A Look at the Largest Sleigh Collection in the U.S.
USFR 12/26/20 - Sleigh Collection
Editor's Note: Republished from Dec. 24, 2020
Bill Engle remembers attending a sale 22 years ago where some old sleighs were being sold. But what he remembers most is what the winning bidders did with those sleighs.
"I said 'what are you doing that’s history?' And they said 'all we do, all we want is the runners and we ship them out to Denver Colorado and they make coffee tables out of them there,'" says Bill Engle, owner, ofDenver Sleigh Works in Denver, Mo.
Engle didn’t like the answer they gave him, so he made a decision on the spot about what he intended to do.
"You gotta be kinding, history is important and all of that," he says. "You got competition from now on."
So for the past two decades, he has been buying sleighs and bringing them here to tiny, Denver, Missouri where he owns most of the old buildings around the square and has filled them with sleighs. How many you ask?
"I’m going to say roughly in various conditions there’s 300 or thereabouts," says Engle. "There’s nine buildings here."
People are always asking if he’s working to restore all that he buys. He reminds people that he’s over 80 years old, he still farms and there’s only so much time in one’s day, so he does what he can. He enjoys writing about their history and sharing stories with those who make an appointment to stop by, free of charge.
"This one here I know was a mail carrier," says Engle. "There it has the brass mail carrier. Of course all of the RFD mail carriers they made their own or had their own sleighs much like today they have their own car."
A walk around these buildings reveals a multitude of shapes and styles of sleighs. There are sleighs that carried school children, others carried doctors and some were fancy, others more practical.
Engle believes he has the largest collection of sleighs in the country. He doesn’t sell them, except to a museum on occasion, his purpose is to share the history with others.
"I’m saving them right now is what I’m trying to do," says Engle. "What’s happens to them I don’t know."
