I'm glad to hear that it was saved! Finding a new home for a layout, even an outstanding one, after its owner has passed away can be terribly difficult unless the owner previously made arrangements. And even then, that's not a guarantee. I've been going through this with a friend's layout for four years, now.
-Fritz Milhaupt, Publications Editor, Pere Marquette Historical Society, Inc.http://www.pmhistsoc.org
Are there any pictures of the layout?
South Penn
I was doing a google search on Jaques and found this old post. The layout was in fact reassembled and restored and is on exhibit in a special building at the Minnesota mining museum in Chisolm, well worth a visit if you get up there. Although he had an article on his layout in the May 1962 MR, he's not a well-known figure in the hobby, even though his ability is probably comparable to John Allen. A station on my layout is named Jaques after him.
Jaques himself is an interesting figure, a noted US nature artist, whose skill is visible all over the web, and also in the backdrop of his layout. A google search is worthwhile.
Come to think of it, MR or MRVP really ought to revisit that 1962 article and run up to Chisolm and re-introduce later generations to that layout. I notice that on MRVP, Jim Hediger credits John Armstrong with the first multi-level layout in the 1970s, but the Great North Road had come up with the same idea much earlier.
Modeling BNSF and Milwaukee Road in SW Wisconsin