Roof top signs don't cost like Internet and news paper and trade mag ads do. And they help customers find your plant. Lacey is my son in law. Rek'lis is a local bar in Bethlehem. Franconia paper was a big deal back in the '60s in Lincoln NH. It has been toast for decades. Digital Equipment was my favorite mini computer house years ago. They operated out of "the old mill" in Maynard Mass for years. The desktop computers killed them in the 90's. The white strip inside the turnout guard rail is a thin styrene shim used to get the turnout into proper gauge.
David Starr www.newsnorthwoods.blogspot.com
As for DEC, ok, I found an image on Pintrest that originally the Maynard factory had large capital letters spelling DIGITAL, however by 1960 digital had started to switch to an all lower-case letter sign like here (the locer case black on white OR whte letter on red that even I remembered from the old Vaxen at my school). I don't think (well, as far I can can find in old trade press and images) that signs consisting of sans-serif initial capital/lower case following lettering was all that common until maybe the late 1960s - so see that on a layout just brings me back to the 1980s when we were printing our signs in B/W using dot matrix printers (some had selectrics, and a lucky few hads lazer printers - zounds!). It just looks...off to me.
If a business deserves a sign, it deserves it's own sign. I have a few name-brand companies on my layout, but most are made up and printed on my computer. I've also bought individual letters from craft stores to make 3D and rooftop signs.
I saw a sign in an MR photo for a Merrill Lynch, Pierce, Fenner and Smith office. My Dad used to work for them, and I remembered that this layout was set in earlier days, when it was Merrill Lynch, Pierce, Fenner and Beane. I contacted MR, and through them reached the original author. He was grateful for the knowledge, and changed his sign accordingly.
It takes an iron man to play with a toy iron horse.
I have been making a number of signs for buildings on the Boothbay Railway Village layout. I found Wirthmore Feeds on line in a Google image search and printed on photo paper
I did AH Benoit & Co using Powerpoint and printed on photo paper. Benoits was a well known clothing store in Portland ME for many years
2 more buildings next to Benoits with home made signs; the Serwin Williams paint sign is an animated, electrolumenscent sign from Miller Engineering
George In Midcoast Maine, 'bout halfway up the Rockland branch
My scrap yard just got a new sign along the road just the other day:
Jaite_Scrap by Edmund, on Flickr
Coke_Truck by Edmund, on Flickr
Cheers, Ed
Since I model 94/95 industries there is no signs since I switching cars on the working side of the industry.. Modern box type industrial buildings usually have signs by the front office.
Larry
Conductor.
Summerset Ry.
"Stay Alert, Don't get hurt Safety First!"
Most of the signs on the BRVRR were made on my home computer. Usually printed on common paper and sanded to 'age'. Barron's is one example. It was the fuel oil and gasoline distributer in the small Michigan town I lived in through high-school. They were actually a Shell distributer, and I worked in one of their gas stations for years.
Remember its your railroad
Allan
Track to the BRVRR Website: http://www.brvrr.com/
Nice structure! I like how you detailed it. I too have signs on the layout from actual industries where I model. Adding that provides another level of realism.
I go for whimsy in my business names, like the Powder Milk Buicuit Company or Sal Monella's Ice Company. The Brass Rat is a pool hall and bar named after my college class ring. I made a rubber mold from the ring and then cast it in Hydrocal, painting it to the dark color of the ring and mounting the castings on the bar.
While I've made a few signs using paint and decals or dry transfers, like these...
I also cut a stencil from cardstock, covered with a foil-like material, to do airbrushed signs on all of the Hoffentoth coal&ice dealers' fences on my layout...
However, the artwork for the majority of signs on my layout was done by my brother, then printed by the commercial printing company used by his business. Most are based on real industries...
...but a few are made-up names, or ones to honour friends...
Wayne
I agree. The mini-mart was inspired by my grandson with the sign based upon a web photo of an abandoned motel/cafe on route 66.
Once upon a time when there were big factories in west Berkeley and Emeryville some of them had big colorful lighted signs on their rail served sides which faced the east shore freeway and San Francisco bay. We kids got the biggest kick out of the animated one with the earth being covered with red Sherwin Williams paint.
Regards, Peter
Factory on my layout doing their best to help out in the pandemic panic.
Alan Jones in Sunny Queensland (Oz)