One of my favorite spots on the layout is a Western town made up of old school 70s and 80s Fine Scale Miniatures and other high end craftsman kits. These were built by Mrs. Pat McCue and Pete Therrein over the years and include an impressive amount of interior and exterior detail and board-by-board construction. Though Mrs. Pat and Pete are no longer with us, their work shares a place of honor where it can be best viewed by all who enter into the clubhouse.
Pete would use a seamstress' pounce wheel to make the nail impressions. The stains and coloring he used would naturally pool into the dimples, making perfect nail heads.
(1) --A Psalm of David.-- LORD, who shall abide in thy tabernacle? who shall dwell in thy holy hill?
(2) He that walketh uprightly, and worketh righteousness, and speaketh the truth in his heart.
(3) He that backbiteth not with his tongue, nor doeth evil to his neighbour, nor taketh up a reproach against his neighbour.
(4) In whose eyes a vile person is contemned; but he honoureth them that fear the LORD. He that sweareth to his own hurt, and changeth not.
(5) He that putteth not out his money to usury, nor taketh reward against the innocent. He that doeth these things shall never be moved.
It Is Well with My Soul
1. When peace, like a river, attendeth my way, when sorrows like sea billows roll; whatever my lot, thou hast taught me to say, It is well, it is well with my soul. Refrain: It is well with my soul, it is well, it is well with my soul.
2. Though Satan should buffet, though trials should come, let this blest assurance control, that Christ has regarded my helpless estate, and hath shed his own blood for my soul. (Refrain)
3. My sin, oh, the bliss of this glorious thought! My sin, not in part but the whole, is nailed to the cross, and I bear it no more, praise the Lord, praise the Lord, O my soul! (Refrain)
4. And, Lord, haste the day when my faith shall be sight, the clouds be rolled back as a scroll; the trump shall resound, and the Lord shall descend, even so, it is well with my soul. (Refrain)
Text: Horatio G. Spafford Music: Philip P. Bliss
------In 1871, tragedy struck Chicago as fire ravaged the city. When it was all over, 300 people were dead and 100,000 were homeless. Horatio Gates Spafford was one of those who tried to help the people of the city get back on their feet. A lawyer who had invested much of his money into the downtown Chicago real estate, he'd lost a great deal to the fire. And his one son (he had four daughters) had died about the same time. Still, for two years Spafford--who was a friend of evangelist Dwight Moody--assisted the homeless, impoverished, and grief-stricken ruined by the fire.
After about two years of such work, Spafford and his family decided to take a vacation. They were to go to England to join Moody and Ira Sankey on one of their evangelistic crusades, then travel in Europe. Horatio Spafford was delayed by some business, but sent his family on ahead. He would catch up to them on the other side of the Atlantic.
Their ship, the Ville de Havre, never made it. Off Newfoundland, it collided with an English sailing ship, the Loch Earn, and sank within 20 minutes. Though Horatio's wife, Anna, was able to cling to a piece of floating wreckage (one of only 47 survivors among hundreds), their four daughters--Maggie, Tanetta, Annie, and Bessie--were killed. Horatio received a horrible telegram from his wife, only two words long: "saved alone."
Spafford boarded the next available ship to be near his grieving wife, and the two finally met up with Dwight Moody. "It is well," Spafford told him quietly. "The will of God be done."
Though reports vary as to when he did so, Spafford was led during those days of surely overwhelming grief to pen the words to one of the most beautiful hymns we know, beloved by Christians lowly and great.
------The railroad train on which Mr. and Mrs. Bliss rode to their death left Buffalo, New York, on Friday afternoon, December 29, 1876. At eight o'clock that evening, while approaching Ashtabula station, and crossing a ravine, the bridge gave way, and the train, with its precious freight of human lives, was precipitated to the bottom. Fresh as is the memory of this horror in the minds of all, the newspaper accounts given at the time will be read now with renewed interest, and fittingly form a part of the record made in these pages...When the train fell, Mr. Bliss succeeded in crawling through a window, supposing he could pull his wife and children after him. But they were jammed fast and every effort of his was unavailing. The car was all jammed up, and the lady and her children were caught in the ironwork of the seats. Finding that he could not save them, he staid there with them and died.
Went there for a visit, most likely my last in a long time because of the gas involved. I wanted to get a good batch of pictures and videos to put together a presentation for them that highlighted more of their upgrades and equipment. Found Ray, Bob and a new member working on the yard modules of the club's portable layout. They were upgrading the turnouts from #4s to #6s and reconfiguring the yard throats and roundhouse area.
I have many pictures to post of this visit that I will show in the coming daze including a photo spread of Paul's scratchbuilt circus train and their new engine servicing facilities.
