History Lesson: Where are you to?

[Fergmiester]

Someone asked me recently what I based my MR after? And after much musing I came up with a shortened version of the history of my empire, which is loosely based on the Louisburg & Sydney for the simple fact the Railway bought up used equipment to move massive amounts of raw materials.

As for the history? It's sketchy at best. The Musquodoboit, Eastern Shore & Sydney aka MESS came to being in the late 40's after a group of local business men and politicians put the run to CN. as it was felt the large company wasn't operating the line in the best interests of the area. The CN not overly concerned packed up their gear and left. However it soon became apparent that the locals were more incompetent then their predecessors. So along came the shipping magnate FBH Francey "The Old Man, owner of FBH Francey Steam and Navigation. Faced with insurmountable obstacles he quickly went afar and started buying up old used engines and started to run the MESS. The railway thrived under his wizardry but came to a grinding halt in 62' when the availability of spare parts suddenly dried up and the large diesel manufacturers refused to negotiate leasing contracts with the "Old Man". It was later discovered that CN wanting the line back, resorted to skullduggery, as it was now lucrative and profitable, and thus the MESS was no more. The Old Man now disgraced vanished and it is said roamed the Nova Scotian foot hills for years before his own demise. However to this day Whistle of the last of his engines to be scrapped can be heard from time to time on a cold and clear winter's night.


What's your history?

[Anonymous]

What's your history?

History? I'm just making it up as I go along! [:D]

Bob Boudreau

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by FundyNorthern

What's your history?

History? I'm just making it up as I go along! [:D]

Bob Boudreau

Ditto to that!

[GDRMCo]

Well here goes.
In the early 1920's the mining company called Morice Minerals Inc. were surveying the Queensland Great Dividing Range and started constructing serveral mines along the Range.
The ores were originally being transported by horse to the smelters and refineries. Morice Minerals Inc. were digging out more ore than the horses could move and eventually with help from the QLD Government built a small rail line from the mines to the smelters and refineries. Over time this rail line grew and eventually it was sold to the Northern Territory and Queensland Railway or NT&Q. The NT&Q was not profitable with the rail line and so they put it up for sale in 1946. The buyer was a man called "Rail Man" El Brento Legg. He brought the railway out of the dump and the new company became the Great Dividing Range Mining Co. or GDRMCo. The GDRMCo ran till 2003 when the Legg family bought the old mines from the Morice group and rebuilt them. During the rebuilding months GDRMCo bought Mt Isa Manufacturing and GDRMB and the company was renamed Great Dividing Range Mining & Manufacturing Co or GDRM&MCo. at the end of 2003 GDRM&MCo had been overrun and the Legg family were ordered by the employees to sell the rail line and go with it. The Legg family formed Mine Rail and used the last of their mines and all the RR related items to bring back the legendary Super Ore Movers. These trains were made up of 10 HOH cab and booster sets permanently coupled together. Seeking revenge on GDRM&MCo now run by the Employee Overruners Group. The Legg family made a deal with Great Lakes and Atlantic who bought Mine Rail and made PNQ what it is today but I plan to model GDRMCo from 1997-1999.

[Paul3]

I model the Boston & Providence portion of the New York, New Haven & Hartford Railroad Co.

The 44-mile long B&P was one of the "Big 3" original railroads of the Hub (aka Boston), along with the Boston & Worcester and the Boston & Lowell. Built in 1832-1835, the B&P was surveyed by Capt. William Gibbs McNeill in almost a straight line (an entire graveyard was exhumed in Attleboro to make way), with a max. grade of less than 1%.

In 1888, the Old Colony RR leased the B&P, and the New Haven in turn leased the OCRR just to get the B&P and the all-important all-rail route to Boston. By the turn of the century, the NH was running a passenger train every 15 minutes over the route.

Ever since it was built, the B&P was a key link in New England transportation. It has seen the fastest trains (the Comet - 109mph, the TurboTrain - 178mph, the Acela Express - 150mph, etc.), and back in the day, heavyduty freight service (especially during WWII).

