Maine Garden Railway Society Annual Outing Held on Saturday, July 25, 2015

We had a fine time at  our annual outing this past Saturday at the Overlook Garden Railway in Buxton, hosted by Carl and Pat Churchill. It was cloudy in the morning, and the sun came out around mid-afternoon.

On arrival you saw some well-known helpers at the gate
-Mac MacMillan for parking and moving things in
-Terry Norton for check-in, voting, and door prize tickets
-Art Handman selling raffle tickets for the very nice railroad quilt made by Sue Hoffman
-Ernie Packard selling tickets for the 50/50 raffle

Entering the Annual Outing

Then you could move on to coffee,  talk "garden railway" with friends, check out the auction items, and take a look at Norman Waycott's circus display. He has some new 2 'x 2' modules this year, and we may have as many as 14 at this year's Holiday Train Display.

looks a lot like Entering the Circus

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Lunch started coming out to the coolers, and the call was made to line up. We had the usual excellent meal with lots of choices and  additional courses announced as they arrived. Thanks to Pat Churchill  Sue Norton, Sue Hoffman,  Donna Latino Ellie Garth, Heidi Mills,  Robin Goodrich and others who helped and brought food for this potluck.
 
Then it was Auction Time! The semi-famous comedy auction team of Terry Norton and Frank Howard took us through bidding and laughing about the items and the crowd. They were ably assisted by designated hecklers Donna and Bob Latino. During the auction there were drawings for the Door Prize, Railroad Quilt and 50/50 Raffle. Those tickets were drawn by Deidre Libby. A secondary  market for some items, notably metal signs, developed during the auction. The auctioneers also bid on items they were trying to sell, and some starting bids were less than what the auctioneers were asking. Just another part of the fun! Thanks to  Mary Garland who recorded the bid number of each auction item winner

Terry Selling a Small House

Frank Talking Up the Price on a Grab Bag

Raffle Winners
-Door Prizes John Sharp, Art Handman, John Middleton, Phil Lentz
-Railroad Quilt: Phil Sypek
-50/50 Raffle: Art Handman

Desserts were offered just before and during the auction. The crowd of MGRS members could not fully conquer the endless dessert table. