Is this an all male hobby?

[G Paine]

If this thread is considered a non-scientific survey, there are no female model railroaders left out there. Here we are on page 3 with 31 responses and 171 views and all the respondees are male. Is all this testosterone scaring the women away??   

[CNJ831]

HaroldA

I appreciate all of the comments about this topic.  I didn't want to imply by the title that we have no women at all in the hobby, but, like I said, I was struck by the DPB video which prompted this post as it seemed to continue to draw the gender line.  I also remember the Lionel ads in the 50's and I think there was some line about bringing a father and son closer together - no mention of mom and that would be understandable knowing the time in which the ads were produced.  A woman's place, at that time, was as a homemaker but even that was beginning to change as the country came out of WW2.

In fact, Lionel's literature throughout the 1940's, 50's and early 60's endlessly extolled the idea that their trains would bring dads and sons together. It was a very clever and successful marketing approach for the company in promoting their product. In the catalogs, little sister, or mom, was relegated simply to bystander status; an admirer of junior's trains, who might occasionally be offered the "privilege" of operating the red button that activated the F-3's nasal-sounding horn. Make no mistake, except for the 1957 debacle of the "Girl's Train in Fashion-Right Colors", Lionel was totally oblivious to the possibility that a girl might be interested in playing with toy, or model, trains.

Lionel had produced girls' toys back in the 30's, but they were limited to those items firmly associated with the little homemaker's field, including things like miniature stoves and such. The idea that women's place was in the home...and not anywhere near a ZW transformer...was deeply ingrained at Lionel. Only during the past decade did Lionel finally come to appreciate that girls, or women, might conceivably harbor an interest in trains by running TV ads showing a mother giving her daughter a Lionel train on Christmas morning, while expressing how she wished she could have had one in her youth. Sadly, it was too little...far, far too late. 

Given that something like 2/3 to perhaps even 3/4 of the hobby today is compose of male hobbyists who were born, or grew up, during the Baby Boomer years cited above, with all its gender stereotyping, is it really much of a surprise that women currently make up only a fraction of one percent of model railroaders?

CNJ831

[stebbycentral]

I would also note that the condition of the hobby tends to reflect the industry we model.  Years back I worked for a government agency that was closely involved with the rail industry.  By my experience, outside the white collar jobs women railroaders are very thin on the ground.  This may be an example of art imitating life. 

[HaroldA]

I appreciate all of the comments about this topic.  I didn't want to imply by the title that we have no women at all in the hobby, but, like I said, I was struck by the DPB video which prompted this post as it seemed to continue to draw the gender line.  I also remember the Lionel ads in the 50's and I think there was some line about bringing a father and son closer together - no mention of mom and that would be understandable knowing the time in which the ads were produced.  A woman's place, at that time, was as a homemaker but even that was beginning to change as the country came out of WW2.

It's true that we seem to channel children at a very early age.  I had to go to Babies R Us last April to buy a birthday present for a 2 year old boy.  There were defined aisles for boys/girls and and once  the salesperson found out what I wanted, I was taken immediately to the Thomas the Tank Engine section and away from anything that seemed to be for girls.  Sorry folks, I ended up buying books that helped him with his speech....

Many of you have mentioned the names of females that are involved in the hobby.  I for one would like to see more of them here and to see more examples of their layouts.  I can ony recall one article in MR in recent years that highlighted a lady's work and would like to see more.  Could this perhaps be a way to encourage more women to become modelers?

Like many of you I am perfectly content to retreat to my 'man cave' - the basement - and work for hours at time on the layout as many of you.  But I am also a little envious of those of you who have spouses or lady friends who participate with you in the hobby.  I am afraid mine is more typical in that when we are shopping and I go into a hobby shop, she wanders on down to the next store.  (sigh)   

I hope the hobby can find ways of encouraging more women and maybe it all starts with the individual modeler. 

 

 

[Metro Red Line]

Most female modelers who model on their own (i.e. not with their husband) that I've seen are either into N scale or the larger scales (O, G).  I would tend to think that most HO scalers got into the hobby via train sets as little boys, and that most little girls do not get (HO) train sets.Thus women who are model railroaders enter the hobby at an older age than most men do and choose their scale.

[edkowal]

HaroldA:

Hi Harold!

The shortest answer to this question is "No."