The key structure is still the Canton Viaduct, finished in July of 1835 to hold up tiny teakettle steam engines hauling stagecoaches on a single track. Today, it's a double track electrified span holding up Acelas, HHP8's, AEM-7's, GP40MC's and F40PH's with a speed limit of, IIRC, over 100mph. Not bad for 170 years old...

This is the nice thing about modeling a certain line... The history has usually already been written...

[Jetrock]

Modeling a prototype makes some things easier, like not having to make up a history--and you get the fun of researching it and finding out all the weird and wonderful stories that go along with it. I'm modeling the Sacramento Northern's Sacramento Belt Line, an industrial belt that went around the perimeter of the original city limits of Sacramento, CA. While the Belt Line was removed in 1966 to make way for freeways, the borders of "downtown" are still demarcated by the Belt Line's path.

It was put in place originally to provide an alternate route through Sacramento for the Northern Electric's freight trains--passenger trains and local trolleys went on a zig-zag route through downtown streets and the central business district. The NE ran from Chico to Sacramento, and later combined with the former Oakland, Antioch & Eastern, an electric line that ran from Sacramento to Oakland, to form the Sacramento Northern.

Sacramento, due to its central location and its abundant connections to other railroad lines, river lines, and large canning industry, became a natural point of interchange. Due to the politics and economics of the railroad at the time, there were, surprisingly, no through freights: all trains are broken up at the north end of town, with local and interchange traffic delivered immediately and through-routed traffic moved to the other end of town by switcher.

This means LOTS AND LOTS of switching for an otherwise sleepy short line. While the Belt Line was around for almost sixty years, I am modeling the last decade--when it was operated by 44 and 70 ton GE switchers, with occasional help from Western Pacific's S1's and SW1's. Add to that mix harvest-season fruit trains, wine trains from the San Joaquin Valley, State Fair specials of livestock, and railfan trips of old-time traction fans, and you've got a busy little railroad...

[jrbernier]

I model a 'fictional' extension of a Milw Road branch in SW Wisconsin. Basically I extended the Schullsburg mine spur all the way to Dubuque, IA(connection there with the Iowa Division). I run through trains between Galena Jct(Dubuque staging) to Janesville(east staging). The idea is that the old lead mining district is now supplying zinc ore to be sent south of Chicago for processing. I use 'ore jennies' for moving this traffic, as well as the usual agriculture type industries. I also have C&NW locals move from a 'jct' onto my line and deliver to a small yard. This is all set in the 50's and is a 'might have happened'. Most everything(cars/engines) are 50's era with a lot of Milw/C&NW cars.
As far as the towns, I used Wisconsin County names from old maps to give some 'flavor' to the layout. I have 'Grant County Mining', 'Badger Oil', 'Sexhauer Feed & Seed' & 'Pecatonica Power & Light' for industries. My yard is named 'Sinsinawa Yard' after the famous mound in SW Wisconsin, and I even plan to have a 'Point of Beginning' marker by the track(where the survey of Wisconsin was started).
Even though all of the modeled towns are fictional, many folks comment that they have been there and the model looks just like the real thing(I keep my mouth shut)!
I really think having some kind of 'story' really helps your modeling, and 'sells' the concept better.

Jim Bernier

[trolleyboy]

I've tried to just follow the script of real railroading as far as my mainline CN/CP stuff goes but the streetrail system H&SRR would go something like this. At the turn of the century the Heatherton and Scottsdale street railway was formed to provide public transportation for the two growing towns and provide daily switching for the local industries and provide interchange with the rest of the continent via conections with CN/CP After the depression and WW2 like most interurbans the equipment was old and cars were becomming more common CN absorbed them onto their electric lines and abandoned them by 1956. The city councils unhappy with being forced to buy buses repurchased the street railway right of ways and began picking up used streetcars and light interurbans from the many abandoned lines accross the US and Canada thus allowing me to model any aand all types of traction equipment. So the line is modelled as it would have appeared in the early 60's TB

