breakfast 😀. The Whistle Stop was just a few miles away, and we stopped there to see what they had to offer. It's a delightful place, great service, and fantastic food. The museum wasn't open, but we will definitely be visiting this place again to see what they have in their museum.

I have been enjoying Whistle Stop for years. When I travel from Kentucky to Michigan, I have made it a tradition to stop there on the way to or on the way back. The two menus (breakfast, lunch/dinner have choice selections that work for the local and transient diners. Today, I had one trip to the salad bar and green pepper soup. The soup had a robust tomato base with just the right amount of beef to enhance the taste. The salad bar had fresh garden salad and prepared salad selections. The bar was chilled jist right to keep the fixings crisp and fresh. For the rest of their menu visit their web sight. To add to the experience, there is a small unique museum and gift shop and a display of railroad equipment.

Came with my family and the host was very knowledgeable and soo patient with my 2 and 3 year old. They have ALOT of train memorabilia! Worth the time and not very expensive.

Great place if you love trains! The food was pretty good but the salad bar was amazing!

If you like trains the place is awesome !!! A variety of popular locomotives all in full scale and feet from your finger tips There is a cool gift shop and some perfect photo locations

The collection of actual train cars and equipment, as well as the memorabilia inside the restaurant and museum is definitely some of the best I've seen. And while some may think the $5 admission is steep for such a small museum, I'm sure it doesn't go very far to helping maintain such a collection. It is displayed beautifully, inside and out. The stop here is all about the trains. The food was decent, and the service was good and friendly, though they were "packed to the gills". (It was a Sunday afternoon when we went and possibly the only restaurant for several miles.) It is one of those out of the way places that is worth a stop for that iconic Americana experience.

You wouldn't expect to find a place like this on a rural country road in Indiana. That's what makes it so special. It's by far the nicest train museum I've been to, and I say that as a Foamer. (Look it up.) The collection is meticulously kept and beautifully presented, and the tour guides are knowledgeable and kind. And the food at the restaurant is great, too. Seriously, this place is a gem. Check it out.

Our tour guide was absolutely wonderful and really made the experience great. Really neat things and he explained it all to us and really engaged with the kids. He was very knowledgeable about trains and you could tell he really liked them. Food at the restaurant was normal family diner food. They have trains that run up above you and they even have little animals and people in the train cars! There are also trains to look at outside. Highly recommend you check it out too!

Homespun tourist attractions miles from the nearest Interstate are often worth going off the beaten path to see. This museum/restaurant appeals to railroad and nostalgia buffs, and families with children. When we told the gatekeeper we were railroad historians (which we are), my companions and I got a personalized 'red carpet' treatment and we were even introduced to the museum's owner, Dale Ward. I have visited many railroad museums through the years and this is one of the finest and best-displayed collections of railroadiana and artifacts I've seen. Restoration projects and other enhancements are ongoing. We had a light lunch at the adjoining Whistle Stop Restaurant, where the railroad theme extends with more preserved artifacts and model trains clickety-clacking overhead. The menu offers home-style diner fare. At the time of our visit, Indiana's mask mandate had just been lifted. The dining room was filled to capacity and none of the servers were wearing masks. Wanting only a snack, I ordered a cup of their homemade bean & ham soup. It was thick but very bland. The accompanying corn muffin tasted like it was made from a Jiffy mix. However, my companions gave a hearty thumbs-up to their sandwiches and fries. The historic railroad town of Monon, located a bit further south on Route 421, is worth exploring while you're in the area.

Our tour guide Joe was excellent. We have been through the museum several times but today was the best. Joe was very informative and interesting. First time thru the Flagger Car... beautiful piece of workmanship. Dale would be very proud that his love of trains continue.

Went in a group of four. Two ordered the prime rib. It was NOT prime rib. It was a severely over-priced, over-cooked, thinly sliced steak. Why call it something other than what it is? Put steak on your menu, people will be happy to get a steak. Other two at our table were also disappointed. And the meal was crazy expensive. Will never go back. Also the "museum" is basically the owner's personal collection of train memorabilia and then overpriced antiques for sale. Not a museum at all.

Great day! The memorabilia displayed was more than I could take in just the three hours we had available to us. Should have planned for the whole day. The tour was very detailed and we enjoyed talking to the owner of this magnificent collection. We didn't leave without sitting down to the whistle stop cafe. We found the food very good and price reasonable as well.

