The Norwegian Railway Museum (Norsk Jernbanemuseum) is one of the oldest established railway museums in the world.

It was established as the result of an idea put forward by the Norge Stasjonsmesterforening (Norwegian Station Masters' Association) in October 1895, when a member suggested the time was right to form a museum.

As a result on 5 October 1896 a Museum Committee was formed, with representatives from various Norwegian railway organisations.

The NSB (Norwegian State Railways) allowed a room in the new station building at Hamar to be used for the museum, and the Government made an annual donation to its expenses.

At first the collection was confined to small items like photographs, documents, telegraph equipment. Unfortunately the museum's collection had to go into storage in 1912 when the room was needed for railway purposes. The museum was reopened on its own site at Hamar in 1930, and now included large objects like station buildings.

The collection is now large, and includes standard and narrow gauge locomotives and rolling stock. On most days during summer a narrow-gauge steam hauled train is in operation on the site, but the locomomotive was scheduled for maintenance on the day of my visit.

There is also an excellent library in the museum, but this is closed during July — and the date of my visit was 1 July !

(I will have to go back!)

My photographs are mostly confined to items in the main exhibition hall.

Frank Stamford

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Hamar station, from the road side. This magnificent building was built in 1895, and from around 1896 to 1912 the Norwegian Railway Museum was housed in an upstairs room. The first Hamar station was a much more modest timber structure built in 1862 for the pioneering 3 ft 6 in gauge railway to Grundset.

Hamar station from the trackside. For many years this was the break-of-gauge point where travellers from Oslo to Røros and Trondheim changed from standard gauge to 3 ft 6 in gauge trains. The overnight trains to Trondheim included sleeping cars.

The central ebtrance hall of Hamar station, from the rail side.

Close-up of details of the central entrance hall.

Inside the entrance hall of Hamar station.

Now we move to the Railway Museum, which is over a kilometre from the station:

Before the coming of railways sledges such as this were used for land transport in Norway. Water based transport was used wherever possible, by river, lake and fjord as well as coastal shipping.


Standard gauge 2-4-0 locomotive No.16 of class 2 of the Norwegian State Railways (NSB) was supplied by Robert Stephenson & Co. in 1861 for the Kongsvinger Railway. At that time the NSB was pioneering the development of 3 ft 6 in gauge railways, but the Kongsvinger line was built to standard gauge because it would eventually link with the standard gauge Swedish railway system. No.16 remained in service until 1914.


Letter type telegraph instrument. Public telegrams could be sent over the railway telegraph system, and with this type of machine they were sent letter by letter. Later (in the 1870s) morse code was used, which was much faster but required much more highly trained operators to use.

Leading to bridge

Needle telegraph instrument to record train movements. Normally the staff and ticket system was not used in Norway, traffic control was by the Train Order System.

bridge pier

Standard gauge Manning Wardle 0-4-0ST shunting locomotive No.25 of the NSB. Eight of these were used at Oslo station, the last was withdrawn from service in 1964. This one is builder's number 576 of 1875.

And here is the builder's plate.



The first railway in Norway was the standard gauge Norwegian Trunk Railway (NHJ) running from Oslo (then Kristiania) to Eidsvoll. It was a public/private partnership with a large contribution from English shareholders. The locomotives and rolling stock was designed and built in England. This included fourteen of these fourth class open passenger carriages, which had no seats. However the passengers apparently brought lots of luggage and could sit on that! The fourth class fare for the 67 km trip from Oslo to Eisdvoll would cost the equivalent of one day's wages for an average worker.


NSB standard gauge 1st and 2nd class coach No.AB 116 of 1867, built by Ashbury of Manchester..

First class compartment in the carriage above, with lined ceiling, curtained windows, and fully upholstered seats.

And one of the second class compartments, with loose cushions on the seats.

This is Carl Augustus Pihl, who was largely responsible for the development of Norwergian railways during the thirty years from 1856. He pioneered the use of 3 ft 6 in gauge against the advice of English railway engineers who felt that anything less than standard gauge would not work.

A 3 ft 6 in gauge wagon outside the Norwegian Railway Museum.

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All photographs Copyright Frank Stamford, 2008, who may be contacted by email at: frank.stamford@bigpond.com

Last updated: 27 August 2008