Gordon Garnhart

There were 29 people gathered at the Summer Hill Retirement Community conference room on Wednesday, June 8th.

The meeting was opened by John White leading a brief discussion to finalize the line-up of programs for the coming year.

Al Frasch's N scale barn was awarded Best Entry Runner-up

The guest speaker for the evening was Jack Hamilton MMR, who spoke about many different tools, fixtures, clamping and lighting devices that a model railroader might find useful. He also took a few jabs at some tools which Micro-Mark and other catalog sales operations tout as essential but which, in Jack’s estimation, are not very effective. He distributed a very comprehensive list of 159 different tools, what each is called, where it can be purchased, its item number in a catalog, its price and, in many cases, a commentary on its practicality and usefulness. He cited a number of examples where a fancy high-priced catalog item is not as effective as a similar tool from a hardware, sporting goods or kitchen supply store. He had examples of most of the items, discussed each one briefly, and passed it around for everyone’s inspection. His lively presentation prompted many questions and sparked many thoughts on how each of us might improve our methods, skills and techniques.

The main purpose for Jack’s visit, however, was to judge, with the assistance of Di Voss, the entries in our Scratchbuilt Dilapidated Building Contest. There were only eight entries in the competition, but what the field lacked in quantity, it more than made up for in quality. Steve Jaffray, the Competition Shepherd, announced the winners: Best Entry was awarded for the work of Jack Tingstad; Best Entry Runner-up was won by Al Frasch; Most Humorous was taken by David Laws; People’s Choice went to Iver Johnson; and Honorable Mention awards went to Al Frasch, Steve Jaffray and Curt Johnson.

The clinic does not convene in July or August, but we are looking forward to Wednesday, September 14th and a visit to the very elaborate HO layout of Nick Muff in Sedro Woolley.

Steve Jaffray's HO scale barn

This HO scale barn was a joint effort by Iver Johnson and his son Curt

Jack Tingstad's HO scale mine structure will be used on his layout.