All over Northeast Ohio on Monday, June 8, people lined the historic Nickel Plate Road rail corridor, today operated by Norfolk Southern, to catch a glimpse of the Union Pacific Big Boy No. 4014—the world’s largest steam locomotive. The enormous train followed the southern shore of Lake Erie, from northwest Ohio to the northeast part of the stae before continuing on to New York and Pennsylvania.

The front view of Union Pacific's Big Boy No. 4014. the world's largest steam locomotive.The train’s journey is part of the America 250 celebration, carrying the anniversary message across the United States from the West Coast to the East Coast.

FreshWater writer Elizabeth Hille was on Krebs Road in Avon Lake as Big Boy passed through town. This is her account of the once-in-a-lifetime event:

There were a ton of cars lining the whole street (on both sides) and hundreds of people. The train was running a bit behind schedule as it left Lorain and arrived to where we were watching around 12:10 p.m. It was supposed to leave Lorain at 11:30.

A lot of people were camped out in chairs, but some were standing just feet from the tracks (which was not advised)! It was definitely like nothing I had ever seen before.

It was very impressive to see such an old steam locomotive running so smoothly. It really wasn’t as loud as I expected—and you would never know that it was from the 1940s!

Unfortunately, it didn’t honk the horn near us, but we heard it in the distance later on.

It was really cool to see everyone there and so invested in the train. A lot of people were wearing red, white and blue or had American flags, so it really felt like a great community spectacle!