I travel this stretch of road (421/43) between Lafayette and Michigan City often and this is one of the few sit-down places to eat between Brookston and Westville. You probably wouldn't go out of your way to eat here, but if you're on this road and want to eat something other than fast food or if you're a train fan, especially Monon fan, this isn't a bad place to stop. I had the BBQ pulled pork sandwich and iced tea and my husband had the ham steak and a chocolate shake.The bill was $17. The restaurant was busy for a weekday lunch which is, in part, a reflection of the fact that there isn't a lot of competition for the dining dollar in this area. Our waitress was very friendly and the food arrived quickly The decor is railroad oriented with several Lionel trains circling the restaurant on overhead tracks.

We make the Whistle Stop a regular stopping point on our way from West Michigan to Gulf Shores, Alabama. Our recent stop on 5/11/2013 was a particularly delight. Dale the owner stopped at our table and introduced himself. Dale told us a little about the Whistle Stop and the museum and introduced us to his grand daughter who was working as host, cleaning tables and sweeping the floor. Dale's work ethic was obviously passed along to his grand daughter. Dale's hospitality and family values were a nice diversion from our long trip home. If you're looking for something other than rural Indiana hospitality, Chicago's not far away. We've always received exceptional service here and the food is good down home comfort food. The model trains traveling on tracks suspended from the ceiling and all the train memorabilia are enough to make stopping here worthwhile.

If you have kids, like Hoosier history or just want great food - this is a great place for you. Indiana seems so void of cool stuff but sometimes you find this cool little-known niche that you just have to share. The Monon RR operated from north to south. They had a train painted for IU (passengers) and one for PU (freight). They picked up Indiana limestone and carried passenger traffic for the Oaken Bucket game. It was a Hoosier original and made Monticello a robust town. The museum is excellent with substantive memorabilia and many train cars you can board outside on the lot. Counter to another critic, I thought the salad bar was fresh and excellent and unusual since it's hard to find one these days. The sandwiches my kids had were readily eaten and they loved seeing the small scale train work it's way around the ceiling while we waited on our food. This is one of a few Indiana locations I would deem a destation. -Greg

Great tour of the museum! I had a Train Wreck at the restaurant - baked potato, pulled pork, nacho cheese, scallions, jalapeños and sour cream.

I give the Monon Connection Museum 5 stars because it is obviously a labor of love for the people who put up the money to create the museum and for the people who parted with their beloved collections to help fill-out this out-of-the-way, small town museum. It's places like this that make me love Americana because they preserve parts of the past that could very well be discarded and forgotten. This isn't the Smithsonian by any stretch of the imagination, but it's worth stopping at, if you're going through here, and $5.00 entrance fee not only provides you with half and hour to an hours entertainment/education but it helps preserve the collections. I've been to a lot of museums, including train museums like Henry Ford's Greenfield Village, and I don't remember ever seeing a crane car. I can't even imagine the cost of transporting that monster from Rockford, IL to Monon, IN. I give the restaurant 2 stars. I know they warn you in the menu that their service is not speedy and that they put quality over speediness, but I just don't buy it. From the attitude of the staff (for which there are a surprising abundance of them compared to diners), they just don't care to seat you or serve you. We waited by the front door with 8 other people for 10 long minutes while they bustled around the 4 tables which had diners already seated. They all saw us (3 parties), but it was someone else's job (wherever she was) to seat us so they just left us all scrunched in the doorway. When we were finally seated and our drinks and meals ordered, our glasses remained empty most of the time and were refilled twice in the long wait before and after we received our entrees. My SO got a hamburger and I got the open rib-eye sandwich. The food was just OK. The lemonade was fantastic which is the nicest thing I have to say about the restaurant and my dining experience here. Come see the museum, and eat only if you really, really need a long time to stare at the trains overhead.

Awesome place for rail fans and I just came here after my vacation.There are lots of Monon railway places in Indiana because it's the Hoosier Line.The first Monon place I've went to is abandon in Munster Indiana and South Hammond were the company The Hoosier Line was,at now it's torn up and it has dirt and mud the water tower and bridge remains.I am a rail fan I went to different places like Griffith Indiana were the Erie Lackawanna remains and the C&O tracks remain there.But the Monon is still running today as CSX and Amtrak.Monon is still a famous city to Indiana but Indiana is no longer the motto of The Crossroads of tracks.Griffith's motto is the town that came to tracks.The Monon and Amtrak work together in the 1980s until Monon was out of business and the same as Griffith the El the C&O and the EJ&E are out of business today the C&O line is now the Illinois central which runs a chemical plant.Cn (Canadian National) took over all of these lines except for Illinois Central.

Normally I would rate about the food. Today I have to say it was the management I will rate. I overheard the owner/manager call an employee stupid and ignorant to other customers because of a bumper sticker. This is not how one should run a business. Slander is not a good practice. This employee should file a formal complaint. I will never eat at an establishment that speaks poorly of their employees. How Unprofessional!!!!!

