SPRINGFIELD - Union Station's rebirth is underway, but the chance at recapturing the retro-elegance and charm of the original may have - literally and figuratively - left the station.

Between 30 and 40 of the station's historic wooden benches, each roughly 18 feet long and weighing 1,000 pounds with a value of up $100,000 on the antiques market, have disappeared, officials admit.

"They were apparently stolen," said Kevin Kennedy, the city's chief development officer. "Not 'apparently' - they were stolen."

The benches can be glimpsed in a number of file photos in The Republican archives with those dated July 2, 2014 and Jan. 16, 2015 depicting at least eight benches on the construction site.



"It's very strange that the benches walked away," said Christopher Moskal, executive director for the Springfield Redevelopment Authority, which has owned Union Station since 1989 and is leading its recent renovation.

Where the benches went remains a mystery, as is who took them from a sealed renovation site and how.

The station building remained closed for more than 20 years, but closest anyone can give as an answer to when some of the benches went missing was 2012, prior to the start of the ongoing construction project.

What is known is that minus the original benches, Union Station may have to be fitted with more modern furniture when it opens as expected in December.

And it also means is that Springfield, for all its emphasis on preserving Union Station's history, may well miss out the chance to create a modern transportation center that still harkens back to the golden age of rail travel. Anyone who has ever been to refurbished train stations in New Haven, Baltimore or Los Angeles knows what that means.

"That's the frustrating part of all this," Kennedy said. "To say it is a disappointment would be an understatement."

Moskal said no one knows when the benches were stolen but they figure it was sometime during May 2012.

At that time, SRDA staff and historical consultants were going through Union Station regularly in advance of the start of construction to take inventory of what artifacts were there and determining whether they were worth preserving.

One week the benches were there, Moskal said, and the next week they were gone.

Not all of the benches were gone, he said. It was just the ones that were worth anything.

"All the good benches were gone," Moskal said.

He described the ones that remained as "pieces of benches" in a pile that turned

out to be "nothing but garbage - wet, deteriorated and moldy" from leaks in the roof that developed over the years the station was vacant.

Of that pile of garbage, the city was able to restore a single bench at the Department of Public Works facility on Tapley Street, he said. The one bench will be displayed in the station, much like the restored original barber chair, as an exhibit to the station's past.

Ironically, one month after the benches went missing, U.S. Rep. Richard E. Neal, Union Station's biggest advocate and political benefactor, toured the facility with Moskal and Mayor Domenic J. Sarno. If anyone mentioned their disappearance to Neal, he never let on to the press.

A June 22, 2012, article in The Republican described Neal pointing at some benches in the corner and saying "And these great wooden benches ... I'm so glad to see that these are going to be restored."

The benches Neal saw are apparently the same ones that Moskal described as the pile of wet, deteriorated and moldy garbage.

Neal spokesman William Tranghese on Friday that when Neal toured the station at that time, he did not know the other benches were missing.

Neal has toured different Union Stations across the county to get ideas how they were successfully renovated.

He has also met with Amtrak officials at his office to discuss the Springfield project, its history, landscape and how its original integrity can be maintained. Neal has also invited the same Amtrak officials to tour the project in Springfield and to give a presentation city officials and residents.

In a prepared statement released by Neal's office in April, Neal said the city has "one chance to get this important project right."

His goal all along has been the renovation and refurbishment of Union Station to turn the downtown landmark in to something that will be a source of "considerable civic pride," he said.

Neal cited other train stations in Baltimore, New Haven, St. Louis and Los Angeles as examples of restoration projects that have been done with an attention to detail.

"My goal with Union Station has always been to restore the historic building to its original splendor. And we are almost there. I would like visitors to the refurbished station to enjoy the same vibrant and elegant terminal that travelers did more than 50 years ago," the statement reads. "That means acquiring and recovering period benches, lighting, signage and other related artifacts that were a part of the rail structure's long and rich history."