...in the 65' "Shortie" version, a compromise designed for the tight curves of smaller N scale layouts. The NYC never owned vista domes, the tunnels on eastern roads were mostly built in the early to late 1800s, making them too low for over height cars like these. Now that major upgrade work to the tunnels has been done because of the advent of double stack container trains, these could conceivably be run by Amtrak but, I wouldn't hold my breath.
...from about 1963 when Bowser bought out Penn Line. This beast weighs in at 2 1/2 pounds and sports the old fabricated brass frame and Pittman open frame motor. Note that the attention to prototype fidelity wasn't quite as strict back then as it was now---no bottom to the water tank or coal bunker in the tender.
Newcomer FYI---the easiest way to tell a Pennsylvania RR steam locomotive is by the Belpaire firebox, that boxy looking bulge on top of the boiler in front of the cab, it was pretty much exclusive to the PRR.
Still trying to find those blasted marker lights for just above the smoke box...they're around here somewhere I just know it...sigh...
Penn Line ad from Jan. '52 Model Railroader---could you imagine some dandy puffing a pipe in a hobby mag now?
(1) ---A Psalm of David.--- Fret not thyself because of evildoers, neither be thou envious against the workers of iniquity.
(2) For they shall soon be cut down like the grass, and wither as the green herb.
(3) Trust in the LORD, and do good; so shalt thou dwell in the land, and verily thou shalt be fed.
(4) Delight thyself also in the LORD; and he shall give thee the desires of thine heart.
(5) Commit thy way unto the LORD; trust also in him; and he shall bring it to pass.
(6) And he shall bring forth thy righteousness as the light, and thy judgment as the noonday.
(7) Rest in the LORD, and wait patiently for him: fret not thyself because of him who prospereth in his way, because of the man who bringeth wicked devices to pass.
(8) Cease from anger, and forsake wrath: fret not thyself in any wise to do evil.
(9) For evildoers shall be cut off: but those that wait upon the LORD, they shall inherit the earth.
(10) For yet a little while, and the wicked shall not be: yea, thou shalt diligently consider his place, and it shall not be.
(11) But the meek shall inherit the earth; and shall delight themselves in the abundance of peace.
(12) The wicked plotteth against the just, and gnasheth upon him with his teeth.
(13) The Lord shall laugh at him: for he seeth that his day is coming.
(14) The wicked have drawn out the sword, and have bent their bow, to cast down the poor and needy, and to slay such as be of upright conversation.
(15) Their sword shall enter into their own heart, and their bows shall be broken.
(16) A little that a righteous man hath is better than the riches of many wicked.
(17) For the arms of the wicked shall be broken: but the LORD upholdeth the righteous.
(18) The LORD knoweth the days of the upright: and their inheritance shall be for ever.
(19) They shall not be ashamed in the evil time: and in the days of famine they shall be satisfied.
(20) But the wicked shall perish, and the enemies of the LORD shall be as the fat of lambs: they shall consume; into smoke shall they consume away.
(21) The wicked borroweth, and payeth not again: but the righteous sheweth mercy, and giveth.
(22) For such as be blessed of him shall inherit the earth; and they that be cursed of him shall be cut off.
(23) The steps of a good man are ordered by the LORD: and he delighteth in his way.
(24) Though he fall, he shall not be utterly cast down: for the LORD upholdeth him with his hand.
(25) I have been young, and now am old; yet have I not seen the righteous forsaken, nor his seed begging bread.
(26) He is ever merciful, and lendeth; and his seed is blessed.
(27) Depart from evil, and do good; and dwell for evermore.
(28) For the LORD loveth judgment, and forsaketh not his saints; they are preserved for ever: but the seed of the wicked shall be cut off.
(29) The righteous shall inherit the land, and dwell therein for ever.
(30) The mouth of the righteous speaketh wisdom, and his tongue talketh of judgment.
(31) The law of his God is in his heart; none of his steps shall slide.
(32) The wicked watcheth the righteous, and seeketh to slay him.
(33) The LORD will not leave him in his hand, nor condemn him when he is judged.
(34) Wait on the LORD, and keep his way, and he shall exalt thee to inherit the land: when the wicked are cut off, thou shalt see it.
(35) I have seen the wicked in great power, and spreading himself like a green bay tree.
(36) Yet he passed away, and, lo, he was not: yea, I sought him, but he could not be found.
(37) Mark the perfect man, and behold the upright: for the end of that man is peace.
(38) But the transgressors shall be destroyed together: the end of the wicked shall be cut off.
(39) But the salvation of the righteous is of the LORD: he is their strength in the time of trouble.
