The Seoul Museum of History has restored for public showing one of the last streetcars that ran through the capital city. Once the most widely used means of transportation in Seoul, the vehicles went out of use in 1968. On display in the museum’s outdoor space is Streetcar No. 381, which was decommissioned in 1968. From 1973, it was shown to citizens at Seoul Children’s Grand Park, and it was moved to the Seoul Museum of History in 2007.
Recent conservation and treatment efforts have revealed that the car was restructured between 1966 and 1968, uncovering the fastening methods used in its hardware manufacturing and restoring through scientific analysis of the substances and colors of pigments in the vehicle’s interior and exterior paints. The hardware, which previous attempts couldn’t restore, has been returned to its original form thanks to the restorations and refurbishments made following historical documents and materials from the 1960s. Now at Seoul Museum of History, visitors can see the streetcar, just as it was when it ran the rails.
55 Saemunan-ro, Jongno-gu, Seoul 03177, Korea
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