On Sunday, one day after Jakoby Koehler turned 7, the Augusta boy, his mother Ally Small and her boyfriend Steve Batchelder took the train at Wiscasset, Waterville & Farmington Railway Museum in Alna. Koehler, a train fan and experienced rider, said it was awesome. “It was a fast one, and I like fast.”

At 2 1/2, Leanne Fox of Auburn is used to riding the museum’s rails. Her father Joe Fox volunteers at the Cross Road nonprofit and her mother Dawn Fox has helped out there, as well, including when pregnant with her. Before being born, Leanne was active, but would quiet right down when her mother took the train. Now a rider since the age of 1 month, she still likes it, her mother said. Asked what she liked about it, Leanne said: “Chug-a-chug.”

Midday Sunday, day two of the museum’s annual picnic weekend, mother and daughter were on board the 1923 Model T Ford rail car, converted from a road car. The Model T’s replaced railroad’s hand cars, said the driver, volunteer and museum neighbor Stewart Rhine. Railroad workers could load their tools onto them and take them to their work sites, and not be tired like they would be pumping the hand cars, Rhine said.

“The nice thing is, we can still get brand new parts for pretty much anything from the dashboard up,” because Ford and other companies still make parts for it, he said. The car still has its original engine. Leon Weeks worked on the rail car for four and a half years at his shop in Farmington Falls, Rhine said. Then the museum added the heavy, cast steel railroad wheels and it has been in service about seven years.

In Wiscasset for a five-month stay, Jo Van De Velde brought twins Kiera and Arthur, 7, and their sister Erin, 9, because it seemed like a fun thing to do. They were having lunch after riding the train. Kiera said her favorite part was getting to see the train’s engine.

In a first for the museum, World War I reenactors had an encampment with training exercises, tents and early 20th century items including a Victrola and a bat and baseball gloves. The baseball gear was circa WWII, said Matt Payson of Epping, New Hampshire. By then, the military had learned sports were a better form of recreation than going out drinking before shipping out, he said.

The visiting group was reenacting the former Second Maine, which joined the 103rd Regiment, 26th Division in going to fight on the western front, said Tom Backus of Warren. WWI gets overlooked because the U.S. was in it less time than other wars, he said. But quite a few of the 90,000 Americans killed in the war were from Maine and the Midcoast, Backus said. “It’s something that’s kind of forgotten in local history and U.S. history.” The war was the first time the U.S. stepped out onto the world stage, and the need for supplies helped propel the industrial revolution, reenactors said.

Among the reenactors was Bath Iron Works firefighter Nehemiah Chase of Lisbon Falls. Asked about the group’s encampments, he said they are a chance to play, and a chance to get a feel for what the soldiers experienced. His first name comes from a family member who served with the North in the Civil War.

Cornelius Donovan of Topsham doesn’t belong to the group but likes to go to period events in period wear. He had a cane and a hat and wore a suit made for him in Vancouver. Donovan’s great great-grandfather Beltran Crocker of Woolwich served in WWI. Donovan said Crocker died at about 70 and had had longtime problems from gas exposure in the war after being injured in the second battle of the Marne in France. Donovan said his grandmother Patricia Donovan has said Crocker would talk about the war and had medals from it.

He said she has always admired Crocker and, although he was born decades after Crocker’s death, Donovan, 27, said he does, too.

Visiting the encampment, Doug Caron of West Palm Beach, Florida donated to a project to get a WWI memorial in Washington, D.C. The encampment had a United States World War I Centennial Commission display where people could give $2 for a poppy seed packet. We have monuments for other wars and World War I should have one, said Caron, who served two years in the Army.

Caron and wife Marcia took the Model T rail car to the encampment. At one point on the ride, he got to help Rhine and another museum volunteer, Waterville’s Dan Malkowski, turn the car around on the track. It was fun, Caron said, smiling after returning to his seat in the back of the Model T.

The weekend’s picnic food was being prepared and manned like everything else, by volunteers. Nancy Weeks of West Gardiner, cooking with Sonja Wyllie, said the breeze was helping with the heat from the cooking Sunday. The only pay is in friendship, Wyllie said about volunteering at the museum. Wayne Laepple of Lancaster, Pennsylvania said he has been volunteering at least 15 years. Asked what led him to join, he said he liked the museum’s efforts at authenticity and thought it was good those operating the train wear period clothes.

Small also commented on the authenticity, and volunteers taking the time to talk at length with visitors. Not all museums do that, she said. “This was very family-friendly.”