"obnoxious/pun" building name help needed

[leighant]

Gondolas with scrap metal move in westbound through trains on my railroad from a scrap dealer named REESE EICKLE in the unmodeled city of Lost River on the east end of the land.  The scrap yard of course is not modeled.  But the name appears on the waybills.

Boxcars and refrigerators cars with food products move in eastbound through trains going to a wholesale grocery warehouse at Lost River.  The company has a chain of a stores in small towns in the low-lying delta country on the Texas-Louisiana border that appeals to low-income customers with groceries on credit.  The name of the chain is BUY-OWE GROCERIES.

Pulpwood rack cars are picked up by local peddler freights in my modeled town of Johnston, bound east for a paper mill on the Louisiana border.  The paper mill is the result of a business arrangement between an old Cajun family with one of those French names, and the Conde Nast Publishing Company.  (Similar to the way Time Life has an interest in a paper mill at Evadale just on the Texas side of the border.)  The mill (unmodeled) that receives the pulpwood is QUEAUX - NAST PAPER CO.  You have to say it out loud to get it.  But be careful where you say it out loud.  Some Cajuns may mistake that corporate name for a colorful colloquialism which some will take affectionately, but at which others might take umbrage.

There is a sign on Interstate 10 about 15 miles east of Houston where the highway crosses from old channels that used to be part of the San Jacinto River at some time in the geologic past.  The sign for the eastbound lanes says "Old and Lost Rivers" and westbound "Lost and Old Rivers".  In other words, one river name comes on one side of the other but they are so confused, they are not sure where one starts and the other stops.  I thought LOST RIVER would be a good name for the hidden layover siding representing the east end of the East Texas line I model.  Lost River is for the trains going to Beaumont, Silsbee, into Louisiana, everything that is east of Conroe and Cleveland.  I also thought Lost River would sound good for the name of a city located on a sleepy bayou, where trains "disappear".

Originally I was going to use "Old River" as the name for the same layover siding when you get to them going west.  Like the sign on the bridge, you can't tell where one starts and other stops, since it is a layover staging siding representing each end of the line.  But it got confusing having trains always running from Lost River to Old River, and Old River to Lost River.  Just sounded too much alike.  I solved the problem by switching to Spanish for Old River.  I saw a bar in the Mexican-American section of Corpus Christi with the name "El Viejo".  It doesn’t  just mean the descriptive adjective "old", it means "old man".  So my staging at the end opposite Lost River has become 'RIO VIEJO" and the pun is hidden by the language.  It means Old Man River!

[leighant]

Centerpiece of the Johnston small town scene on my East Texas layout is the WAYNE COUNTY COURTHOUSE on the courthouse square.  Most counties in Texas are named for famous Texas heroes: early settlers or soliders in the Texas Revolution.  For my ficticious Texas county, I figured I needed a ficticious Texas hero.  It's named for John Wayne.  Town of Johnston is named in memory of a model railroader friend who died 30 years ago.

 

Dixie Darlin receives boxcars of bagged peanuts from SCHULTZ PEANUTS (named for the late creator of Charlie Brown and Snoopy) Norton,TX (once built a small layout for the Norton Brothers) and NEW ACES FARMS (the English pronunciation of "Nueces", Spanish for nuts) Truesdale TX.  Though Texas nuts are the main base, Dixie Darlin occasionally gets a shipment of Georgia peanuts for subtle taste blending.  Those shipments come from KENNEDY-BUTLER ENTERPRISES (named for two of the three husbands of Scarlett O'Hara in "Gone With the Wind") Tara, GA.

 

One of the model railroaders in Corpus Christi is a rock-n-roll disc jockey in real life (if you can call that real life) with the "air name" J.J.STONE.  Of course, when I built a gravel pit, I had to give his name to the operation.

 

Not exactly a pun but... the Methodist church in Johnston has a half-inch tall sign in front with the week's sermon topic and the name of the minister, Rev. Charles Whitner.  That is a name I made up for a semi-autographical novel I was writing in college.  The model is very loosely based on the church where my mom and dad were married in 1935, a church located only 50 feet from a railroad track.  The church was an extreme kitbash from a Danish rail passenger depot.  About the only recognizable feature is the pair of arched door openings.  I wanted a southern feel to my east Texas town, and thought of that shape of church as typical of southern towns. 

