The Historical Switchback Railway and Museum of Vychylovka, New Bystrica, Slovakia

HISTORICAL FOREST COGWHEEL RAILWAY

A narrow-gauged 11 km long Historical Forest Cogwheel Railway leading from the settlement Kubátkovia to the locality Tanečník in the Orava region constitutes an integral part of the Museum. It is what remained of a former railway that used to connect two northernmost regions of Slovakia - Orava and Kysuce.

Presently, two parts of the original railway were preserved. The 1st part leading from Chmúra to Tanečník was declared to be the Slovak National Monument for its technical uniqueness.

A chapel most likely comes from the beginning of the 19th century. It has two parts: tower and nave finished by a semicircle apse. A facade shows no artistic details. Interestingly, thanks to the time and incompetence of its builders, there appear to be slight irregularities in height and ground plan of the chapel. The tower has two bells. The bigger one was cast by a bell-founder Kajetan Zeidl in Trnava in 1834, and the smaller one comes from Trenčín (1918). The ceiling of the chapel is decorated by a fresco by an unknown painter.

Tombs were brought to the museum together with the Chapel of St. Mary Rosary from a nearby cemetery. Most of the preserved tombs were made of cast-iron that became widely used in the Kysuce cemeteries at the end of the 19th century. The oldest tombs date back to 1823. As probably the same form was in use for a long time, shapes of the crosses do not differ too much. The crosses set into the stone prisms, are decorated with plant ornaments (vinegrapes, rose, acanth), ribbons, and plaits. The body of Christ is placed right in the middle of each cross with a writing "INRI" above, or, on a ribbon, and there is also an oval medallion of various shapes under it. A huge wooden cross can be found in the center of the cemetery. Left from the Chapel is situated a copy of sculpture of St. Jan Nepomucký from Riečnica (the original is in the Kysuce Museum in Čadca).

Being only one of two buildings saved after the fire in 1954, it is a typical wooden house with a saddle roof from 1810. The house has 3 rooms, stone cellar and later added chamber. The room is arranged with a traditional kitchen furniture from the beginning of the 19th century. Moreover, there is also a device for home cloth production. Kysuce women used to weave the thick linen cloth for domestic use in the wintertime. The house has a brick oven with a smoke discharged to chimney and further to an attic where it is fmished by another smaller oven.

This early type of heating installation is notable for its decoration - a solar rosette. In the chamber are shown devices used for linen processing - wingle, beater, grinder, bristles, etc.

A house consists of 3 rooms with the last one being added from the back part of pitvor. It was built on a relatively flat terrain in 1884. Once again, it possesses the typical architecture signs of buildings of this area: the log walls, the saddle roof covered with home-made shingles.

The current exposition features the life of a Kysuce tinker. A craft of tinkering was once one of the most spread houseworks in Kysuce. To practise the craft, tinkers needed wire and tin. They did not only mend tools and metal pots, but also produced spoonholders, hangers, sieves, ladles, mousetraps, ironing boards, etc. These craftsmen usually carried all the tools on their backs in a hamper. The Kysuce tinkers travelled widely and became wellknown all over the world - in America, Asia, Australia, Europe.

A house is made from logs and has three rooms with a divided pitvor. The bigger of the chambers was added to the back of the room. Situated in a slope, there is a stable underneath. The location of the stable made it possible to utilize the warmth of animals to keep plausible temperature in the residential part above. The smoke from an oven, which has signs of ceramic tiles, was already discharged to a chimney.

Today, the house exhibition features bridal belongings displaying several traditional aspects of the Kysuce wedding. Characteristic bridal dress and wedding presents can be seen in the chamber.