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2013 |
|
January 2013 |
We began the year by changing our open house
hours to the Second Saturday of each month between 10 am and 2 pm. Not
many folks usually showed up after 2 pm anyway. Restoration activity
continues with several members of the Carolina Southern Division taking
buildings home with them for restoration. This gives us room to do the
basic scenery groundwork. Our work is on the heavy industry portion of
the layout (the last section) and fitting all the buildings back in is
proving to be a scenic challenge. Carl Wessel and Michael
Lethcoe continue to add their 'lighting magic' to the scenes.
We expect to add more lighting enhancements in the near future. |
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2012 |
|
2012 Annual Summary |
We continued our restoration efforts during
the year. We have now completed about 75% of the restoration and hope to
complete the remaining sections by the end of summer next year. Our
monthly open houses hosted nearly 400 people during the course of the
year. In November we held our second annual swap meet. The
Central Carolina N Scalers joined us
by setting up a small N Scale layout in an adjacent room. We will
probably try this again next year. |
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2011 |
|
November 2011 |
After a hectic summer, things returned to
'normal' for our restoration project. We continue to make steady
progress toward our goal of finishing initial restoration by November
next year. This year, however, we celebrated the fifth anniversary of
our grand reopening (in 2006) with a special showing. We set up display
tables in the lunchroom covering many aspects of model railroading in
celebration of National Model Railroading Month. Rick Knight, Jack
Haynes, Larry Paffrath, Carl Baumgart, Gil Brauch, and Bob Halsey
each manned a table. We had more than 110 visitors drop by to help us
celebrate. The Hickory Daily Record also ran a feature
story on the front page of it's "Flair" section (complete with a couple
of layout pictures) on the Sunday before the event. It was such a
success, we are already talking about making this an annual Model
Railroad Month event. |
|
August 2011 |
Summer has been really busy. The biggest news
is that we hosted 249 children from nine schools for field trips
sponsored by the Newton Community Schools "SummerKids 2011" program. Gil
Brauch also took the opportunity to present an Operation Lifesaver rail
safety talk to the children after they visited the layout. You could
hear the "AWESOME!!"s for miles around as they admired the breadth and
depth of Wade's handiwork. It's time like these that make all the
restoration effort worthwhile.
We are still working on the industrial area, so drop by some second or
fourth Thursday and lend a hand. |
|
June 2011 |
We continue to make progress on the
restoration, albeit somewhat more slowly recently. Michael Lethcoe has
been spending a lot of time under the layout doing the wiring for the
building and street lights. We have finished off the agricultural area
and are well along in dealing with the light industry section. Progress
on the heavy industry has been slow, as some of the buildings are in a
more severe state of disrepair. However, we are still planning on being
finished with the 'first pass' restoration in time for our 5th
Anniversary Grand Re-opening. Planning is underway to make it more than
just an open house. Stay tuned... |
|
March 2011 |
Jim Gulnac is making some real progress in
cleaning up and repairing buildings in the heavy industry area. There
may be some light at the end of the tunnel for completing our first
round of restoration on the whole layout by November, which is the 5th
anniversary of the Grand Re-opening. Still lots to do, so drop by some
working session (2nd and 4th Thursday each month - 6:30 pm or so) and we
will find something to keep you busy. Don't forget that you can earn
points toward your Volunteer AP certificate for helping out. |
|
February 2011 |
Our February open house was well attended. We
were lucky to be included on the list of "Things to Do" on the front
page of Saturday's Hickory Daily Record. Work is still a little slower
than we would like because of the cold evening weather (the room's not
heated very well), but we continue to make progress. |
|
January 2011 |
Our regular crew was enhanced this month when
Jim Gulnac joined us. Welcome Jim! It's good to have another
regular helper aboard. Jim has already attacked a section encompassing
five buildings in the light industrial area and is getting ready to take
care of restoring another section in the grid that encompasses another
half dozen or so light industries. Gil Brauch is putting the
finishing touches on the rural scenes, while Carl Wessel and
Michael Lethcoe are working hard at keeping up with installing the
lights in all the buildings and along the streets. It's been a little
cold this winter, but things are really starting to heat up with the
restoration. |
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2010 |
|
December 2010 |
We closed out the year with a very successful
Open House. One hundred thirty-three (133) people came by to view the
layout. That brought our year's total to 952 visitors, the most ever
since we reopened the layout for public viewing. We are looking forward
to a good year in 2011 and invite all modelers to come by on one of our
work sessions (second and fourth Thursday evenings) to lend a hand. |
|
November 2010 |
Our annual membership general meeting was held
at Brookford on the same day as our Open House. Members were able to
view restoration progress since last year's visit. We only hold one work
session during November and December because of the holidays, so most of
our time is spent 'touching up' areas previously restored. Work on new
restoration areas will begin in earnest in January. |
|
October 2010 |
Our Open House was really slow this month.