Excellent display of railroad memorabilia and great food at the restaurant. Well worth the stop, just East of I-65.

A railroad museum-cum-diner in BuFu, Indiana--sounds awesome, right? I wish I could give this place a better rating, but the food was so uninspiring. The salad bar was half-assed. No fries. The grilled cheese was okay. Everything on my dining companions' plates looked pretty meh, even for a diner, and the service was neither warm nor sassy nor quick. I did like what I could see of the railroad museum area (which was very small) because I can geek out on old-skool train advertising or China patterns from the dining cars of yore, but I wasn't inspired enough to pay the $5 admission. A kid might really enjoy this place as there are at least three model trains suspended near the ceiling of the restaurant and some cool old fixtures outside, but definitely don't come hungry.

Great place to see trains other than that is just a frozen food prepared restaurant . At the prices they charge you should have. Fresh meal prepared with fresh food instead of frozen boxes of horrible Sysco food products. I can get the same meal a lot cheaper in the frozen food isle at Walmart .

We have visited before, but it's been a while. I don't know if we had a unambitious waiter, or if quality has fallen. We had to ask for utensils, but only one of the four of us received them. Hamburgers came with nothing - no lettuce, tomato, onion - totally plain. Water is awful. We got napkins after asking twice. Food was okay, but not extraordinary. No dessert menu, or desserts listed on the main menu. The restroom is for one person. We had to wait in line, or pay to get in the "museum" to use a unisex restroom. No way to dry our hands, because they were out of paper towels. The sink water was scalding hot to the point of steaming. I felt like we paid a lot for a very mediocre meal and service. We were sadly disappointed.

The trains on the walls were frightening and I wanna just say I like trains so not sure how to go about myself here lol

Food is very good. Service was great! We had the country fried steak, corn & mashed potatoes, real taters by the way! Wife had pork chops, baked potato & salad. Free dip of ice cream each.

Hands down, this is the best railroad artifact museum one can see in the US. Dale Ward began collecting in 1993 and he has amassed over 6000 of rail related and period. There are literally hundreds of different hand held lanterns, a movie screen which displays a variety of train related DVD's, and a Illinois Central RR depot from Emory. Outside the different signals are powered but at the time of my visit, not all were working; the rolling stock collection is also growing with four more units to be brought to the grounds, there is a gift store in the ticket depot from Cove. This museum was a definite visit on this particular vacation and now I feel that I can die a fulfilled train fan. Harold, the interpreter, was more than happy to point out all of the significant pieces and even went out of his way to answer my questions. At the beginning of his tour, he gives an overview of the pieces in the first room. In the dining room, there are Pennsylvania RR calendars from 1929-1959, and two drum heads, one from the Presidential coach. Inside the dining room is a G scale model train which operates elevated just below the ceiling. MAKE the effort and budget some extra time, I spent just shy of 5 hours. Note, I didn't have time to eat in the restaurant but it was very busy from when I arrived till when I left.

Food is acceptable, not worth writing home about, but acceptable. I take the kids anytime we're in Monon. My boys love to watch the trains circle overhead on the tacks suspended from the ceiling. We even get in the caboose outside when it's open. Service is great, trains are fun!

Today we had a five Man road trip from Indianapolis to the Monon Connection Museum and Whistle Stop Restaurant. We ate at the Whistle Stop first, which was great food at decent prices which included ice cream to our surprise! The decor is great with antique calendars on the wall and a great 4 track train set hanging from the ceiling. They had 3 "G" gauge trains running above you all the time. I kept looking at them as if I was a kid again! We then walk outside to see all the cars, rail cranes and more which was all free. We decided to go thru the museum which again was a great value. We met Harry Harvey, which really knew all you wanted to know about all the 6,000 items of this multimillion dollar collection. It took you back in time when the railroads where in their prime. Harry mentioned the items on the Monon Railroad sign that we could relate to since we were from Indy. The Monon ran straight thru Indianapolis many years ago. Many items contained there were beautiful and created in the craftsmanship that you really don't see today. I was very please that one of the guys suggested this trip.

We had a great time celebrating my mothers 70th birthday party there. The tour was great and the staff were very accommodating. Eating in the museum made it extra special.

great place to eat, especially if you are into trains. good food, quiet other than the cool large scale model trains running overhead! nice clean place!

Food was horrible and service was slow. Took 45min for my wife to get her meal (and it want even busy). I was half done with my plate by then. Her food was so bad she returned it. Her replacement order took another 30 min and she didn't like it enough to finish it. Haven't been back.