(The following story by John Keenan appeared on the Omaha World-Herald website on January 4, 2010.)
OMAHA, Neb. — In the basement of the Durham Museum, displayed on tables in front of bright-yellow Southern Pacific rail cars, a different set of “train cars” was drawing visitors Monday.
The Girl Scouts were holding their third annual “cookie train” event, one of six held in cities across the state.
Scout-decorated train cars — actually shoebox-sized cardboard boxes — included a series of four highlighting the four seasons; a version of Edvard Munch’s “The Scream” painting with a cookie taking the place of the screamer’s open mouth; a house modeled after the animated film “Up,” complete with a cluster of brightly colored balloons on top; and a miniature White House, with President Obama and a Brownie troop out front.
“The girls get a box (to decorate) and a box of cookies, and the only requirement is that they decorate with those Girl Scout cookies — at least one cookie a box,” explained Theresa Cassaday, spokeswoman for the Girl Scouts.
“This is a great way for the girls to get excited about the cookie program,” she said.
Girl Scout cookie sales start Jan. 8.
The Durham event featured about 150 “cars,” and there were about 600 decorated statewide. Between 300 and 400 girl scouts stopped by the Durham on Monday, Cassaday said.
“Every year, it seems to just get bigger and bigger and bigger.”
Maggie, 9, and Jessie Meiers, 6, of Omaha were looking through the tables for Jessie’s Daisy troop’s train, which was done in a “Flower Power” motif.
“We had a New Year’s Eve party and had the girls come over and decorate the box,” said mom Carrie Meiers, also the Daisy troop leader. “They got to decorate it any way they wanted.”
The scouts also were taking part in a museum scavenger hunt, where they had to search to find answers to questions such as “I started Nebraska Furniture Mart. Who am I?”
“That’s so hard,” said Sarah Madsen, 7. Her sister Kate’s troop had put together a snowman car.
Troop leader Beth Hesselink said it took about a day for her seven-girl Brownie troop to put their White House train car together.
“They loved it,” she said. “They took quite a bit of time deciding what they wanted their theme to be, and they were very excited to do something related to Obama and the White House,”
Cookie train events were also held Monday at the Lincoln Children’s Museum; the Trails and Rails Museum in Kearney; the Columbus Public Library; the Golden Spike Tower and Visitors Center in North Platte, and the Farm and Ranch Museum in Gering.