There were lots of other things going on around town. However, we
continue to work on fixing up the rural section of the layout and are
beginning to work on the light industry section. |
|
September 2010 |
More lights! we have now wired up some more
buildings and lampposts in the sections that have been initially
renovated. We are looking toward the four year celebration of the Grand
Re-opening of the layout coming up over Veteran's Day weekend. |
|
August 2010 |
In addition to our normal work sessions and
monthly open house, we held a special open house on the evening of
August 28 in support of the Brookford Auto Show. About 40-50 car guys
and gals dropped in to see the layout during the course of a couple of
hours. Many commented that they had heard about Train Town, but never
taken the time to come by a see it. We suspect we may see some more of a
few of them in the future. |
|
July 2010 |
Nothing special to report this month. Work
continues through the 'lazy, hazy days of summer'. Attendance at this
month's open house was light also. |
|
June 2010 |
Work continues in 'lighting up' Train Town as
the electrical crew installs lights in buildings in the light industrial
area. However, the highlight of the month was the special showing we had
for the Piedmont Council's Cub Scout Day Camp held at the Brookford
Community Center. We hosted over 213 Cub Scouts and their leaders as we
gave them a glimpse into the world of model railroading. We expect that
we will see some of them again during future open houses. |
|
May 2010 |
This month we began work in earnest on the
rural scenes on the layout. We hope to introduce some different scenery
techniques into this section while still maintaining the integrity of
Wade's design and scenic design. When this section is finished, we will
have completed about three quarters of the layout restoration. |
|
April 2010 |
Not much new to report this month except that we have recruited a new
associate to help us with the restoration. Eddie Jolly has joined
the crew. He's not an NMRA member yet, but we're working on that, too... |
|
March 2010 |
Our open house this month had sparse attendance, but several folks made
special trips from out of town to see the layout, which made it very
worthwhile to be there. Fred Miller repaired the chase lights on the
theater marquee and a billboard, so Carl Wessel is busily engaged in
re-installing them and hooking them up to add a bit of visual animation
for our visitors. We are about halfway down the back side of the layout
in our scenic restoration efforts. Still lots to do. |
|
February 2010 |
From hero to zero... That's what our experience was for February's Open
House. The weather conspired against us and we had to cancel because of
snow and icy roads. We did hold our work sessions and made some progress
in finishing a block of industries on the far side of the layout. Come
on spring!!!...
Fred Miller has donated several boxes of scenery materials to the
project. Thanks Fred, we now have all that we will need to finish the
project. |
|
January 2010 |
Our January Open House started off the year in
a big way. It had been very, very cold for a long while and it warmed up
some and the sun came out -- and so did the folks. The Hickory Daily
Record featured us prominently in their "Things To Do" section on both
Thursday and Saturday, plus there was an indoor yard sale fund raiser
going on in the building. All this came together and resulted in over
180 folks dropping by to see the layout. Some stayed for an hour or more
with their young children riveted to the trains and delighting in
discovering new little scenes on the layout. Days like this make it
really all worthwhile. |
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2009 |
|
December 2009 |
As has become our custom we only had one work session and our monthly open house this month. We will be back in the swing of things in
January with our full normal schedule of work sessions on the second and
fourth Thursday evenings and open house on the second Saturday of every
month. As we closed out the year, we have hosted over 580 people during
our open houses. Members of the Division donated over 300 manhours of
restoration work and the costs of restoration to this point have been
covered by visitor donations. Our goal for the coming year is to
complete initial restoration of the remaining 1/3 of the layout, so
there is plenty of work to be done. We invite all interested in
developing their skills in railroad modeling to join us for our work sessions. |
|
November 2009 |
We had two very successful events this month. First, the Division's
meeting was held at the Brookford Community Center on November 7th.
