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What’s happening now in the 4th Division
The 4D Board of Directors is seeking new members to fill the posts of Director 1 and Superintendent. Each is a two-year term commencing in August 2014.
Email me or the other committee members, Scott Buckley or Jeff Moorman with your name, the position you seek and a 250-300 word Candidate Statement by March 7.
Ballots will be sent by April 15.
I am calling a meeting of the 4th Division Board of Directors to be held March 8, 2014 at 10:00 a.m. at Mitzel’s Restaurant, 22330 84th Ave S, Kent (253) 395-3635.
The major business of this meeting is to deal with two vacancies on the Board. One will be the Director position held by Mike Highsmith prior to his move up to Assistant Superintendent. The term of the position runs through August 31, 2015. The second position is that of Secretary. This is a position appointed by the Superintendent with the concurrence of the BOD.
I have put forward the name of Tina Brikoff for Secretary. If you wish to put your name forth for the vacant Director position, please contact me at russseg@gmail.com. Please be prepared to be at the meeting with a statement of qualifications and why you are interested in serving in the position. After discussion, the BOD will make a selection.
I just received a report from my contact in SoCal (code name: “Dad”) that the Union Pacific Big Boy 4014 has been moved from its previous resting place at the L.A. County Fairgrounds in Pomona to the UP yard in Colton, CA. This is the first step in the final goal to relocate the locomotive to UP’s Cheyenne shops for complete restoration to full operational status.
If you haven’t been following this, now is the time. They will be hauling this behemoth over CajonPass pretty soon, so there could be some exciting moments for railfans. You can keep up-to-date on this incredible project here.
There is a good “foamer” video on the loco’s movement so far on YouTube.
Notice in the photos the chain drive for the lubricator, removed piston shafts and much of the “fiddly bits” of the valve gear. Some interesting stuff is temporarily mounted on top of the tender. I would guess those external hoses are for brake control bypass.
It is time again for nominations for positions within the 4D PNR Board. The open positions are:
Nominations are open until February 28, 2014. Email your nominations to me or the other committee members, Scott Buckley or Jeff Moorman. Please include your name, the position you are seeking, and a 250-300 word candidate statement. Ballots will be sent to members in good standing by April 15.
Should you have questions, please feel free to email me or call 253-381-3636. Thank you in advance for your time and consideration.
The Pacific Science Center has created two 15-second commercials about the upcoming 4D Model Railroad Show January 15-19. Watch for them on Comcast cable.
And it’s never too late to volunteer to help with the show. Get involved! Email me.
After six years of fantastic service to the Skagit Valley and Whidbey NMRA Clinic, our newsletter editor Al Frasch is stepping down to assume greater responsibilities nationally for OPSIG.
Over the years he has provided us with a very illustrative newsletter and has done a great deal to promote the hobby. Many new members that we have received from the local area over the last few years were due to folks either seeing our newsletter here on the 4D website or at the local hobby shop. We also saw the newsletter grow to not only provide information about our clinics, but also as a medium to showcase much of our member’s progress on layouts and modeling as well as interesting prototype information. Al’s efforts set a very high standard and we were all privileged to have someone so dedicated to the job for so many years. Volunteer efforts like this are what keeps our clubs and clinics going.
We wish Al good luck in his continuing volunteer efforts with OPSIG and always look forward to operating with him on his excellent N scale layout, the “Pilchuck Division of the BNSF.”
The 4th Division Board of Directors has a new member. Congratulations to Stu Rogers who has become a Director following the recent changes in our leadership team. At our November Board meeting, Ken Liesse submitted his resignation. As most of you know, Ken has been attending a very heavy load of classes in GPS technologies. So, Ken will continue to hit the books and some of the rest of the leadership will shift their roles and assume new responsibilities. We thank Ken for his years of service to the Division.
As Assistant Superintendent, I succeed Ken for the balance of Ken’s term through August 2014. Russ’ first official act was to appoint Mike Highsmith to fill the Assistant Superintendent post for a two-year term from last August. That means Stu Rogers comes on to the Board as he was the next highest in votes to Mike in our last election. He will complete Mike’s two-year term which ends in August 2015. Stu will also continue as our Video Librarian, a job he has faithfully fulfilled for many years.
All of these officers will need your full support as the Division moves forward. We have a full plate with the Seattle Center Show in January and the PNR Convention in June. If you want to get more involved, talk to any of these three. They will appreciate it.
The NMRA’s national “Build a Memory” program, which was announced here recently for November, has been postponed a year because of a problem obtaining the necessary materials.
However, Jack Hamilton and I will still be at the Great Train Expo in Puyallup on November 16-17 using donated materials to build an N scale starter layout. We call our program “How To Build A Small Layout.” In addition, we will hold “How to Solder” demonstrations that will include “solder it yourself” workstations to give people some personal experience. We will be assisted in all this by other 4D members, including Al Babinski and Russ Segner. We plan to have a completed layout there as well.
So I hope you’ll stop by, say hello, and maybe do a little hands-on teaching yourself. See you in Puyallup!
It is with great sadness that we must announce the passing of Jim FitzGerald, an early pioneer, President and newsletter editor of NTRAK.
For 40 years, Jim FitzGerald ensured that every other month, NTRAK members received their newsletter with updates on Ntrak standards, activities, events and organizational notices as well as news and information about N scale in general. For many years, Jim FitzGerald was a coordinator for the NTRAK layout at the National Train Show, the public event of the NMRA national convention and that is how many people had a chance to meet him, face-to-face. Jim worked with his wife Lee to help get T-Trak going as an alternative modular standard and today T-Trak continues to grow and thrive as it is used at shows as well as for home layouts.
When Jim first started with NTRAK, N scale was in its infancy and a very small part of model railroading. It was through NTRAK layouts that model railroading and specifically N scale was introduced to the public at shopping malls, hospital and museum shows as well as at train shows. It was NTRAK that took model railroading from the private basement to the pubic venue and it was Jim FitzGerald who helped guide, organize, publicize and encourage the NTRAK clubs that sprung up across the country.
Jim will be sorely missed by all.
Have you seen the article in the NMRA Magazine about Build A Memory? The NMRA instituted it with Lowe’s Hardware for helping people get started in model railroading by giving instruction on how to build a module. Where does 4D come in? We are one of the first divisions to participate in the program.
Our first BAM session will be November 16 at the Great Train Expo in Puyallup. However, we need some folks to help with the process. 4D has always been a hotbed for modular construction, so there is a lot of available talent. Some of you are probably planning on going to GTE anyway, so this is the perfect opportunity to help the division while you’re there.
If you have module building experience, or teaching experience, or both, please donate a couple of hours to this effort. This is a great way to give back to the hobby as well as promote our great hobby by showing the general public how easy it is to actually build a layout.
Walt Huston and Jack Hamilton will be spearheading this effort, but they can’t do it alone. If you’d like to help, contact Walt (walthuston@earthlink.net) and let him know you’re available.