Hermann, MO (HEM)

301 Wharf Street
Hermann, MO 65041

Station Hours

Annual Ticket Revenue (FY 2024): $814,849
Annual Station Ridership (FY 2024): 27,495

• Ownerships
• Routes Served
• Contact
• Local Community Links

• Facility Ownership: City of Hermann
• Parking Lot Ownership: Union Pacific Railroad
• Platform Ownership: City of Hermann
• Track Ownership: Union Pacific Railroad

• Missouri River Runner

Ismael Cuevas
Regional Contact
governmentaffairschi@amtrak.com
For information about Amtrak fares and schedules, please visit Amtrak.com or call 1-800-USA-RAIL (1-800-872-7245).

• City of Hermann
• Visit Hermann
• Amtrak Missouri River Runner
• Katy Trail State Park
• Hermann Case Study: Tourism Growth

On the morning of September 12, 2014, city officials, residents and representatives from Amtrak, the Missouri Department of Transportation (MoDOT) and Union Pacific Railroad gathered to cut the ribbon on the city’s new depot and transportation museum. The building replaced a small shelter constructed in 1991 when Missouri Service (now the Missouri River Runner) trains began making regular stops at Hermann.

Dignitaries gathered for photos as the westbound Missouri River Runner made its scheduled morning stop. Following the ceremony, attendees enjoyed light refreshments and tours of the depot and museum. Displays trace the area’s rich transportation history, with a focus on the Missouri River, railroads and roadways.

Designed by architects with CM Archer Group, the one story, 820 square foot depot features a random rubble stone veneer base, walls clad in traditional clapboard siding and a hipped roof. Through groups of windows, natural light floods the waiting room, meant to hold approximately 40 persons. The space is trimmed in warm bead board wainscoting, and there are also accessible restrooms.

The depot was funded through various sources, including the Federal Highway Administration’s Transportation Enhancements program, the city of Hermann and the Dierberg Educational Foundation, a local non-profit organization that supports projects to preserve the region’s cultural heritage.

In 1837, the German Settlement Society of Philadelphia sent school teachers George Bayer and Edward Hermann to Missouri as their agents to find and purchase 11,000 acres for a town. Concerned at the rapid assimilation of its countrymen into American society, the German Settlement Society sought to create an ideal town that would be “German in every particular.” The reality of the steep and rocky terrain dealt a blow to high expectations when the first 17 settlers arrived by barge. However, determined settlers took advantage of this vertical real estate by planting vineyards on the rocky slopes which were already tangled with wild grapes. A decade later, steamboats from St. Louis brought visitors to Hermann’s first Weinfest.

The city was named for the German national hero, Hermann, a Roman-trained military leader who is deemed responsible for the rout of three Roman legions at the battle of Teutoburger Forest in 9 A.D.

By the turn of the 20th century, Hermann’s vintners were immensely successful. The Stone Hill Winery of Hermann, which is still in operation today, had grown to become the second largest winery in the country and was winning gold medals at World’s Fair competition around the globe. Before the Volstead Act of 1919 shut them down, the town’s numerous vintners were producing three million gallons of wine a year, and the city was a rollicking river port with a tavern on every corner.

The anti-German sentiment of two World Wars and Prohibition all but shut the town down. However, it also preserved the appearance of the city, which now has more than 100 buildings listed on the National Register of Historic Places. In the 1960s, local wineries began to make a comeback, and in 1983 they acquired the distinction of becoming the federally-designated Hermann American Viticultural Area (AVA). The seven wineries in the AVA annually produce one-third of Missouri’s wine.

With the opening of California, the westward-bound Pacific Railroad was chartered in St. Louis in 1849. Its first passenger train arrived in Hermann on August 6, 1855, but it was another ten years before the Pacific was the first to arrive at Kansas City, due to the interruption of the Civil War. In 1872, the Pacific Railroad was reorganized as the Missouri Pacific, often called the Mo-Pac, and their St. Louis to Kansas City line was the only route of theirs to be included in Amtrak’s original passenger operations on May, 1971. Until 1991, Hermann had no regular stops aside from some special trains run out at Maifest and Oktoberfest.

Today, Hermann has positioned itself to take advantage of short-distance holiday-makers from Kansas City and St. Louis. The town hosts German festivals throughout the year and provides much to see with several German Heritage museums. Across the river runs the 250-mile Katy Trail, popular with bikers, hikers and walkers.

The Missouri River Runner is financed primarily through funds made available by the Missouri Department of Transportation.

Station Building (with waiting room)