[Anonymous]

I'm freelancing my layout so I have a pretty broad and varied possibility for a 'history'. It goes something like this, so far. In the 70's the Morale Falls and Sadgino (read Joe Fugates former layout) sold their operations and holdings to a different organization (me) with an as yet to be determined name. The new company was looking to build and expand on an established organization and the sale was approved. Over the next two decades several false starts were attempted with limited and futile results. (I didn't have the time or space for a layout) In the 90's a major shift in the direction of the railroad was begun ( We built a new house with a dedicated train room) and expansion began. Initially, the right of way grew ( I built several new tables) and track laying began.Due to unmotivated management (I was busy with kids, family and other things), this effort was not sustained and faltered after 9 years. A sudden downturn in the economy (my wife lost her job to downsizing as we were building our new retirement home) brought the upstart railroad to a jarring halt. The railroad went into an idle period ( I had to store the layout while we built the house) and after emerging from possible financial ruin ( my wife landed a dream job with a new company) the Long, Thyme n Cummin R.R. was raised from the ashes of the now defunct Morale, Falls and Sadgino ( I had to scrap Joe's former layout ). After 2 years, the L T & C is growing at a record pace. Full operations have not yet begun ( I can only run an engine back and forth on a section or two of track) but the future is bright and it's full steam ahead.

[twhite]

In order for my California Extension of the Denver and Rio Grande Western Railroad to actually exist between Salt Lake City UT and Oakland CA, via the Yuba River watershed over the Sierra Nevadas, I'd have to ignore the fact that the Western Pacific ever was constructed. And since I like WP (even run an occasional WP train), I just figured that in the latter part of the 19th century, a network of unconnected short lines extended from Oakland east to Auburn CA on the SP, then northeast to Nevada City, and eventually sort of connected themselves via the Yuba River over the watershed divide of the Sierra into the Sierra Valley. From there, various logging roads ran southeast along the Verdi Range to an SP connection to Reno, NV and a connection with the Virginia and Truckee railroad to Carson City, NV. About 1909, these railroads were amalgamated into a system known as the California Northern, and between 1910-12, was extended from Carson City NV to Salt Lake City, UT, roughly paralleling what is now US Hwy 50. In 1934, the Denver and Rio Grande Western acquired the California Northern, rehabilitated the track,
double-tracked the Sierra Nevada portion between Sierraville west to Oakland, and had a much shorter route to California than the Western Pacific (which still obtained business from both Rio Grande and UP). Traffic swelled to enormous proportions during WWII and the Korean conflict, and Rio Grande, as it dieselized its Utah lines, sent most of its steam power onto the old California Northern, also ordering a series of 2-8-8-4 Yellowtones from Baldwin, copies of the Missabe giants, as power for the 2% Sierra grades (the never-were Rio Grande L-140 3900 series). SP gained trackage rights between Sacramento and Reno and use the line as a connection to their Modoc Line. Great Northern and Rio Grande, under a trackage agreement via part of WP's Highline, also exchange traffic, with occasional GN run-throughs between Spokane and Oakland. With the surge of WWII traffic, Rio Grande has been forced to 'borrow' motive power from several roads such as the Colorado and Southern, Norfolk and Western, Pennsylvania, and even their arch-rival Santa Fe. Lots of action around here, you never quite know WHOSE locomotive is coming out of the next tunnel. of course it doesn't make logical sense, but hey--I'm having fun.
Tom

[Anonymous]

