JeoffreyCat I've been with the Richmond, Fredericksburg & Potomac HS since the beginning. Regular membership is $20/year. Four quarterly meetings (held in Fredericksburg) and a quarterly magazine. Meetings are free and open to the public. I'm three plus hours from FBG so have never been to a meeting. They've sponsored special runs of models with manufacturers and have a variety of merchandise and books. The publication might focus on specific equipment, operations, or stories from former employees. The HS also maintains an archives which is available online to anyone. For me, the $20 a year is well spent supporting the HS's activities. I think HS with a "niche" like the New Haven and RF&P will survive since they tend to have a "cult" following.
I've been with the Richmond, Fredericksburg & Potomac HS since the beginning. Regular membership is $20/year. Four quarterly meetings (held in Fredericksburg) and a quarterly magazine. Meetings are free and open to the public. I'm three plus hours from FBG so have never been to a meeting. They've sponsored special runs of models with manufacturers and have a variety of merchandise and books. The publication might focus on specific equipment, operations, or stories from former employees. The HS also maintains an archives which is available online to anyone.
For me, the $20 a year is well spent supporting the HS's activities. I think HS with a "niche" like the New Haven and RF&P will survive since they tend to have a "cult" following.
Simon
I am not a member of any historical society - I don't thing we have one locally that focusses on railroads. I do use online information posted by historical societies. It is extremely useful for model railroaders.
Would I be a member of a local society? Yes, but I now live on a fixed income (more or less), so membership cost would be a consideration. I would think that a brick-and-mortar association would be unecessary at this point. We have a few local museums that have railroad items, so I would assume that the bulk of the information would be in - or easily convertible to - digital format. So I would support a society that would host a Website with rich online information of the local railroad history. Hosting a Website does cost money, I would assume that membership fees to cover these would be fairly low. I would love to manage such a "branch" for our local MR club, but I don't think there would be sufficient support for it.
Good post, Paul. Thanks.
Rich
Alton Junction
richhotrain,Speaking for the NHRHTA, we're doing just fine considering the NH disappeared 55 years ago. Part of it is that no railroad ever replaced the NH in the hearts and minds of southern New Englanders. PC, CR, CSX, Amtrak, Metro-North, MBTA, P&W, NECR... None of them have the following of the New Haven around these parts.
There was also no competition for railfans as the NH had a virtual monopoly in Rhode Island, southeastern Mass., and Connecticut (other than the CV). If you were a fan of local railroads before 1969, you were a NH fan.Unlike the IC, which got bought out entirely by CN 27 years ago. Not only did it disappear into a larger railroad, it's also surrounded by other big Class I railroads that also remain popular.
maxman Looks like they consolidated with the Monticello Railway Museum in 2020: https://www.mrym.org/green-diamond-magazine
Looks like they consolidated with the Monticello Railway Museum in 2020:
https://www.mrym.org/green-diamond-magazine
The newsletter is no longer published, and their assets now belong to, and are stored by, the museum. They no longer exist.
I wonder if mobilman44 is aware of that.
mobilman44 The ICHS is now gone, but was active from the mid 80s til two years ago.
The ICHS is now gone, but was active from the mid 80s til two years ago.
If you are seriously interested in a particular railroad, joining their historical (and usually modeling) society will be well worth the cost of admittance. I was an early member of both the Illinois Central and Santa Fe societies, and got a lot of enjoyment and information from them over several decades.
The ICHS is now gone, but was active from the mid 80s til two years ago. The SFH&MS started earlier, and is still active. Most of the societies put out quarterly mags that contain a wealth of photos, information, and articles of interest.
ENJOY !
Mobilman44
Living in southeast Texas, formerly modeling the "postwar" Santa Fe and Illinois Central
I dropped out of one HS because they were frequently publishing photos of dirty, heavily weathered, covered with graffiti, ready for the scrap yard equipment rather than easily found photos of equipment in service before their railroad was merged.
I wonder how many historical societies have meetings virtually or only in-person? Having both is ideal since some live away somewhat from the meeting location(s). I get the logistical and financial challenge of offering both options.
I model the Milwaukee Road, but I live in Delaware now. I don’t travel much anymore. So, it’s unlikely that I would attend a Historical Society meeting.
It takes an iron man to play with a toy iron horse.
My interest in the NYC is only in eastern New York, so I am not that interested in the other 90%. I'm also interested in Colorado mountain RRs, but that would be too many RR H&TSs to join. I belong to the NRHS as a catch-all.
[quote user="danmerkel"]
Up front, let me point out that I'm a member of the BoD of the Nickel Plate Historical & Technical Society. We are in the midst of trying to find out what brings new members onboard as well as what causes current members to allow their memberships to lapse. So I'm asking each of you who read this to share why you are or why you aren't a member of your favorite railroad's historical society.