Prior to the meeting we were open for a work session. Neal Anderson,
Steven August, Gil Brauch, Jack Haynes, Michael Lethcoe, Carl Wessel,
and Stephen Wood (from Div 13) worked on varying projects for a couple
of hours. The next weekend
was our monthly open house. The Hickory Daily Record gave us a prominent
'splash' in their weekend Things To Do section and, as a result, we had
about 150 folks come through to marvel at Mr. Warren's handiwork. We
didn't work Thanksgiving evening, nor will we work on Christmas eve.
That leaves us with one work session (Dec 8) and one open house (Dec 10)
remaining in the year. |
|
October 2009 |
Our Open House this month was slow. There were too many festivals going
on around the area and it was a fairly nice day. Folks were probably
more interested in enjoying the good weather (while it lasts!). We spent
some time during our second work session getting things ready for anyone
who wants to come early on November 7th to work on a couple of projects.
We are making final adjustments to the location of buildings/scenes in
the industrial area in preparation for a major 'push' in getting that
area restored over the winter months. We are still looking for
volunteers to take some buildings and work on them at home, as well as
some more folks to join us on the second and fourth Thursday evenings
for our work sessions. |
|
September 2009 |
Not much new to report this month. We are just getting started on the
'light industry' and the 'agricultural' areas of the layout. Most of our
restoration efforts are now devoted to planning exactly where each
building/scene goes and preparing the 'ground' to install them. We are
still looking for volunteers to work on restoration of individual
buildings so we can 'plant' them when the sites are finished. |
|
August 2009 |
Work has begun on the window side of the layout in the 'light industry'
area. As we proceed through this section, there will be many
opportunities for folks to help restore buildings with an industrial
flavor. CSD members who are willing help with this can contact the
project manager at
to make arrangements. Building restorations can be made 'offsite' and we
can arrange pickup and delivery if you want to do that. |
|
July 2009 |
We received some prominent announcement notices in The Hickory
Daily Record's weekend activities sections the week of our open
house this month. The results were very satisfactory. Our attendance was
'way up. We had lots of folks bringing their children and then marveling
themselves at the layout. Watching their initial expressions as they
walk through the door serves as a powerful reminder that most folks
think of 'toy trains' as a single loop of track on the living room floor
(or a piece of 4x8 plywood). They have never seen anything quite this
large before. Welcome to the World's Greatest Hobby!! |
|
June 2009 |
Turnout for our open house this month was boosted by a fund raiser for
the Bo Peep Grill, which experienced a fire earlier in the month. Folks
kept dropping by before and after visiting the yard sale and cook-out in
the lunchroom next door. Many were long-time residents of Brookford and
expressed their pleasure in seeing that someone had taken interest in
preserving and showing off Wade's work. To them, it's a part of their
town's history that they are proud of. Days like that make it all
worth-while. |
|
May 2009 |
We have light!! Carl Wessel and Michael Lethcoe have been
working really hard to illuminate the structures on the layout. Almost
every restored building on the layout has some sort of lighting
associated with it and there are street lights all along Main Street and
at several key intersections in town. The half of the layout that has
been restored really shines when the room lights are turned out. |
|
April 2009 |
Not much new to report on for this month. We once again had a successful
open house with about 80 folks showing up. The most notable improvement
in the layout is that we have most of the downtown lights working now
and it really livens things up when they are all turned on. We are
inching ever closer to the 'halfway point' in restoration. We will be
posting new photos when we reach that point.
For our open house on May 9 we will be celebrating National Train Day
with a special run train loaned to us by David Ward. Yet another 'photo
op'! Drop by and take a look. |
|
March 2009 |
Our attendance at the monthly open houses continues to be very good. We
are seeing between 50 and 100 folks, most of them 'first timers' each
month. When they find out that we are preserving Wade Warren's work, all
of them are most complementary about the organization taking the time
and interest in such a project. We are still working on the downtown
section and things appear to be going slowly still. Now that Daylight
Savings Time is with us, why don't you take an evening drive up to
Brookford on a second or fourth Thursday of the month and lend a hand.
With only three folks working regularly, it will take a really long time
to get things looking really good on the whole layout. Try it... You'll
like it... |
|
February 2009 |
Even though the Project Manager forgot to publish a notice about our
open house this month, we still had over 50 folks drop in to see us.