I'm modelling a fictional museum, loosely based on the Illinois Railway Museum (they have both a museum site and a running line). The stock used is a slightly oddball mix, mostly elderly diesel locos and passenger cars sold off by the main line operators. The museum's line is assumed to serve a few industries that still recieve goods by rail, so the occasional CSX loco is seen hauling short freights. The museum has also been able to boost its funding in recent years by gaining contracts to haul some of these services using their elderly but still capable diesels - usual motive power is a Fairbanks-Morse C-Liner and a Baldwin Sharknose, sometimes a C-Liner B unit is added for heavier loads. CSX are in fact looking at simply delivering cars to the interchange sidings from now on, as running their locos on a branch line hauling three or four cars is not proving cost-effective. In this event, there will be much more work for the museum fleet. The beauty of this fiction is that I can run pretty much anything and still silence the purists - real-world museums tend to have locos and cars that would never have been seen together in the outside world, so having a C&NW Erie-Built arriving with a couple of bilevel passenger cars full of tourists while a NYC Sharknose idles in the yard awaiting its next duty is perfectly feasible!

[Anonymous]

The history of my empire is on the Gloetown website at www.freewebs.com/gloetown .

[robengland]

Sorry if this is a bit long, but hope it is interesting in showing that you can rationalise just about anything with a bit of imagination. I want to model New Zealand but I don't have the time or money for all the scratch and kit building required for the 3'6" prototype. With this story, I model cheap readily-available US equipment in a New Zealand context. And I love steam but my son is a diesel fan. Once he is old enough for his own layout, I plan to wind the clock back on mine and those diesels are GONE. But for now...

When the USA drove the Japanese out of New Zealand in 1945 [which they didn't at all of course, but work with me here], the infrastructure was left in ruins. As part of the reconstruction, the Americans rebuilt much of the rail network in standard 4'8" gauge, although many of the curves and gradients were still extreme due to the terrain. They imported a lot of US rolling stock and second-hand pre-war steam engines.
When the Kiwis insisted on an end to US administration, finally cutting loose in 1953, much of the infrastructure was still in poor shape (but we are an independent bunch, so we were not going to wait). Some of the smaller branch lines remained 3'6" gauge, getting by with pre-war equipment that had survived. The roads were still very poor, as the Americans had rightly concentrated on getting the rail network up and running. So the rail network was at least highly profitable, and did not face serious competition from road haulage until well into the eighties. By that time diesels were finally established (steam having survived until the early eighties) and much of the mainline was later electrified, so the rail network held its own against the trucks.
However the infrastructure was still shaky when the Americans left. The government struggled on for years trying to fund the needed improvements, but in 1960 a conservative government privatised the railways to introduce private capital – a visionary move for the times. A number of local enterprises sprang up, but after a series of mergers and acquisitions, most of the rail network was dominated in the 1970s by the famous Allied Transport and Shipping Federation (AT&SF).
A few local lines held out. In the 1870s coal had been discovered in the Wairarapa. There had already been several attempts to float a railway connecting the Wairarapa to Wellington, but the Rimutakas had proved impassable. The Akatarawas looked possible but the longer round trip to Wellington made it unattractive. The new source of coal was enough to pu***he project into profitability (just), and a new line was opened to Pukerua in 1882. In the privatisation of 1960, the Pukerua Frozen Meat Company (PFMCo) and a group of local businessmen pooled their resources to form the rather ambitiously named South Pacific Lines, which was in fact the Akatarawa branch line hauling stock to the Pukerua freezing works, meat and by-products to the world, logs from the hills, some freight to and from local industry, and goods to the wealthy Wairarapa farming community. One of the conditions of purchase was to maintain daily passenger services across the line.
In 1970, true to their entrepreneurial spirit the SPL bought out a loss-making mainline passenger service serving towns from Wellington to Auckland up the west coast, and rebadged it as their "Daylight" service.
In 1972 they went into the tourist excursion business. In partnership with local preservation societies they run a number of (highly profitable) historic tourist trains across the scenic Akatarawas to the east coast at Riversdale.
The AT&SF has tried a number of times to acquire the SPL, but the fiercely entrepreneurial SPL has held out, and now the two companies are locked in “coopetition”: SPL leases much equipment from AT&SF, contracts diesel servicing to them, interchanges a lot of freight with them at Pukerua, and directly competes for mainline passenger revenue.
In 1975, the SPL is still in business with a mix of motive power and rolling stock. Some is owned by SPL, such as the steam locos which run the local freight and stock trains, and the daily passenger service to Riversdale. Geared steam locos work the Tararua logging branch-line, and occasionally venture into Pukerua for major maintenance. A saddle-tank 0-6-0 steam switcher was leased for Pukerua yards duties from AT&SF (which has recently converted to diesel switchers). The SPL is making its first foray into diesel with a mix of its own equipment bought second hand from the USA, and a battered old EMD leased from RailFleet, a leasing company that specialises in third-hand ex-US equipment. There is no servicing facility for diesels yet in Pukerua except fuel – they have to run down the line to the AT&SF facilities in Wellington. Needless to say, this doesn’t happen often enough.
A range of AT&SF equipment rolls through the Pukerua interchange. The big KA class 4-8-4s still do the heavy lifting and J class 4-8-2s haul fast trains. The new EMD diesels are starting to bring the daily express passenger trains through, (including the SPL’s own crack Daylight) and it won’t be long before the AT&SF steam fleet disappears, but for now the cheap West Coast steaming coal keeps them viable