(40) And the LORD shall help them, and deliver them: he shall deliver them from the wicked, and save them, because they trust in him.
..."copperheads" to those of us who've been in the hobby awhile, the older units from the 60s and 70s anyway. MRC has been a trusted source of power for model trains for a long time. When I first got into the hobby, you knew if a fellow modeler in the after school club was serious if you saw one of these peeking out from under their bench work. At 2-4 amperes output, one of these would send those can motored, flywheeled shelf queens from Kato squealing home to mama.
These are mine, they have their original boxes and paperwork and were purchased over the last 3 years as NIB items that were never used. Not bad for being 35-40 years old already, they provide all the power I will ever need.
---or---just say yes when someone asks you, "You want this European stuff I got in this box? I'm just gonna toss it."
Wrapped in a Sept. '56 newspaper, it ran after a couple of drops of Wahl Clipper oil were put on the commutator and motor bearings. The track was in excellent condition, the lot also included 12 tinplate freight cars and 4 passenger coaches. Even the lights worked after 50 years in storage, a testament to Marklin's workmanship.
Recently I came upon an intriguing hobby, paper card modeling. I've been amazed at what is available out there. I even know of one individual putting together a Union Pacific "Big Boy" kit.
...from the 1970s. They would provide you with all the basics for a kitbash, the rest was up to you. You could even build a static 2-4-4-2 saddletank logger from one of their kits and, of course, some enterprising sprite with a lot of talent powered one, outlined in the Jan./Feb. '87 Railroad Model Craftsman magazine. My plow was a partially built one found in a box lot that I finished with whatever kibbles and bits I could muster frm the scrap bin.
I don't know about you, but I'm ready for some snow...
(1) --To the chief Musician upon Gittith, A Psalm of David.-- O LORD our Lord, how excellent is thy name in all the earth! who hast set thy glory above the heavens.
(2) Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings hast thou ordained strength because of thine enemies, that thou mightest still the enemy and the avenger.
(3) When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars, which thou hast ordained;
(4) What is man, that thou art mindful of him? and the son of man, that thou visitest him?
(5) For thou hast made him a little lower than the angels, and hast crowned him with glory and honour.
(6) Thou madest him to have dominion over the works of thy hands; thou hast put all things under his feet:
(7) All sheep and oxen, yea, and the beasts of the field;
(8) The fowl of the air, and the fish of the sea, and whatsoever passeth through the paths of the seas.
(9) O LORD our Lord, how excellent is thy name in all the earth!
...the very thought of finding it on a vintage piece can stop a collector's heart. It came my way a couple weeks ago on this very nice Marklin 346/1 HO scale tinplate coach, a reminder of the first law of thermodynamics, entropy---matter tends to go from order to disorder. More on zinc pest can be found here and here.
Though these pieces were given to me, it is a constant reminder that my home and my treasure is not and should never be here.
Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal: But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal: For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.
...again, in a better, more scenic setting. I model in HOn30, a gauge that allows for the easy adaptation of N scale mechanisms, track and running gear for modeling narrow gauge railroading. The track also allows for the posing of N scale equipment in outdoor light.
April '77
February '70
Original ads from early Model Railroader magazines.
Shortly after I got back into the hobby, I realized that where the hobby was going and what I enjoyed about it were going on wildly diverging directions. The hobby has become very polished with excellent detail, exceptional running and rolling abilities and, with the advent of digital command control and better sound modules, as close to real as you can get in the scale of your choice.
I, on the other hand, just like model trains. I do very little real train watching and am content to run my models in circles for the most part. I am as pleased to own a mint condition, whacked out Tyco fantasy offering that barely stays on the track as I am a slick, well detailed Atlas car that, 35 years ago, could have copped a blue ribbon in a modeling contest.
I've always wanted one of these so I was especially pleased to have it come my way---and only for the price of postage. The blue paint is quite striking if not somewhat over the top. Offered from 1977-87, to find one that runs as well as this one is especially hard. I have a scrapped locomotive to help with the missing hand rail parts but other than that, it is complete and ready to go.
Oh...the color?
It's there for all to see...under all the black its previous owner put on it. ...sigh...
(1) Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.
(2) For by it the elders obtained a good report.
(3) Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear.
(4) By faith Abel offered unto God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain, by which he obtained witness that he was righteous, God testifying of his gifts: and by it he being dead yet speaketh.
(5) By faith Enoch was translated that he should not see death; and was not found, because God had translated him: for before his translation he had this testimony, that he pleased God.
(6) But without faith it is impossible to please him: for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him.