Looks like word of mouth is starting to work for us in the local area.
As far as progress on the layout is concerned, things have slowed down a
bit since we are working in a detail-heavy part of the layout in the
downtown area. Hopefully March will see us finish up this area,
including the lights (there are a lot of them to do here!). |
|
January 2009 |
The first open house of the new year was well attended. We didn't do as
well as November, but more than 80 folks dropped by the see the layout.
We are working right now on finishing up the downtown area during our
work sessions. Because we are adding details to finish off some of the
scenes, the progress isn't spectacularly noticeable, but we are getting
closer to declaring 'victory' for the urban area real soon. Joe
Howard came up and helped us during the open house and again during
our second work session. He is almost finished ballasting the mainlines,
which is a big help. |
|
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2008 |
|
December 2008 |
We only had one work session and our monthly open house this month, so
things were pretty slow. We will be back in the swing of things in
January with our full normal schedule of work sessions on the second and
fourth Thursday evenings and open house on the second Saturday of each
months. Come join with us. There is still plenty of work to do. |
|
November 2008 |
We had a spectacular open house this month. Over 180 persons dropped by
to marvel at Wade Warren's handiwork. The increased interest can be
attributed to local publicity in the Hickory Daily Record, which
featured the open house on the front page of the Thursday "Buzz" section
and on the front page on Saturday in the "Things To Do" column.
The following Saturday was the pre-meeting work session. Ed Locklin,
Dave and Michelle Chance, and Joe Howard joined Gil
Brauch and Michael Lethcoe in completing several projects on
the layout. Thanks to them for their support. There will be only one
work session in December (11th) and the open house on December 13th will
close out our year's activities. |
|
October 2008 |
Our work sessions this month have been really productive. We are just
one small block shy of finishing the right half of the front side --
including lights in all the buildings. We would like to finish the
rest of the front side before the end of the year, but it will be tight.
We won't be working on the fourth Thursday of both November (the 27th) and December
(the 25th) because of the holidays, but we have scheduled a couple of
special work sessions on November 6 and November 15 (just before our
November meeting) to make up for some of that.
Division members are invited to come a little early (11 am or so) for
the meeting on November 15 and put in a couple of hours of light work.
It counts toward your AP Association Volunteer Certificate, you know. We
will have a couple of small projects lined up for those who come. It
really will make a big difference in getting closer to completing our
first round of restoration. |
|
September 2008 |
We were glad to welcome some of the patrons of the Hickory Train Show
who took time to drop by while they were in the area. We were also
honored by a visit by the Town of Brookford's Mayor Tom Schronce during
our Open House. He told us how important it was to the town of Brookford
that this piece of the town's history is being preserved. He was very
pleased with the progress we have made so far in our restoration
efforts. |
|
August 2008 |
As with most things, August was rreeaaalllyyy sssslllllooooowwwwww. We
held only two work sessions, in keeping with our new schedule (2nd and
4th Thursdays), and our monthly open house (2nd Saturday) drew only a
handful of visitors. Nonetheless, we continue to make progress with the
downtown area. Court House Square is ready for landscaping and by the
time Rick Knight finishes restoring the parking garage, we will be ready
to 'declare victory' for everything east of Main Street. We are looking
forward to our September Open House. Hopefully folks (including CSD
members) will drop by Brookford during the day after visiting the
Hickory Train Show on the 13th. We will be staying open a little longer
just to accommodate those who can't tear themselves away from the show
until it closes. Hope to see you there. |
|
July 2008 |
Our July open house experienced many more visitors, most of them
first-timers, than in past months. We still have a lot of fun watching
the expressions on the faces of old and young alike as they walk through
the door and catch the first glimpse of the majestic jumble of color and
action that is Wade's handiwork. Our restoration efforts are now focused
on finishing the back side of the downtown area. When we finish that, we
will have about half the layout restored. Carl Wessel and Michael Lethcoe continue to make excellent progress in lighting the buildings
and installing street lights. The effect is startling when we darken the
room. Remember that we have a new restoration schedule for the summer as
shown above. Anyone is welcome to come help us out. |
|
June 2008 |
June was a slow month, for a change.