Local peddler freights going through Johnston also carry traffic for SPELVIN, another town in the woods just down the line....and not modeled.  But the cars going to Spelvin are modeled.  That keeps the local from hauling only cars switched in the one modeled town, and it gives me an excuse to handle exotic cars for which I don't have modeled industries, like the sulphur cars or special covered hoppers for carbon black.  Spelvin is a name from an old theatre tradition.  When a theatre saved payroll costs by putting an actor in one role in the first act, and then having him double and play a different role in the second or third act, they would put a false name for one of the roles in the program to hide the fact.  The traditional false name was "George Spelvin".  Dates back as least as far as the 1930s, probably farther.  An "actress" (?) in "adult" films of the 1960s used the name Georgina Spelvin, somewhat sullying the old tradition.  I'm looking back at the original heritage from vaudeville days.  My hidden staging track, besides its main role of representing the unmodeled big city at the end of the line, also doubles in the role of the smaller town along the way. 

 

One of the industries at Spelvin is MCDONALD FARM SUPPLY, named not for the burger but for the old guy who had a farm in the song. E-I-E-I-O, and all that.

 

[leighant]

I wrote about the names of places on the portions of railroad I have already modeled.  I have a number of scenes planned, in some cases kits bought, for the big city of Santa Vaca IF I ever get the space to build it.  In the meanwhile, I run cars that are supposedly coming from Santa Vaca over the portion of railroad I already have.

 

I want a coffee plant like the Maxwell House plant I gew up near in Houston, right near the old Houston Belt and Terminal Milby Street engine terminal.  The building is fascinating for having an old portion, a newer add-on in a modernized but stylized version of the old architecture, and then a still newer add-on, built to harmonize.  The oldest part of the building was an automobile assembly plant in the 1920s according to Ray Miller's Texas, and it looks very similar to Walther's "Brach's Candy Factory".  Now for the name.  The name of A&P Grocery Stores came from The Great Atlantic and Pacific Tea Company, and there was also an Atlantic and Pacific Railroad that became part of the Santa Fe.  So why not the name or initials of a railroad as the name of a coffee company.  The Santa Fe in Texas was the Gulf, Colorado and Santa Fe.  I thought of Gulf and Colorado Coffee, but Colorado is not a name one associates with coffee.  Gulf and Caribbean fits a little better.  Abbreviated G&C, with the slogan "G&C is Good Coffee!"  

A steel fabrication yard that builds refinery vessels so big they take two heavy-duty flatcars to ship: TOTAL FABRICATION.

 

A chemical plant that ships smelly stuff in tankcars: EUREKA CHEMICALS

A siding where cars are left to interchange with the industrial railroad serving the port but it is actually only a dead end track: SOUTH TEXAS URBAN BELT  ("S.T.U.B.")

One of the industries supposedly at STUB ships cowhides in old mostly obsolete Santa Fe wooden boxcars dedicated to that service because no other shipper will take them after they've been used for hides.  The company is PLAINVIEW HIDE.

Big reels of cable wire are shipped via the STUBRR interchange to a distributor at the port:  TYSON WIRE & CABLE.

I have had a couple of odd covered hoppers for 30 years trying to find a prototype.  Finally saw a picture in a Model Railroader from the 1950s of that type of hopper used for Holly Sugar Co.  Sugar is a good commodity for my layout, but the only real sugar operation in Texas in the 1950s was Imperial at Sugarland, and they didn't use those covered hoppers. And Imperial is associated with the Missouri Pacific, not the Santa Fe.  However there was a sugar operation in the 1920s on the Santa Fe at Booth, Texas, about 10 miles southeast of Rosenberg.  I found pictures in Fort Bend County Sesquicentennial 1822-1972 of the factory and sugar cane cars of BOOTH OPEN KETTLE SUGAR.  I can imagineer that it was still operating in 1957 with the sugar covered hoppers.  The pun here is that the reporting mark for the car (the owner name abbreviation) would be BOKX but the BOKX cars ("boxcars") will actually be covered hoppers.   Meanwhile, I used the design of the 1920s Booth car and built my cousin's kid who lived in Sugarland a G gauge model of a cane car lettered for Sugarland.

I built a small portable railroad with a scene I want to include on my big dream layout someday, a railroad inside a navy base used for blimps.... a destination for helium cars.  There was just such a base at Hitchcock, Texas, ten miles inland from Galveston, during World War Two.  The hanger for six blimps was equivalent to the world's largest wooden building (several copies of same building built in several places).  It is in the imaginary community of Tidelands, Texas, so in the actual Navy nomenclature for blimp bases, it would be the Naval Air Station Tidelands (Lighter-Than-Air).  The on-board supply railroad is named for the base so it is the NAVAL AIR STATION TIDELANDS LIGHTER THAN AIR RAILROAD.  Makes it sound like the railroad is lighter than air.