Regards,

-Ed K

 

[airwolf crazy]

Greetings,

My wife does enjoy the hobby but she is not active in helping me build the layout or the structures.  She has helped make a few trees.  She is very interested in operating the layout after she watched a video and looked at one of my books on model RR operations.  She grew up only running trains around a loop.  She does go to trains shows with me as she enjoys watching the trains on the layouts.

She likes the G Scale trains also.  We have talked about putting in a simple garden layout but again she would be more interested in the garden part and watching the trains run then in the build of the train layout and the buildings, etc.

Christopher

[Seamonster]

Chuck, I'm glad to see that I'm not the only one with a granddaughter who's interested in fire engines.  My 8 y.o. granddaughter loves fire engines and wants to be a fire fighter when she grows up.

I have to agree with the posters who have said that we channel our children along different paths depending on whether they are boys or girls.  Children themselves seem to be "programmed" to different activities--boys like energetic, rough play, girls prefer gentler, more artistic play.  Boys like big noisy machines, girls tend not to care for them.  However, as adults, women are doing jobs that were once considered "men's jobs" and they are doing them well.  When I started my job as an industrial electronics technician 42 years ago, the department was all male.  By the time I retired 10 years ago, there were many female technicians in the department.

As far as model railroading goes, my now-17 y,o. granddaughter became interested in model railroading at a very early age.  When her family lived nearby, she frequently came over and helped me with my layout.  She is very artistic and was a great help in doing scenery and painting.  She knew what colours looked best and how to imitate nature with ground foam, paint and washes.  Her family moved away a few years ago and I miss her help.  She really surprised me recently by telling me that she would like to have my model railroad when I die.  She said she'd find a place to store it until she had a house of her own to put it in.  I also got her into using tools, even power tools, at a very early age.  In her pre-teen years she worked with me patching and painting walls, building benchwork, installing appliances and many other jobs around the house.  She would get enthusiastic over every new power tool I bought.

Now it's time to get the 8 y.o. interested in helping me.  Her 5 y.o. brother is still a bit young, but his turn is coming.  Hopefully they will develop an interest in model railroading because it's getting too hard for me to get down on the floor to work under the layout.

Let's not assume that girls would rather play with dolls than a model railroad.  Some will never develop an interest, but I think that given the incentive, many would.  They could be introduced to the hobby by helping with scenery and painting as my granddaughter did.  And they have smaller, more nimble fingers and far better eyesight than we old fogeys have.

 

[mobilman44]

Hi!

While the mags/media seem to go out of their way to point out a woman that is in the hobby, I doubt that they are even close to one percent of the total MRs.  Now I am not talking about our wives or girlfriends that paint figures or backdrops or help with scenery, etc., I am talking about those that actually build a layout or string of cars from the ground up.

I started playing with trains in the mid '50s.  Lionel was at its peak and issued a "girl's train" with pastel cars and locos, in their attempt to bring females into the fold.  It was the Edsel of its time, although those sets went on to be worth big bucks as collectors items.

In the "old days", trains and train layouts were for boys/men.  Girls/women had their own thing and it was considered weird if there was a crossover.  Today, this line is not as well defined, but it is still there. 

My wife (#2) is the perfect MR wife IN MY OPINION of course.  She has painted figures for me, offered constructive suggestions, never questions my spending or time spent with the hobby, goes on train related trips (and seems to enjoy them), and really seems to enjoy and appreciate my layout building efforts.  She has her own hobbies (computer graphics), and I feel the same about her stuff as she does mine.

[dknelson]

There are at least two women who the NMRA has recognized as Master Model Railroaders: Mary Miller and Fran Hale, also a well known clinician.  Anita Smith, the late Doug Smith's wife, had an article or two in Model Railroader back in the 1960s (and actual construction articles, not the "oooh that husband of mine" sort of article that MR used to like to publish). 

Here in the upper midwest Ingrid Drozdak "The Tree Lady" is a well known clinician on trees and signs.

At this year's NMRA national convention at least one woman's layout was on tour, Wendy Mollenhauer's.  Judge for yourself:

 http://www.nmra75.org/LayoutImages/BaysideCommuter/slides/Layout%202.html

Wendy has also given clinics on scenery and has been featured in the NMRA Scale Rails.

Dave Nelson

 

[tatans]

YES !  There are only 3 women in the hobby.

[richg1998]

Quite a lot of dude's and there are dudette's I see at times.

Don't know of any numbers, or at least realistic numbers.

Rich

[wedudler]

I think the MMR list represents it. There're even MMR women, but very few.

And at the FREMO are women members too, but also only few.