Our new 2nd and 4th Thursday work session schedule continues and we
continue to make progress in moving from scene to scene in our
restoration efforts. The front side of the layout is almost complete, up
to the trolley line. Our next section is between the trolley line and
the middle, which will complete the front side. That will mark the half
way point in our initial restoration efforts. |
|
May 2008 |
We are modifying our restoration work schedule during the summer. We
will be working only on the second and fourth Thursday evenings. This
will help accommodate summer vacation plans for the crew.
May was a so-so month for attendance on open house day, so Carl
and Gil were able to make some progress with a few restoration
details that don't show up in photos. Things like adding grade crossing
ramps, painting roadways, and sorting out 'little people' to go with
restoration scenes can really eat up the time. We have posted
three examples of recent restorations to our
Brookford Gallery, including one
that Jim Allen did in his home workshop. As always, we can use
help either on Thursday nights, or second
Saturdays (open house), or even at your own home. Just contact either
Carl Wessel or Gil Brauch or drop an email to
and let us know how you would like to be a part of the project. |
|
April 2008 |
The turnout for our open house this month was good. We had about 80
folks show up, most were first-timers. It really helps when we have
front page coverage in the Hickory Daily Record on the
morning of our show date. As of the end of the month we have completed
just over one third of the scenic restoration of the layout. Progress is
also being made on the electrical portion, with most of the restored
buildings and scenes having interior lighting installed. Soon we will
have the yard and industrial tracks operational -- although we won't be
using them regularly during our open house sessions. |
|
March 2008 |
This was a little bit of a slow month for progress. But Carl Wessel
and Michael Lethcoe continued their efforts and Jim Allen
finished restoring a couple more buildings. Our goal is to finish the
front side of the layout before June. There are about five blocks of
scenery involved. We are still working each Thursday evening starting at
6:30 pm. You are invited to join in -- there is plenty to do. |
|
February 2008 |
Our February Open House was very busy. Thanks again to the Hickory Daily
Record including us in a featured spot in the "Things To Do" section, we
had about 150 folks drop by during the day to view the layout. We are
starting to see a real difference, now that we have initial restoration
done on about 1/4 of the layout. Carl Wessel has ballasted the
mainlines along the front and at the Residential end and has installed
manual turnout controls there. The industrial district tracks and yard
now have power thanks to Michael Lethcoe, who has also been busy
installing lights in the restored buildings. Jim Allen has been
doing some restoration work on individual scenes at home and this has
made a big difference in the good progress we have made. He did the Pizza Hut scene. |
|
January 2008 |
The Open House and all work session activities at Wade's Train Town were cancelled for January. We simply ran out of staff because of
personal schedule conflicts. We resumed restoration activities on
Thursday, February 7th at 6:30 pm. |
|
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2007 |
|
December
2007 |
The biggest news this month is that we will be starting the Thursday
night Restoration Sessions a half hour later, at
6:30 pm, in the coming year. Six o'clock has proven to be just a little
too early to start.
We had another successful Open House this month. Although not as crowded
as the November one, there were still over 50 people who came by to view
the layout.
There will be no work session at Brookford until January 3rd. |
|
November
2007 |
We had an outstanding Open House this month. Over 120 people visited the
layout. The good attendance can be attributed to the fact that the
Hickory Daily Record included us in their front page spread
of "Things To Do" that Saturday morning — complete with a photo
from the layout. In addition, one of their reporters visited and wrote a
real nice article on the layout that appeared the next day in the Sunday
edition. Doesn't happen often, but when it does — WOW!!!
If that weren't enough excitement, about 20 Division members gathered at
Brookford the following weekend for our Fall meeting. After observing
what progress has been made over the past year, several of our members
indicated an interest in doing some "homework" for the layout. We are in
the process of putting together some 'exportable packages' for folks to
work on at home and bring back to the layout at their convenience.
In consultation with the Division's leadership, we are also attempting
to develop a work and open house schedule for the coming year that will
allow for more members to participate in the project. Stay tuned for
further developments. |
|
October
2007 |
Not much out of the ordinary to report for this month. We continue to
progress scene-by-scene around the layout. We are looking forward to the
CSD Meeting on Nov 17 so we can show
off our progress. We will also have some smaller projects ready for
members to work on if they wish to remain and contribute a couple of
hours to the project. |
|
September
2007 |
September was a relatively quiet month for our project. Our open house
this month was very sparsely attended, but we used the opportunity to
continue to work on restoration of selected scenes. You can see some of
our recently completed work in the
"Just Completed" section of
our Brookford Photo Gallery. Our
most significant event was a special viewing session for Cub Scout Pack
300 in Hickory in the evening of September 19th. Twenty-four Cubs and
their parents visited and we talked about railroads in general and
modeling as a hobby. We hope to be able to accommodate more special
groups like this in the future.