 

[Schuylkill and Susquehanna]

How about these:

Rob E. Blind National Bank

Smokey's Gas (with a sign in the window that says "Fill your tank and get a surprise trip to Bermuda")

I. C. D. Pink Elephant Bar      (or I. C. A.)

Silver Spoon Diner    (which of course looks like the typical "greasy spoon.")

 

Those are some that I came up with, but you could find more looking through a Walthers yearly catalog.

[galaxy]

Sometimes truth is stranger than fiction. An elderly Reverend in my town growing up  named Reverned Cash had a daughter..you guessed it.. she was named Penny.

 

Penny Cash Savings Bank

Barium Funeral Home, Mr. Don Belough, Director.{spoken as "Down Below"} {one possible motto: You stab em, we slab em.}

Downe & Uppe, Elevator manufacturers {who needs Otis?}

A. Round Towne Diner

Passin Gas CO., Propane distributors

Woodpecker Lumber CO.

That's all I can remember now.

I never exactly subscribed to using the pun funny names for MRRing, although I did come up with some ditties...just can't think of them now after reading all the others {which are often of course common twists on names and phrases, and therefore easy to come up with}. {confused my brain now..easy to do these years } ..

My favorite book title, though, is: Five Miles to the Outhouse, by Willy Makit.

[river_eagle]

real one, located along old US 40 in central MO

Atlasta Motel

 

[ChadLRyan]

Cool Thread, hope this keeps going On-N-Non...... 

[kbkchooch]

galaxy

My favorite book title, though, is: Five Miles to the Outhouse, by Willy Makit.

I've heard of that book! Illustrated by Betty Wont !

[Fergmiester]

Rolling down the Road Brake Repairs

[Sierra Man]

We have the Stan Whey Bac Logging Co.

[erosebud]

I ran across a real one when I switched to DCC and was told I needed a digital multimeter.  In the fine tradition of the Miracle Chair (or Shoe) Company, there's Fluke Electrical Meters ("If it's accurate, ...")

Don't forget that railroads name everything, so in addition to commercial enterprises, remember to label Karpel Tunnel, the branch to Olganga Mine, the siding at Collier Bluff, and so on.

[MisterBeasley]

The Brass Rat is the common name given to my school ring, which features a beaver.  I made a mold of my ring with latex rubber, cast it in hydrocal and used it for the sign over the door of this bar:

Further down the layout, continuing with the theme, there is a liquor store named for its location on Beaver Street.

My wife is named Penny, so I chose that name for one of my subway stations:

[Heartland Division CB&Q]

Mr. B .... I like seeing your city scenes. 

Here is "Mittlemann Wholesale Food & Beverage" 

[Adelie]

Miracle Plumbing Products "If your toilet works, it is a Miracle"  Can be used with a variety of products or services.

Then there is a standby of mine.  Look up Yiddish words. Among some on my list of business names:

Shmata’s Fine Clothing (Shmata means rags)

Shiker’s Bar (Shiker = drunkard)

Chotski’s Gifts (Taking liberty with the spelling, a chotsky is something of little or no value)

Heizel’s Hotel (Heizel is a house of ill repute)

[cv_acr]

One local layout around here had the "Johann Sebastian Box Co."

I saw a "Lie & Cheton Steel Co." in an old Model Railroader trackside photos once.

[Coquihala and Rock Creek]

Not sure if it's been said yet;

Miracle Chair Company

"If it's a good chair it's a Miracle!"

[Coquihala and Rock Creek]

Or on any handy man type truck, the real one was on a Plumbers Truck;

"We repair what your husband fixed."

 

[MisterBeasley]

Leo runs the painting company in town along with his 4 sons.

When asked about Othello over there on the right, Leo's wife, Mona, just smiles....

[cbq9911a]

The best humor is very subtle.

Madonna Della Ferrostrada Cathedral (Our Lady of the Railway).

Jen Nerick Manufacturing Company

Headache Hammers

Tarjhay Department Store

Irene Adler Women's Clothing (woman who outsmarted Sherlock Holmes)

Canine-American Dog Food (and its subsidiary Feline-American Cat Food)

Jesuit Beer (The Christian Brothers make wine, but the Society of Jesus prefers a more manly drink.)

