Model Railroading

Curiously, one side effect of me playing lots of Red Dead Redemption 2 is that I've rediscovered my interest in model railroading.  RDR2 does have, of course, a number of railroads, train stations and stops, etc. although that's hardly the focus of the game.  But something about it has sparked my reminiscences of thinking that one day I'd have that as a hobby when I had the money and time to do so (that still hasn't happened.  But maybe it still will, sometime.)

I also really like the fanciful yet believable names of places in RDR that remind me a lot of the fanciful yet believable names of fantasy model railroads like the famous ones that people still talked about when I was a kid, like John Allen's Gorre & Daphetid or John Armstrong's punnish names on his railroad too.

And I had several books that I bought at the hobby store not far from my house; when I was younger and had free time, most notably during the summer, I'd walk or ride my bike the few blocks to the Townshire shopping center and explore the Waldenbooks and the hobby store.  My favorite of all of the railroads that I ever read about, and one that I'd like to emulate in many ways, was the modestly sized yet fabulous looking Jerome & Southwestern by John Olson; originally done merely on a 4x8; the classic "beginner's" layout, but with a 2x6 extension added later that created a somewhat L-shaped layout, it is not only a great idea of how a beginner can do something pretty cool, but how he could add on to it.

Ideally, I'd do two 4x8s, with a different scenic vibe to each (western mountain vs red rock desert, maybe) in two corners of the room, with a 2xwhatever connector to keep them running smoothly as a single layout.  And it could eventually be added on to even more with another 4x8 in another corner (maybe representing a rural south, with a large port city too?) assuming I had a big enough room.  That would end up having become a significant sized layout, but built in modular format as several "beginner" layouts that are interconnected.

Like John Olson, I'd probably feature Great Depression era small-town frontier, western themes, I'd focus on fantasy and compression rather than excessive realism (like RDR in this regard too, I'll add) although I won't be nearly quite so whimsical as some of the classic modelers did.

Anyway, that's probably a pipe dream.  If I'm already 47 and have no plans to get started with this (maybe when my last son moves out in a couple of years, I can talk about converting the basement?) and honestly, I haven't done much with the hobby other than buy a few pieces of rolling stock and some kits and paint and weather them when I was younger, so the idea that I'd make it one of my major hobbies suddenly is probably not really realistic.  But every once in a while I sit back and think about what might have been.

Anyway, I found a place that has scans of what I think are all of the color photos released for this in the page of Model Railroader.  Not that I read them there, but I got the "fixed up" version of the articles converted into a book, Building an HO Model Railroad With Personality.  I really should dig that sucker back out one of these days.  I think I know where it is, but it's a bit of a pain to get to.

Not the Jerome & Southwestern, but some similarly themed images from John Olson's other projects.

And finally, I can't find a scan of the track plan from the book that's high enough resolution to be useful, but here's the plan redrawn for n-scale with a different scenic layout in two different variants.  The first is a bit more true to the original; the second is a bit "warped" although it's still the same basic layout.  The track plan itself, however, I believe to be same.

Does not include the Back Alley & Wharf RR extension.