So kindly share your thoughts on joining or not joining the historical society of your favorite railroad, past or present.
Thanks!
Dan Merkel, NKPHTS Special Projects Director.
I used to belong to one, but let my membership lapse because the quarterly magazine became always late and very skimpy. I live too far away for their other activities.
Paul
I have a core group of historical societies I belong to - NP, GN, DMIR and NYC. Fortunately a local hobby shop (Scale Model Supplies in St. Paul MN) carries the magazines of several other historical societies, and I pick up an issue now and then if it has something relating to my rail interests. If one of those societies has a convention coming up in the Twin Cities, I often will join for a year to attend the convention.
I think it's historical societies are a good thing, a good way to get information and perhaps meet and become friends with like-minded folks.
I could possibly stomach spending for a membership IF I could limit my interests to just one or two railroads. Historically I have had issues doing that. There's just too much that I like.
It is not fully accurate for me to say that I'm a "lone wolf" modeler because at various times I have been an informal "lodge" member, with people I met at local train stores. On "lodge" nights we get together and run our trains, of whatever roadname one cares to run. I always felt that I learned more from my friends, who have had quite diverse railroad tastes, than from a larger or more formal historical society.
Some of my friends are dead and gone, but their open-minded approach toward buying HO models still influences me. I was never particularly a big fan of the C&O flying pumps and elesco feedwater heater on the front of the smokebox, but my "lodge" friends all were, so partly in memory of a couple of them I have bought the BLI C&O K-2, and now I can appreciate that look.
So due to the people I've met and run trains with, my tastes have changed a lot over the last 25 years, and there's things that I better understand now than I did back in the day.
Other people who know they love only one or two railroads may prefer the membership in a society.
John
This is a very interesting discussion! I've not ever joined a historical society. The N&W might have some useful information available, but I think a lot can be had from looking online and talking here.
With various costs I endure, I cannot stomach spending for a historical society membership.
I did join the Santa Fe Railway Historical and Modeling Society in the past, several years ago, and was a sustaining member for a few years.
However, I was frustrated at that time by the overall national focus on the period between 1940 and 1971 (the birth of Amtrak). There seemed to be outright hostility from the "Steam Mafia" (a term used by one member of the SFRHMS national Board of Directors whom I personally knew) toward fans of the 1970's and later Santa Fe eras. He was in the relative minority of those of us who liked more modern Santa Fe trains.
Ultimately my frustrations with the direction of the national society were such that I chose not to renew my subscription. I did not feel that my interests were adquately represented in the Society's quarterly publication at that time.
PS For those and various other reasons, I basically became a lone wolf modeler, ironically now mainly interested in Texas & Pacific steam.
I'm a member of the Tennessee Central Railway Museum in Nashville. My primary reason for membership is that the Museum has a small MR Hobby store which stocks most of the basic MRR supply items, but also offers any item in the Walthers Catalog at a 25% discount, and as you pick it up at the store (staffed by volunteers, and hours are Saturdays 10am to 2pm) so there is no shipping charge. This is the "go-to" MRR store in Nashville and a significant revenue generator for the Museum, so I would encourage any club/society to explore this concept.
The Museum houses two MRR Clubs (HO & N) none of which I belong to as 1) I have my own large layout to work on, and 2) I'm an anthracite RR modeler and NE PA is a long way from Central Tennesse.
The Museum also offers a large, year-around schedule of train excursions.
Jim
I joined the New Haven Railroad Historical & Technical Association (nhrhta.org) back in 1990 and started volunteering to staff train shows to sell our NH-related products.Today, I run the train show crew, produce the quartely Shoreliner magazine and annual calendar, run the NHRHTA Facebook page, and "nitpick" NH models produced by manufacturers. In my spare time, I also scan NH slides and large NH documents for preservation. You could say I am involved. I joined the NHRHTA because it was the railroad that used to run by my house before I was born. Growing up in the 1980s, modern railroading through my town was dull and boring, and the NH seemed to do everything better and more often. My dad gave me the 1988 20th Anniversary Edition of Passenger Train Journal:"Dedicated to the Late, Great, New Haven Railroad." I've been hooked ever since.The NHRHTA was the very first single-railroad association, est. in 1961. All previous groups were national or regional in nature, like the R&LHS, NRHS, RRE, NMRA, etc.We were founded as a modeling organization and had official ties to the NH's PR Dept.; we answered questions sent in to the PR Dept. and they printed our newsletters. We later turned into a historical group after the NH disappeared into Penn Central.We have an annual Reunion & Train Show (this Sept. 14th in Essex, Conn.), where we sell calendars, DVDs, decals, hats, glassware, books, models, etc., plus we have other dealers there plus the live museum steam engines of the Valley Railroad to look at. We have seen an increase in memberships lately and we have a new, younger president who is keen to do new things, like rare mileage trips, buffet banquets, summer cookouts for volunteers, and so on.We're probably most famous for these days is the line of NH passenger cars made in partnership with Rapido Trains. We supplied them with half the tooling cost to create the coach, parlor, diner, and 'County' cars, then got to sell them to raise money for the next car. We put our money where our mouth is and it's paid off for us.One of our other big accomplishments was when we helped create the Railroad Archives at the University of Connecticut in Storrs, Conn. They have all the buiness records of the NHRR, and they have since become a leading railroad archive collection.As a modeler and railroad historian/collector, joining the historical organization for the railroad you model is just fundamental and everyone should do it if they can.
