It is presently known as the All Aboard Dinor, but in previous centuries, it was known as the Girard Station and served a very different and important purpose.

In 1861 the Girard Station was indeed a busy place, buzzing with excitement about President Abraham Lincoln’s visit. Regarding that president’s stop here: “At Girard station several baskets of splendid fruit and flowers were presented to the Presidential family. No little sensation was produced at this point by the unexpected apparition on the train of Horace Greeley, equipped with a valise and his well known red and blue blankets. He was at once conducted into the car of the President, who came forward to greet him. He got off again at Erie, after traveling about twenty miles with the company.” Quote is from the New York Herald, February 17, 1861 as posted at oldtimeerie.blogspot.com.

As a train station, this depot opened in 1852 and closed its doors in 1957. It sat vacant and unused until 1993, when it was remodeled and reopened as a dinor.

“Lake City Borough’s original name in 1850 was Girard Station because it was a little more than a railroad stop,” according to https://lakecityboro.org/government/history/

So if you make All Aboard Dinor a delicious destination as a scheduled stop for something to eat, take a moment to imagine what it might have been like to walk into that same structure in the 1800s to purchase your ticket to Erie or New York. Or to catch a glimpse of President Lincoln and his family.