Wolfgang

[cv_acr]

There's not a very large percentage of actual female modelers out there it seems, but I have seen photos of some absolutely amazing scratchbuilt and kitbashed diesel locomotives built by one Elizabeth Allen.

[MisterBeasley]

BRAKIE

   We had to change our act by not passing bad air and then joking about it,cleaning up our language and knocking on the bathroom door before entering...

Most male group activities seem to be like this.  It's the "locker room" atmosphere, much as our ancestors went "out on the hunt."  When you think about it, there are few "guy" activities that are not like this.  Most revolve around sports, and even "hanging out at the bar" is often centered around the game on the TV.

I think we need it.  While I'm happy to see more women in the hobby and in the engineering workforce where I spend my days, there are times when I wonder if we are losing something that's really essential to our nature.  Perhaps it's the lack of these traditional gatherings that drives many of us down into the basement by ourselves.

[PL&M RR]

 

I would say that while many of us are men, saying that this is an all male hobby would be overstating things. 

Two hobby shops I used to frequent in were owned by women who were modelers.

My wife does partner with me on my HO layout, but she does have her own N scale layout. She will be starting the scenery soon and is quite excited by it. And she is what one would term "girly'- her other hobbies are sewing, fashion design and knitting. Speaking of knitting, one of the most accomplished knitters I know is a man.

 

[Colorado_Mac]

I think it has a lot to do with the fact that the era when young women were beginning to break out of stereotypical roles in society, (50s - 70s) the railroad was disappearing from public awareness.  And even as late as the 70s, the industry itself was a "boys club".  Children who thought they could actually join that club (boys) gravitated more towards a fascination with trains than those who felt they could not join.  This just carried over into hobbies of men who wanted to be railroaders as boys.  Many more young women today become interested in the same thing boys do, but as we all know, neither gender of kids is interested in trains to a great degree, except for the fact that they bring them their iPods.

That said, the last president of our club was a woman, and a pretty good modeler.

Also, I have a great many female friends who don't really have hobbies, as we define model railroading, though many are into outdoor hobbies/activities and sports.  Different strokes, I guess.

[IRONROOSTER]

I agree that there are very few women hobbyists independent of husband, boy friend, etc.

For good or bad, model building, woodworking, metal working, etc. seem to be male hobbies while sewing, knitting, scrap booking, etc. are female hobbies.

Of course with model railroading you not only have model building, you have woodworking and electrical - metal working too, if you build your own turnouts.

My wife once expressed an interest in building the Iowa Schoolhouse by Campbell.  I promptly bought the kit for her.  35 years later it's still a kit.

Enjoy

Paul

[selector]

Motley

How many of us men do you see hanging out getting our nails and makeup done, or at the mall shopping for cloths. You know what I mean, women have their own intersts and we have ours.

I do however, see some women at my LHS, but they are usually with their husbands.

Men are from Mars, and Women are from Venus.

I think that women tend to be more social about their interests, often desiring company or someone with whom to actively compare and share ideas and experiences.  We men do some of that right here, but really, we are mostly lone wolfs, probably a lot of alpha types, not used to playing second fiddle....or not liking it, at least.  Sure, many hobbyists enjoy their time at clubs, but most of their hobby time (thinking, dreaming, reading, building, and playing) is done alone.

It doesn't surprise me that so few women are in the hobby, and that when they are, it is usually as a partner with someone else.  As far as skills and abilities, men lost that argument years ago...women can do pretty much anything they set their minds to...except maybe convincing a man that he is wrong or that he should ask someone else for directions.

-Crandell

[fafnir242]

There's only one woman (that I'm aware of) in the model railroad club I belong to, but one of the guys brings in his girlfriend on occasion, and she seems to enjoy it.  I've wondered about this same thing, though, because I thought it was kind of a shame there weren't more women involved with the club.

[tomikawaTT]

When I was employed by a major toy store some years ago, I couldn't help but notice two things:

1. There was a sharp and obvious break between 'boy toys' and 'girl toys.'  The boys' aisles were full of action heroes, construction machinery, RC cars and the small selection of train sets.  Girls had frilly pink 'girlie' stuff, domestic machinery and a gazillion iterations of Barbie.
2. Girls who accidently wandered into the 'boy' stuff were usually diverted by their parents, sometimes almost forceably.  If a boy wandered in among the Barbies he would usually be left alone - but most retreated of their own volition.