Tranghese on Friday said that while Neal considers it to be a great disappointment that the benches are missing, he disagrees with the suggestion that the main concourse will have to be fitted with modern furniture as a result.

He said Neal is speaking with officials at Amtrak and with the Massachusetts Department of Transportation about obtaining "authentic replacement benches." His office is also working with the city to restore many of the original station artifacts that have been removed to the city's Tapley Street facility.

"The restoration of Union Station has been a priority of the Congressman for nearly four decades. He has invested a considerable amount of time and energy in this important preservation project. The disappearance of these benches will not change that," Tranghese said.

When Union Station opened in 1926, it was considered one of the most modern train stations in the country. At the time when rail travel was the fastest means of transport, Springfield, a major city in the Northeast with railroad lines running north-south and east-west, was one of the busiest stations.

At the station's grand opening in late December 1926, newspaper accounts noted that between 20,000 and 30,000 people toured every nook and cranny of the new station, which had restaurants, barber shops and multiple newsstands. It also had a large waiting room described as having row upon row of benches with enough seats for 650 travelers.

A Dec. 20, 1926 article in the Springfield Daily Republican noted that despite the crowd, the station's "unusually large size" could accommodate it easily. "It was noted the traveling public made particular use of the waiting benches in the new subway at the start of things. These seats are near the doors to the stairway and proved their usefulness at once."

Over the years, the same benches would be mentioned several times as weary passengers waited for trains, mothers tended to children, college students clustered while heading home for Christmas, and GIs on the way to and from posts sometimes stretched out to nap.

In August 1958, when a fire in New York caused delays of three hours or more in Springfield, the Republican reported "scores tried to sleep on the wooden benches."

But nine years later in 1967, reporter Frank B. Murray, for whom the street outside Union Station in named, went through the station, saw main hall partitioned off, the wooden benches empty, and concluded "the romance of railroading - as we knew it - is gone."

Union Station closed in 1973 when Amtrak converted the station to the present Lyman Street facility. The Springfield Redevelopment Authority acquired the building in 1989. The benches had been a staple inside the building from the time it opened until well after it closed, and until 2012 when it was discovered they were no longer there.

Moskal said that when the benches were discovered missing, he contacted Sarno, who in turn notified then-Springfield Police Commissioner William Fitchet.

Moskal said Fitchet notified him that he would increase patrols around Union Station. He also asked for a key to the property to allow officers access to the facility in case there were addition reports of someone inside. A key was delivered, Moskal said.

A few weeks later, the SRDA staff noticed that a large strip of copper was missing from the roof of the former baggage area of the building. Again he notified Sarno, who contacted Fitchet, who assigned an officer to the case.

Moskal said he remembers Detective Michael Carney and another detective whose name he cannot remember coming to Union Station on June 4, 2012, to investigate the theft of the benches and the copper.

He remembers the date specifically because both officers after a while left in a hurry to respond to the scene of the fatal shooting of officer Kevin Ambrose during a domestic disturbance in Sixteen Acres.

Springfield police said they could find no records of a reported theft or an investigation involving Carney at Union Station.

Fitchet retired in 2014. Carney retired in January.

Carney, reached by telephone recently, said he recalls going to Union Station to investigate a reported theft, but he cannot recall an exact date or even a general time period.

At times, the robbery unit was typically working on 40 to 50 cases per month and sometimes as many as 70 cases.

"I do know there's a report. We did go out there," Carney said.

Springfield police could not locate an incident report.

Carney remembers that they took photos of the scene, conducted interviews and took notes.

He said he remembers getting the call on June 4 of that year to respond to the scene of the Ambrose murder, but he does not recall what he was working on before that. Typically, they would investigate during the first part of the shift and then return to the station to write up their notes as part of the case file.

If they were there in the morning prior to Ambrose's death, it is likely they would not have returned to the case for a few days as the tragedy became a top priority. "On June 4, our minds were not there," he said.

Exactly how many benches were in Union Station?