(7) By faith Noah, being warned of God of things not seen as yet, moved with fear, prepared an ark to the saving of his house; by the which he condemned the world, and became heir of the righteousness which is by faith.
(8) By faith Abraham, when he was called to go out into a place which he should after receive for an inheritance, obeyed; and he went out, not knowing whither he went.
(9) By faith he sojourned in the land of promise, as in a strange country, dwelling in tabernacles with Isaac and Jacob, the heirs with him of the same promise:
(10) For he looked for a city which hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God.
(11) Through faith also Sara herself received strength to conceive seed, and was delivered of a child when she was past age, because she judged him faithful who had promised.
(12) Therefore sprang there even of one, and him as good as dead, so many as the stars of the sky in multitude, and as the sand which is by the sea shore innumerable.
(13) These all died in faith, not having received the promises, but having seen them afar off, and were persuaded of them, and embraced them, and confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth.
(14) For they that say such things declare plainly that they seek a country.
(15) And truly, if they had been mindful of that country from whence they came out, they might have had opportunity to have returned.
(16) But now they desire a better country, that is, an heavenly: wherefore God is not ashamed to be called their God: for he hath prepared for them a city.
---"Let us plant ourselves on the hill of Zion and invite the world to come over to us, but never under any circumstances will we go over to them. The cross is the symbol of Christianity, and the cross speaks of death and separation, never of compromise. No one ever compromised with a cross. The cross separated between the dead and the living. The timid and the fearful will cry "Extreme!" and they will be right. The cross is the essence of all that is extreme and final. The message of Christ is a call across a gulf from death to life, from sin to righteousness and from Satan to God."---A.W.Tozer, The Set of the Sail
When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.
That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.
That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shown, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.
...gifts from a friend. I just love European equipment of all sorts, the pizza cutter flanges are second to none and a quick reminder to rivet counters that I don't take my hobby too seriously.
Just a Believer who happens to model trains on a very tight budget, providing a place to showcase my own model work as well as the work of others, regardless of type. Considerations for posting are always welcome. Please check out the modeling links I've put together as well...
Less than God could not have borne your sin so as to put it away; but the infinitely glorious Son of God did actually stoop to become a sin-bearer. I wonder how I can talk of it as I do.
It is a truth scarcely to be declared in words. It wants flame and blood and tears with which to tell this story of an offended God, the Heaven-Maker and the Earth-Creator, stooping from his glory that he might save the reptiles which had dared to insult his honor and to rebel against his glory; and, becoming one of them, to suffer for them, that without violation of his law he might have pity upon the offending things — things so inconsiderable that if he had stamped them all out, as men burn a nest of wasps, there had been no loss to the universe. But he had pity on them, and became one of them, and bare their sins. Oh, love ye him; adore ye him; let your souls climb up to the right hand of the majesty above, this morning, and there bow down in lowliest reverence and adoring affection, that he, the God over all, whom you had offended, should his own self bear our sins.
Though thus God over all, he became a man like unto ourselves; a body was prepared for him, and that body, mark you, not prepared alone, and made like to man but not of man. No, he was not otherwise fashioned than ourselves, he came into the world as we also come, born of a woman, a child of a mother, to hang upon a woman’s breast; not merely like to man, but man, born in the pedigree of manhood, and so bone of our bone and flesh of our flesh, yet without a taint of sin. And he, in that double nature but united person, was Jesus, Son of God and Son of the Virgin; he it was who “bare our sins in his own body on the tree.”
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "Death For Sin, And Death To Sin," delivered November 16, 1873.
Men, protect your daughters....
“Picture this: Some 17 year old snot nosed punk comes over to take out your daughter, and you say, 'No you aren't worthy of her.' (Immediately everyone is up in arms over your 'judgmental' and 'harsh' position, and for 'breaking your daughter’s heart.') Ok, so let's put it another way now: You have a beautiful, brand new $200,000 Ferrari Testarossa in front of your house, and a snot nosed 17 year old punk comes over to take it for a spin. Would you hand him the keys? See, what your problem is, is that you value a car more than your daughter. Men, protect your daughters!”
My sole purpose for this blog is to lift up the Gospel of Jesus Christ and Him Crucified on a no nonsense, no ad platform showcasing my work and the work of other modelers, and to practice my hobby with the world behind me, the Cross before me and Kingdom of God in sight. All Scripture is quoted from the King James Version of the Bible as I have found on my own that there is none more faithful to the original languages. Unless otherwise noted, all text and photographs are mine. Old ads and product reviews are respectfully posted in good faith that any copyright privileges are not being infringed upon, with no intent to profit or disparage in any way and will be removed upon request of their respective holders.
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