Old train depot could recapture its glory days
The Amqui Station between the Louisville & Nashville Railroad tracks in Madison was vacant and close to demolition when Cash bought it in 1979 and moved it a few miles northeast to his property in Hendersonville.
After the singer’s death in 2003, Halo Properties purchased the depot and is now donating it back to Madison, where community leaders want to use it as a museum and, if they can secure the land, as part of a planned commuter rail system for Nashville and its suburbs.
Some see the station, which is almost 100 years old, as a way to help revive some of the town’s heritage.
“For many years, we had generations of the same families and everyone knew each other,” said Nathan Massey, president of Discover Madison Inc.’s board of directors. “The demographics have changed, and since then Madison has lost some of its identity.”
Discover Madison Inc., a nonprofit formed to revitalize Madison’s downtown area, is handling the relocation.
The group needs to raise at least $35,000 to have the station moved, not counting any costs to set up a museum and buy the land to put it on.
In Hendersonville, the little white building was on Johnny Cash Parkway at the singer’s commercial complex called the House of Cash.
Cash, who recorded many songs about trains or with references to trains, said in 1979 that he was buying the station because of his love for the railroad and because he wanted to display all his memorabilia.
But a sign resting behind the door declares the building “June Carter Cash’s Antiques,” and a smiling picture of her hangs on the wall above some dusty furniture, leftovers from the inventory she sold out of the station.
The business has been idle since June Carter Cash’s death in 2003.