[Anonymous]

My railroad came into being as a direct result of WW II. The logging lines extending east out of Headquarters, ID (The end of the line for the Camas Prairie owned jointly by the UP and NP) were carried beyond the first mountain range and joined with rails used for servicing mines west of Butte, MT. These rails were extended until they met to form an additional carrier across the western mountains to help with the flood of traffic generated by the war. The line ( eastern end) interchanges with the Milwaukee Road at Deer Lodge, MT. The name of the road is the Franklin, Ashton, Korinth and Empire (FAKE)). The line owns boxcars, flatcars, hopper cars, tank cars and cabooses. The motive power comes from all over the US, assigned to the road by the War Emergency Transportation Board as larger roads received new locomotives. The assemblage of cars are also hand-me-downs from other railroads. Due to the tight curves and steep grades inherent in the initial railroads, the largest rigid wheelbase locomotive on the line in a mid-sized mikado. There are several 2-6-6-0 locomotives on the road, smaller articulated units that initially were operated on the Denver and Salt Lake. The dominant wheel type is the 2-8-0 with a number of 2--6-0 loco's as well. The road does not interchange with the Camas Prairie on the western end, but has obtained operating rights over their track to an interchange with the UP in Oregon. Blocks of reefers operate over the line, as do stock cars carrying steers to slaughter. The occasional troop train is diverted from the Milwaukee Road and is moved to the interchange with the UP. Blocks of box cars carrying munitions are frequent visitors to the line heading west to the Naval Station at Bremerton, WA. Tank cars of oil also move west to service the newer Navy Ships, the older ships still burning coal which also moves over the line. The time period for the road was summer, 1942 until MR ran an article titled: "1942, A Good Period to Model". My layout is now set in the summer of 1943 just so I can seem strange. The line is primarily a single track line with extensive passing sidings. Freight moves on a strict priority basis. One deviation from normal railroad practice is to give right-of-way to westbound freights rather than to eastbound. This in deference to the Naval Station at Bremerton. The line changes motive power at Ashton, larger locomotives working east of Ashton, smaller locomotives working west. The west lines are frequently triple headed going west to provide sufficient air for the train brakes. Running from the west into Ashton, many freights require double heading because of the gain in elevation from Headquarters to Ashton. The railroad is listed as a Class 1 railroad because it moves over a million dollars worth of freight a year over the line. This amount of freight is due entirely to the war effort and the high value placed on war materiel. No one expects the road to last much past the war, but for the time being everyone along the line is fully employed, and those working for the railroad are exempt from the draft. Needless to say, the railroad has an enormous backlog of applicants seeking employment.

Steam, it's all we know.

Tom