If the stick is bent that hard that early, is it any surprise that women tend to grow away from interest in a hobby that glorifies the dirty, sweaty, hands in the machinery, 'thing' oriented railroads?  Of course, it doesn't always work that way.  One of my granddaughters was into - fire trucks!  (Can't tell yet which way her two boys will go.  One's a toddler, the other is still growing baby teeth.  Daddy is a Sergeant.)

Apropos CNJ's first comment, adult model railroaders of either sex tend to be married, or at least paired off.  So, saying that women model rails seem to be mainly supporting their husbands' hobbies leaves one key question.  Who is the leader, and who's the follower?  My own wife (girlfriend at the time) bent my model railroading twig just over half a century ago, with the gift of my first Japanese prototype rolling stock.  That little six-coupled tank engine is still going strong - and so's the relationship.  (Her suggestion that we visit the Kiso country in 1964 was the birth of my current Master Plan...)

Chuck (Modeling Central Japan in September, 1964)

[tstage]

I think it would be safe to say that MRRing is "mostly" a male hobby.  Where the actual percentages lie, I have no idea.  However, I would dare to guess that 8 in 10 a probably men.

Tom

[jeffrey-wimberly]

When there was a model railroad club in Leesville back in the 80's fully 1/3rd of the membership were women. Of those most had their own layouts.

[Motley]

How many of us men do you see hanging out getting our nails and makeup done, or at the mall shopping for cloths. You know what I mean, women have their own intersts and we have ours.

I do however, see some women at my LHS, but they are usually with their husbands.

Men are from Mars, and Women are from Venus.

[vsmith]

I think most that are active are so as a husband-wife team, in the small scales I have meet no "single women" hobbiest in my adult life and only read about a couple who have actual layouts.  I have read posts from mothers who were building HO or O layouts for their kids, but thats much more for the kids layout than themselves.  

Now in Large Scale garden RRing, I have run into much more women hobbiest, again most were husband-wife teams, but a few were doing it for themselves. I suspect its more that there is gardening part of it and the trains are part of the garden design. But in LS again, most ladies I have met were either husband-wife partners or older retired ladies. 

[CNJ831]

Harold, I would have to say that the number of women in the hobby of their own volition and not simply as a way of supporting, or forming a closer bond with, their husbands and boyfriends, has to be and always has been, vanishingly small.

Make no mistake; there are some women in the hobby. I've even seen a few female TV personalities claim to be hobbyists, but then you know how the Hollywood-types regard themselves as being in a hobby. I do know of one female hobbyist who even holds an NMRA Master Model Railroader certificate. But such are rare exceptions.

Based on my library of 70 years of MRs, I can say that I've not seen examples of layouts built independently by women hobbyists on more than perhaps 5 occasions. Considering the number of layout articles that have appeared over that long interval, the suggestion would be that women probably represent no more than about 0.1 to 0.5 of a percent of all model railroaders at any given time in the hobby's history. 

Traditionally, model railroading has been considered a males-only hobby, this perception being particularly strongly re-enforced in the public's mind throughout the 40's, 50's and early 60's through Lionel's literature. Thus, even for women today who might harbor an interest in the hobby, unless it is perhaps practiced in conjunction with a spouse there might be an unfavorable implication associated in its practice by them. God knows, enough guys get ribbed by their friends for pursuing the hobby instead of spending weekends absolutely glued to the TV watching sports!

CNJ831  

 

[Medina1128]

Stephen and Cinthia Priest have an awesome layout based on the Santa Fe Emporia Division. She is quite the accomplished modeler, too!

[tcwright973]

I see a lot of ladies at different train shows looking through boxes under the tables, having discussions with vendors etc. All of which leads me to believe there are a lot more ladies involved in this hobby than partcipation in these on-line forums would suggest. Just a couple of years ago, an older lady who lived by herself a couple of doors from me passed away. She had a very large O gauge layout in her attic. Who would have thought it...

Tom

[Packer]

Both of the hobby shops I go to have female emmployees.

In a club I was in there was 1 female out of 40 members. I can name one famous one right off hand.

[BRAKIE]

Harold,As far as I know it was at one time now we have accomplish women model railroaders.

 

As a side note..I recall the first woman to join  the club I was a member of years ago..We had to change our act by not passing bad air and then joking about it,cleaning up our language and knocking on the bathroom door before entering...Needless to say a lot of us was unhappy but,we soon changed our tune when we saw her modeling and the knowledge she had and not to mention those tasty home made cookies she would bring..