Make plans now to attend our special Division Meeting at Brookford on
November 17th. We will have plenty of small projects available that will
help advance our restoration work. |
|
August
2007 |
Even though we had our first work sessions in July a year ago, work in
earnest began in August. At the end of the first year of restoration we
have accomplished quite a lot. One of the best indications of our work
is the number of manhours we have devoted to this project. As of the end
of August, over 900 hours. Of course, that doesn't compare with the
countless hours that Wade Warren put in while building the project, and
it will take us a long time at this rate to get the whole layout
restored. Having a few more willing helpers for our
working sessions would help shorten that time.
Another indication of our progress can be seen in the
"Before and After"
section of our Brookford Photo Gallery.
These photos only show a selection of the scenes we have completed and
do not depict the 'under the table' efforts of Michael Lethcoe
and Carl Wessel to get lights in the buildings and power to the
rails. We continue to hold monthly open houses, but unless there is a
special event at the Brookford Community Center, attendance has been
slow. Still, those who do come continue to marvel at the scope and
complexity of Wade Warren's work, so that makes it all worthwhile. |
|
July
2007 |
We took a break from monthly open houses this month, but we continued
our restoration efforts. Progress continues
on the electrical system and we continue to restore individual scenes to
showcase Wade Warren's handiwork. The
gallery shows before and after photos of
completed scenes. |
|
June 2007 |
We have canceled the July Open House, mostly because of the conflict
with our Division Meeting at Martin Oakes' house. We will resume our
schedule in August.
Steady progress is being made on individual scenes. The addition of
lighting in the buildings and on the streets really adds to the look of
the layout. The size of the work crew has been dwindling during the
summer months. CSD members are encouraged to see if they can fit a
Thursday evening or two into their summer schedules. There is still
plenty of work to be done, regardless of your skill level or area of
interest. |
|
May 2007 |
Things really came together this month for two major scenes. We have
declared 'victory' for the
Carnival Scene and the
Residential Area Scene. These two major areas are the visual anchors
of the layout and finishing them represents a major milestone for the
restoration effort. The houses all have lights and the carnival is a
symphony of light and movement, thanks to Michael Lethcoe and
Carl Wessel, who spent many evenings in the 'black hole' under the
layout getting the electrons to do 'the right thing'. Chris
Chrisenbury and Chet Lehrmann put the finishing touches to
the houses and the lawns, so now all the 'little people' are able to sit
back and enjoy them.
Work continues on the downtown area and we hope to have that completed
by the end of the summer. Drop by some Thursday evening for one of the
Restoration Working Sessions. There is still a
lot of work available for all. |
|
April 2007 |
We held two open houses this month. The first was on our normal 2nd
Saturday and was not very well attended. The second was in conjunction
with the Town of Brookford's Centennial Celebration. Over 300 people
dropped in and viewed the layout. Many of the long time residents
remembered Wade Warren and expressed their appreciation that we have
taken on the challenge to keep his Train Town alive. Our restoration
efforts to date have resulted in completing the restoration of about 10
of the individual scenes on the layout. Photos of some of them are in
the 'Before and After'
section of our Brookford Gallery.
We still have a lot of scenes to complete, so check your calendars and
see if you can make it to one of our Restoration
Working Sessions. |
|
March 2007 |
About 25 visitors showed up for our March
open house. Guess the newspaper announcement works!
Our "Brookford Blitz" on March 17th was very
helpful in getting things ready for our two open houses scheduled for
April. Tom O'Neil, Jack Haynes, Michele and Dave Chance, Jack
Monette, Roy and Roxana Becker, Michael Lethcoe, Chris
Christenbury, and Gil Brauch each took on tasks that improved
the layout. They set lights, 'destrung' power lines, installed track
feeders, built a paleontology scene, painted building interiors, and set
'little people' in place. There is still plenty to do, of course, but we
continue to make progress from week to week.
