Category: News

The Anacortes and Fidalgo Model Railroad Club will host what may be their last open house this weekend November 2nd and 3^rd  from 10am to 4pm each day.  The layout is located in the basement at 419 Q Ave. in the beautiful seaside historic town of Anacortes west of Mount Vernon off HWY 20.

The club has been at this location since 1994 starting with a 500 square foot area and about 10 members.   Over the last 25 years the club has enjoyed a long and interesting pursuit of building and operating a detailed layout depicting many of the historic railroad features in and around Anacortes, Fidalgo Island and the Skagit Valley.

A lot of hard work and dedication has gone into the layout and it shows in the many finely constructed structures and scenery details.  The layout now occupies the full 1000 square feet available however the club must unfortunately move out within the next year.

Hopefully the club can find a new location to host their layout and equipment in the near future. Many members of the club are local PNR 4d NMRA members and regular attendees of both the Mount Vernon and the Skagit Valley and Whidbey NMRA Clinics.

A recent GoSkagit article about the layout is here

History of Anacortes and the local railroads is here

Map location of the club layout is here

Ken Liesse just posted this. Ken speaks for all of us in our appreciation of Gene Swanson

“It is with great sadness that I report the passing of my friend, Gene Swanson, MMR last Friday in Tacoma, WA. Gene was a fixture in 4D/PNR and had just won the President’s Award from the NMRA in June of this year. Gene ran the Tacoma Clinic for over two decades and was instrumental in building the popularity of that meeting. He was also a member of the Puget Sound Model Railroad Engineers and built several of the structures on the layout, mostly from scratch. Gene preferred to work in wood, but would “stoop” to plastic on occasion when necessary.

My own association with Gene began when I started attending the Tacoma Clinic. Gene’s welcoming nature brought me into the group and made me feel at home. His layout was the first I assessed for MMR and I was very happy to be on hand when he was awarded this honor. He also invited me to help out with a traveling museum exhibit, which culminated with me doing the figures and animals for a traveling display depicting how the railroads tamed the west that visited several museums around the country.

Ever a high school sports fan, Gene was very encouraging to my son, who was a budding high school sports photographer when they met. They formed a friendship of their own, and Gene ended up commissioning my son to do a photo book of Gene’s layout, which ended up with four separate printings.

Gene will be missed by all in 4D and PNR.”

Thanks, Ken.

I am aware of several who are building dioramas for display at the Boeing Swap Meet November 9. There is still time to get one ready. Rules are simple:

12″ by 24″  

Railroad theme

Any scale

Give it a try to show off some of your skills and challenge others to get those kits out of their boxes and built.

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Questions? Contact me at 206 200 2211. Russ Segner

By James Harvey

The Skagit Valley Children’s Museum located in the Burlington Outlet Mall (Old Bass store) is building a hanging G Scale model railroad with over 700 feet of track as an interactive display. The main layout is suspended 9 feet high due to the other museum structures. There will be false building fronts and wall murals depicting that area of the layout, farm land, city, industrial etc. The trains will be controlled by push buttons and the kids will be able to view the trains from cameras inside the cabs. A lot of items have already been donated for this project and grants from BNSF have been given. This project is ready to begin. We need volunteers to build this layout. If you work with wood, wiring, landscaping and painting, we need you. Click here to see the drawing of the layout. If you would like to participate in this project, please contact me.

James Harvey
(360) 914-7714
James.c.harvey@comcast.net

By Russ Segner

The recent Narrow Gauge Convention featured many very interesting things. There were great clinics, many fine layouts and several prototype attractions. There were also several award winners from our area: Greg Wright and Harry Avis of Olympia both won awards as was previously reported.

Mark Allen from Roche Harbor won two 2nd Place awards; one for his module Mystic Mine and one for his Parlor Car “Cascade”

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Don Rose of Gig Harbor won 1st Place Motive Power Rod Locomotive a CB&Q Consolidation

I saw several fine layouts

Jeff Reynolds – Mears Madness is a famous HOn3 layout which has been relocated to Nevada City, CA in the hill country northeast of Sacramento. It is in it’s own 30′ x 40′ building. It is one of the largest HOn3 layouts in California.

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Aaron Splawn – Nighthawk Branch of the Copper River & Yukon Railroad

Aaron has restored the best parts of Brian Ellerby’s famous Copper River and Yukon Sn3 layout. When we had to dismantle Brian’s layout, we were able to keep the beautiful Nighthawk scenes intact. Jimmy Booth of PBL was able to truck it to California where it is now located. It is possible that this famous layout will ultimately move to the California Railway Museum in the new Model Railroad Section.

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California Railway Museum

This is one of the finest railway museums in the world. A major portion is dedicated to the history of the rails through the Sierra’s. Beautiful 4-4-0’s are displayed alongside one of the Southern Pacific cab forwards.

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A new section on Model Railroading is open now in October. We got a preview.

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I certainly hope many of you will get to Sacramento to visit this fine museum. Plan to spend the day viewing all the exhibits and the nearby historic Old Town.

Next year, the National Narrow Gauge Convention will be in St. Louis and the Convention will be in Seattle in 2022.

By Russ Segner

Once again we are going to provide a public show at the Museum of History and Industry (MOHAI) over the Thanksgiving weekend. This is another great opportunity for members to share with the public our interest and skills in model railroading.

Last Year

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We will have three main layouts; the N-trak; the HO and the Hi-Rail. In addition to their layouts, the HO and the Hi-Rail will be hosting two separate child friendly displays located adjacent to their main layouts. There will also be six one man displays including: the 4D switching layout, a small On30 operating display and Operation Lifesaver.   All of this will need volunteers to run all day each day of the show.

The modular layouts, of course, will have their own members to operate.  But, since we will be operating over several days, there will be opportunity for others of you who are not regular members of these groups to join in and run trains.  So, here is where you can join in and help:

Modules – N-trak – HO – Hi-Rail

Small displays

Switching layout

If you can volunteer for a four hour shift in the morning or afternoon, please contact either:

Ed Ives at 425 391 3313 or email gresley7@gmail.com,

Russ Segner at 206 200 2211 or email russseg@gmail.com.

Russ

By Ed Ives

For you N gauge guys we have available a nice layout roughly 4′ x 7′ looking for a new home. It does contain the basic scenery and is in need of a little TLC along with accessories as well as trains. It was found whilst going through the estate of one of our members and has been in storage for some years. Like an abandoned pet, we need to find a good home for this layout, or failing that it will be destroyed. The advantage with this is, no adoption fee required, no shots required, no license required, no need to take it for walks and we’ll consider free delivery in the greater Seattle area. This layout must go one way or another before the end of October.

Ed Ives
gresley7@gmail.com

By Kurt Laidlaw

There will be an open workshop for the 4D HO model railroad display at the Tacoma Lutheran Retirement Center, 1301 N Highlands Pkwy, Tacoma WA on Saturday, October 12 between noon and 4 PM. Anyone is welcome to come help improve the layout and get it ready for the next “train day” the following Tuesday. We are looking for people who can saw, ballast, add scenery, clean track, solve electrical mysteries, change out wheel sets and couplers and any other modeling skills you can think of. If you have extra scenery making stuff, it would be put to good use. We have some ground foam, plaster cloth, Arizona Rock & Mineral ballast, glue and paint.

If you have time and skills you are willing to donate to this very worthwhile project or you just want to drop by and see what we are doing, please contact Warren Kerr (warrenkerr@rocketmail.com) or Kurt Laidlaw (ananas99@klaidlaw.net) so they can get your name to the receptionist at the front door.

Kurt Laidlaw
President, Pacific Northwest Region, NMRA