UNITY -- The Belfast & Moosehead Lake Railroad Company is back on solid ground after several trips to the precipice of extinction.

Like the little engine that could, the train kept on chugging and on Saturday will celebrate its 140th anniversary with the opening of a brand new museum to celebrate its storied past.

"I think there's a general fascination for railroads and there's a general fascination for history, so I think the two will marry right there (in the museum)," said Robert Gillam, volunteer for the Unity Train Museum, which will open Saturday for the first time.

The ticket office opens at 11 a.m. on Saturday at the station on Depot Street. Adult fares have been reduced to $18.67, to commemorate the year the railroad began, said Bob Lamontagne, president of the Belfast & Moosehead Lake Railroad Preservation Society.

The anniversary ceremony begins at noon and includes the Maine Third Fife and Drum Corps, Lamontagne said. There will be a demonstration of the Armstrong Turntable -- a giant, concrete pivot used to turn engines and cars using only human strength -- at 1:30 p.m.

"It's going to be an exciting day," Lamontagne said. "We have a company that has 140 years of service and the official opening of the museum."

The Unity Train Museum includes a collection of artifacts from railroads throughout the state, Gillam said. Many of the artifacts are on long-term loan from an anonymous collector from Bridgeton, Gillam said.

"He just wanted to see it displayed," Gillam said.

The Unity museum is one of a few institutions in the state dedicated to preserving railroad artifacts, but Unity's collection is probably unparalleled, Gillam said. There are dozens of lanterns as well as timetables dating back to the 1860s.

"There are things you wouldn't think would have survived," Gillam said. "I would say this is the biggest and best in terms of the materials collected."

Gov. Joshua Chamberlain signed the charter for the newly formed Belfast & Moosehead Lake Railroad on Feb. 28, 1867. It was originally leased for 50 years to the Maine Central Railroad, according to Bob Bennett, a train historian.

The train was originally intended to run all the way to Moosehead Lake and on to QuŽbec, but with money running short, the rail was stopped in Burnham, where it could exchange with other trains and head virtually anywhere in the nation, Lamontagne said.

The train never did make it to Moosehead Lake, Bennett said.

Maine Central was losing so much money on the train that by 1925 the company wanted out.

The town of Belfast bought about 80 percent of the rail's stock with the remainder purchased by other towns along the line, including Brooks, Thorndike and Unity, and some private investors, Bennett said. It was one of only three municipally-owned rail roads in the nation.

"You could say (the railroad) dodged a bullet there," Bennett said. "It was a real oddity in the industry."

Belfast continued to operate the train until 1991, until the town decided it was losing too much money and sold it to Unity businessman and philanthropist Bert Clifford.

The railroad officially began operating as a non-profit last summer.

The museum is just the first of three planned developments, Lamontagne said. A non-profit preservation society, formed last year, plans to restore the 1900 depot and turn a portion of the engine house into a display area.

"As soon as (the museum) is complete we'll be going into phase two," he said. "This is only the beginning. We have a lot of plans and things will be changing over a period of time, so when people come back they'll see more things."

Repairs continue to the 70-ton steam locomotive, Lamontagne said, but the General Electric 70-ton engines, which date to the 1940s, are considered antiques. The railroad has three of only about 25 of the engine models still in operation.

The train takes off at 2 p.m. throughout the season for a roughly two-hour round trip to Burnham Junction. The train runs Fridays through Sundays until July 18th, when the trips will expand to Wednesdays through Sundays.

Tickets for the General Electric, 70-ton train rides are $20 for adults, $18 for seniors and $10 for children aged 3 to 15. Children 2 and younger ride for free.

Lamontagne believes people will still want to connect to the past by riding the rail 140 years from now.

"It gives you that chance to have a hands-on experience with train travel," he said. "It's so much a part of our heritage."

For more information go to UnityTrainMuseum.org.