Some more 'Before and After' photos have been
added below. |
|
Jan/Feb 2007 |
We opened the New Year with the first of our monthly open houses on the
second Saturday in January. The weather was nice and we had about 145
persons drop by during the day. What a great start! Attendance at the
February Open House wasn't as good, but the Webmaster didn't get around
to getting it announced in the local newspaper, either. He'll try to do
better in March.
We have almost finished renovating the carnival scene and Carl Wessel
and Michael Lethcoe are
working hard at rigging up lights in various scenes. The
downtown area is our next area of concentration. There are lots of cars and
people that populate these scenes. Take a look at some of our 'Before
and After' pictures below. We hope to have a lot more after
The Brookford Blitz in March. |
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(Return to Top) |
2006 |
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December 2006 |
Even though December is supposed to be a
'slow month' for getting things done that are not directly related to
Christmas, our Wade's Train Town Project has experienced no letup in
activity. Many thanks to the team that put in over 370 volunteer hours
of work together since we began in June. Those participating so far have
been: Frank Binder, Gil Brauch, MD 'Chris' Christenbury, Tony Dentino,
Mike Gahagan, Jack Haynes, Rick Knight, Chet Lehrmann, Michael Lethcoe,
Tony Putnam, Carl Wessel, and David Ziehr.
We have been able to complete the restoration of the
small park scene and are working hard at putting the extensive Carnival
scene back in operation. We also continue to work on the town's housing
complex and downtown area; cleaning/repairing the houses/buildings and
fixing up the 'yards'.
In January we begin our regular series of monthly open houses on the
second Saturday of each month between 10 am and 4 pm. If you are a
member of the CSD, you can get points toward your Association Volunteer
AP Certificate by helping out with these sessions as well as the
Thursday night work sessions. |
|
November 2006 |
This month saw the Grand Re-opening of the
layout to the public. We held two open houses. One was on November 4th
in conjunction with the Town of Brookford Annual Police Picnic. The
other was over the weekend of November 11-12. Over 60 people came in
and visited. A few photos are posted here.
We are still continuing work on Thursday nights. Much work remains to
clean and repair buildings and scenes.
The monthly open house schedule for 2007 has been developed. We will
host an open house on the second Saturday of each month between 10 am and
4 pm. |
|
October 2006 |
Our major
accomplishment in October is that we have the new trolley line and the mainlines
installed and running. Basic scenery work is underway in the residential section
of the layout and we are beginning work on the downtown and carnival areas. Even though we
still have much to do with the restoration project, we will reopen to the public monthly beginning on the
weekend of November
11-12, 2006 during Model Railroad Month. |
|
September 2006 |
During September we
almost finished with relocating and re-installing the track. We should finish
that the first week in October. As we have relocated the track, we began
re-installing the buildings and scenes on the layout. This will be a continuing
project for quite a while after the layout becomes operational again. We still
have plenty of projects that you can work on either during a work session or at
home at your convenience. Just contact the Superintendent or the Webmaster if
you are interested in helping out.
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July-August 2006 |
We met our July goal of inventorying the layout and have begun with scenery
restoration.
Equipment will be inventoried as it is repaired and track
restoration continues through August-October. On July 20th we began removing buildings and
the loose scenery materials in preparation for more permanent scenery and
trackwork rehabilitation.
We finished this job
on August 24th and have settled on the revised track plan and building
arrangements. We also removed all of the old electrical wiring 'rats nest' from
the layout in preparation for upgrade. Actual roadbed/track installation began
on August 31st. This includes the double loop mainlines, several double ended
sidings, a small yard, two stub sidings, and an independent trolley line. As
track gets laid, we began putting the final scenery in place. There are lots
of 'sub-scenes' under development/restoration -- not the least of which is the
impressive carnival grounds with operating rides and attractions. |
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June
2006 |
We held our first
two work sessions at the layout on June 22nd and 29th,
2006. Only three folks showed up on the 22nd, but we got some general
cleaning done. We had a few drop-in guests from the karate class next door who
were interested in what we were doing. The turnout wasn't any better on
June 29th with only four folks showing up, two of whom are not Division members.
However, we were able to meet our modest June goal of cleaning up and 'dejunking'
the room. |
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