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When Wade Warren retired from Coca-Cola in Hickory, NC, his family gave him a train set as a retirement present. When he expanded it and it got too large for his house, he talked the aldermen in the Town of Brookford into letting him use a room in the Brookford Community Center. Eventually the layout got too large for that room, so he talked them into a larger room, where the layout resides today. Over the ten years between his retirement and his death, Wade's Train Town grew to an 18 foot by 24 foot work of art. It includes over 280 buildings and thousands of 'little people', many of which he painted by hand. As outstanding as that may be, the truly amazing thing is that Wade built much of his layout while confined to a wheelchair. He worked on the layout almost every day and hosted hundreds of folks, from pre-school to senior, on visits to his empire. The Carolina Southern Division is proud to be involved in restoring and maintaining this layout for the enjoyment of young and old as a heritage layout. |
The layout is essentially complete and sceniked with over 280 structures, most with operating lights and other features. The two main lines circle the layout and are operational and there is a respectable stock of locomotives and rolling stock. The room also has tools, equipment, and supplies normally found in a model railroader's shop inventory. We did a lot of work before our first public viewing in 2006 to clean, repair, conduct initial upgrade of the trackwork and clean up the room and equipment. There is still plenty to do for anyone who wants to participate and all sorts of skills are valuable – even so called ‘beginner skills’ for those interested in exploring the hobby and trying it out before making the ‘plunge’ with their own layout. Selected scenes of the layout are in this photo gallery. Additional trackwork has been installed and buildings are being refurbished and relocated to increase the visual realism of the layout. Train Town is located in the Brookford Community Center, 1700 South Center Street, Hickory, NC. As you drive up to building, the Train Town entrance is in the left wing (west side). Use the link above to get a Google Map and directions to the Community Center. |
The layout is open for restoration sessions the second and fourth Thursday evening of each month starting at 6:30 pm. The long term goal of the restoration program is to preserve the Wade's work, while upgrading the layout with contemporary electrical equipment and scenery materials. Additional trackwork has been installed and buildings are being refurbished and relocated to increase the visual realism of the layout. You can see how we are progressing by taking a look at our Restoration Blog.
Even though we are now holding public open houses, we still are in need of volunteer restorers. As of the end of 2009, over 30 folks have contributed to the effort producing over 1,800 hours of volunteer work. Even at this, we have completed only about two-thirds of the initial restoration, so there is plenty still to be done. You don't need to commit to long term participation in the project. Just show up on a Thursday night when you are able and we will have something for you to do. On the other hand, if you have a free Saturday, we can make arrangements to have a work session. to set things up. The skills we need include people who would like to work with installing new lights in the buildings, working on other electrical items on the layout, refurbishing buildings, and installing scenery items.
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so you can view our PDF documents.