Moskal said the number missing is between 30 and 40. He estimated the number of dilapidated benches to be eight or nine, of which one was salvageable. That would put the total at a minimum of 38 to and a high of 49.

No exact count is available, but articles through the years have said the waiting room seating capacity was 650 people.

If the 18-foot-long benches were projected to seat 12 people each, it would mean 54 benches. If they were intended to seat 14, because people in the 1920s were on average thinner than they are now, it would require 46 benches.

Newspapers accounts of the station over the years have described the waiting room area has having rows and rows of benches.

Even as late as 1961, when rail travel was in decline in the dawning of the age of commercial air travel and the interstate highway system, a Republican article described a near-empty station with "row on row of the great benches, worn smooth by thousands who had lingered there."

A Jan. 16, 2015 file photo of benches from the original train station at left as work gets underway at the Union Station building. The long wooden benches were a staple of Union Station from the day it opened in 1926. They sat idle in the station for more than 20 years and as renovation of the station ramped up, they went missing.

The benches were to be a key part of the renovation project. They were going to be refurbished and set up in the main hall, similar to the station project in New Haven. The rehab of Union Station was intended to draw heavily on the station's history, Kennedy said.

The benches were to serve a functional role in allowing people to sit, but they were also supposed to harken back to the station's heyday, just like the restored barber's chair, the old incoming and departing chalkboard, and the antique clock.

"That is the frustrating part of all of this," Kennedy said.

With the construction ongoing, Union Station is a beehive of activity during the day. At night it is locked up.

But prior to the start of construction, Union Station in 2012 was empty and abandoned, much as it had been since the mid-1970s.

"Given the size of the benches, getting them out of there would be no small task," Kennedy said. "They would have to have a truck to get them out of there."

Moskal said it would be difficult to drive a truck up to the abandoned station without someone noticing.

"You couldn't just take the benches out without someone saying, 'What's going on?'" he said.

Kennedy said the missing benches, if in good condition, would fetch a high price in the antiques circuit.

As an example, the restored original barber chair that is being returned to Union Station had an estimated worth of $5,000.

"You can imagine what a bench - or 10 benches - would be worth," he said.

Peter Imler of Stanton Auctions, an auctioneering and appraising business in Hampden that specializes in antique furniture, said he is not sure what each of the benches would be worth.

Looking at a Republican file photo of one of the benches that was in good condition, he said he would probably appraise its worth at $2,500. That estimate is due to its size, which he said would likely limit the field of prospective buyers.

"It's hard to place a realistic value on something like this because at its size it is not really a household antique and therefore has a limited appeal from a usage standpoint," he said. "In other words, few people would be looking at this and saying, 'Gee, this would look nice in my home.'"

Using Moskal's count of 30 to 40 benches, if each were worth $2,500, the total haul would be worth $75,000 to $100,000

Kennedy and Moskal said that minus the original benches, Union Station will have to purchase more modern furniture.

"The cost of replacing them would be astronomical," Moskal said.

Moskal said the plan for the past few years has been to make the main concourse a multi-use facility.

During the day when traffic is higher, there will be tables and chairs for travelers. At night when traffic is less, the facility could be used for special events and the tables and chairs could be moved out of the way.

It is nearing the point where they need to order furniture in time for the station's opening in December, he said.

If more benches were available, Moskal said they would be incorporated into the finished station.

"Would we use them? Without a doubt," he said. "We would reuse them in a minute."

He said they would not fit in with the plans for the multi-use concourse, but they could be used elsewhere in the building.

In the months since they were discovered missing, Moskal said SRDA staff, sometimes aboveboard and sometimes incognito, have tried to find traces of the benches. They've checked eBay, craigslist and other social media. They've gone to tag sales and flea markets, and reached out to antiques dealers and pawn shops.

And the end result was to find nothing. Not a trace.

"We couldn't get anyone to say, 'We got some benches,'" he said.

"We did as much as we could," he said. "But they are gone. Gone."