<Your Favorite Politician> False Teeth - They Keep You Talking!

Condemned Edison (It sounds like the real utilities Commonwealth Edison and Consolidated Edison.)

Penguin Tuxedo

Theodor Seuss Geisel Memorial Library (especially if the building looks like it was designed by Dr. Seuss.)

<Chocoholic Friend>'s Chocolate

Comiskey Hoisery - Home of the Original White Sox!

Lawyers Can Service - Call a Lawyer to Clean Your Can.

Lawyers Waste Service - Call a Lawyer to Take Your Trash.  I've lettered garbage trucks for the company.

Coyote Acme Company - Specializing in bird capture systems.

Another source for names is the personality of your friends.  I have a friend who is very involved with canine rescue and Catholic devotion.  My layout has a factory named for her that manufactures dog beds and rosaries.

[Steven S]

Although I've never been a fan of punny names on layouts, Tom and Ray Magliozzi always had some good ones at the end of their show.

Marge N. O'vera: Accountant

Pikop Andropov: Limo service.

Heywood J. Buzzoff: Customer Service

Steve S

[Great Western Rwy fan]

How about the C.R. Krack Plumbing Supply...

[locoi1sa]

I found an old weather beaten sign in the storage area at work. Hyannis Sand and Gravel. The L was almost worn away so it says Hyannis sand and grave. It kind of fits into our mantra. Most of the employees end up staying till they check out.

  Almost forgot. We had a morning catering truck that had a picture of a giant cockroach and the name was Crises roach coach. Darn good breakfast they would have.

          Pete

[DSchmitt]

From

http://www.google.com/finance?cid=5316271 :

"Thomas Crapper & Company Ltd.  ..................... Thomas Crapper restores antique bathrooms and continues to make the Victorian and Edwardian sanitary ware that long ago made its name. Founded in 1861 by the eponymous Thomas Crapper, this venerable plumbing-fixtures company supplied the private facilities of King Edward VII and King George V. It was acquired by a rival in 1963, but later resumed business as an independent company. Products include cistern pulls and chains, wooden toilet seats, cast-iron and copper bathtubs, sink basins, shower rails, and towel racks. The company admits that its name inspired a slang word for the toilet, but disclaims responsibility for other vulgarities. "

Company Website:  http://www.thomas-crapper.com/

[jeffrey-wimberly]

Taking one from the Munsters TV sitcom, Gateman, Goodbury and Graves Funeral Home. It must have been a great place. people were just dying to get in.

[last mountain & eastern hogger]

I have a few I would like to add >>>>>>

R.U. Stiff  Mortuary

Back to Basics Creamatorium

Dr. I.C. Red   Anger Control and Intervention

Dr. I.P. Freely Urology

R.U. Stoned Sand & Gravel

I. Must P. Beverage Co.

I.C. Green Inc.   Investments of all sorts

I.C. Black & Sons Whitewashing and Painting

Broken Mirror Photography.

Cracked Glass Driving Lessons

Poker Plumbing.    "A Flush is better than a Full House"

R.S. Hole & Sons Excavating

Johnboy out...............................and chuckling   

[locoi1sa]

S.M.Ely septic pumping.  Were #1 in the #2 business.

       Pete

[leighant]

cbq9911a

The best humor is very subtle.---  Canine-American Dog Food

In real life, SP Tariff #1517-F dated June 1973 listed rail served industries in Houston, Texas that included E. K. Wine Co., commodity handled, dogfood.  Run the letters of E K Wine together and they come out "equine", ie. horsemeat.

[MRL Guy]

Burnham Downs matchworks

Hernia Movers (real company) slogan- The potentate of totin' freight

[vsmith]

These are real business names, family version:

 

Dirty Hoe garden center

 

Boris’ Car Loft used cars

 

Curl Up & Dye hair salon

 

Den of Antiquities antique store

 

Shun Fat grocery Store

 

Luftwaffle waffle house

 

Juan More Taco restaurant

 

Java The Hut coffee house

 

China Syndrome china shop

 

The French Confection pastry shop

 

Salt and Battery fish and chips

 

The Codfather fish and chips

 

Daily Grind coffee house

 

Vicious Cycle bike shop

 

Turn Your Head and Coif hair salon

 

 It would get far worse if I included the adult only version

[steemtrayn]

Royal Septic Service

"A Royal Flush Beats a Full House"