Hello from Alaska

[WadleySouthern]

My first railroad memory is seeing the Wadley Southern still in steam in Swainsboro, GA from my grandfather's shoulders somewhere around '53 or so. Had a 4 x 8 with the kind of cheap crap you could afford in rural Georgia in the late-50s, early '60s. Got out of school, moved to Atlanta and discovered money. Had a 4 x 6 N-Scale, the double-tracked one from the old Atlas book. Sold it all when I moved to Alaska in '74 but along the way had discovered HO brass and structure kits that came in shiny red boxes and yellow boxes with black print. Didn't sell those and still have all that stuff that the now-ex didn't make off with just because she knew I liked it.

You have to be pretty well off in AK to have a house with enough room for railroading so I limited my railroading to showing up at the club a little. Work just became too demanding and the stuff just stayed in boxes in the garage. I'm retired now and have a spare room that might make for a decent layout room, so I feeling my way back into the hobby - but God how it has changed!

[tootnkumin]

Originally Posted by WadleySouthern

I'm retired now and have a spare room that might make for a decent layout room, so I feeling my way back into the hobby - but God how it has changed!

Ain't that the truth, but (and your story has echoes in mine) I think this is also the most exciting time in model railroading for those of us that may not be so well endowed with detailing skills with the manufacturers doing most of it for us (even though we might have to go over them and glue all those detail bits to make sure they don't fall off)

I wish we'd had all that and DCC + sound back in the 50's.