I have made purchases from a couple of historical societies and authored an article for the magazine of a third historical society, but I have never joined a historical society as a member.
I model Dearborn Station in downtown Chicago. Seven different railroads used Dearborn Starion and the trackage was owned by an eighth railroad. I am not about to join eight different historical societies, although all eight railroads are of interest to me.
I am a long time member of the ATSF Railway Historical and Modeling Society. I enjoy the conventions even though I have only attended 3 in the last 40 years; work gets in the way more often than not. I also enjoy the books they have published. I am amused sometimes at how hyper-focused some folks get on modeling prototypically. I do not have the time, skills or resources to count rivets. To each their own.
I've been a long time (probably about 30 years) of the PRR Technical & Historical Society. I contribute some amount above the base membership for preservation of the archives, and for the modeling magazine. In my opinion the base membership is worth it if only for the super high quality glossy magazine (the Keystone) that comes out quarterly, with fascenating articles on the history of the PRR. In addition, there is a good online site with reference material, books available (with discount for members) in the library, and an excellent (also quarterly) online modeling magazine. Unfortunately, each issue of the Keystone includes obituaries of the older members, many who worked for the PRR and Penn Central, who have passed. Not sure what the demographics of the society look like but there seems to be an emphesis on archiving and preservation, and capturing the reminiscenses of the former employees who remain. It seems that there is quite a lot of effort on the preservation side with the T-1 and K-4 projects. I have been pleasently surprised at what appears to be real progress, especially on the latter.
A very intersting thread imo.
Here in the U.K. I am interested in the North British Railway up to 1923 (when it became part of the London & North Eastern Railway. Seeking inforrmation on the NBR I get from books and that satisfies my curiosity on the Company.
My other interesting railway company is the Lancashire & Yorkshire Railway; which my layout is loosely based upon.
I joined the Lancashire & Yorkshire Railway Society. The information and pictures from the quarterly magazines etc. have been and are a godsend to me. Such information on operations, signalling, buildings and rolling stock is immense and not available on the open market.
David
To the world you are someone. To someone you are the world
I cannot afford the luxury of a negative thought
The one thing I will add to the discussion is not to throw out suggestions that "younger" members might make (and demean them in the process).
I was part of one pre-pandemic and would attend the conventions anytime they were within resonable traveling distance. (e.g. bus as I don't drive) A number of years ago when we were discussing recruitment I made the impertinent (at least to certain members) gesture of suggesting getting a Facebook page. Many of my generation seem to be getting them. I basically was yelled at that the only thing social media was good for is trolling everything. (My words as I don't remember the exact words but that was the intent.) To this day, I think it had to do with the fact I was one the youngest people there. The convention organizer (who used FB to promote it) that year felt for me as well as he couldn't understand the comment. I attended one more convention after that and still didn't feel welcome. (My models did however as I have gotten compliments there.) I decmided to not renew my membership.
danmerkelThe board of the NKPHTS feels that the future of most "fallen flag" historical society will be modeling so this forum seems like a great place to get some answers regarding membership. ...
I'm suprised that a rail historical society so closely associated with an active steam engine/train fantrip operation seems to be forgetting railfans who are interested in the history of the trains they ride, and might not be active modlers. I am more of an armchair modeler/collector, but I belong to the NRHS to support history, preservation and train rides.
I think you are missing feedback if you don't also post the thread in the Trains forum.
I think historical societies are a very important part of the maintenance of knowledge of railroads - and history in general - and am a proud member of a few. However, if you are just interested in modeling information, I'd recommend just buying the odd back issues that are relevant to your modeling interests (in particular for larger historical societies). There are lots of benefits besides that, and of course you are supporting an important endeavor.
The exception, in my opinion, is for more minor railroads. Obviously there are major amounts of work done to archive the Pennsylvania Railroad, or the New York Central system, but the smaller scale railroads really benefit from these societies, and often end up being centered around enthusiastic modelers. They can help bring together widely disparate collections, and bring them to your attention. My prototype, the Copper Range, has photos in archives all around the US in various, often inaccessible collections, and the efforts of that organization have brought those resources to light.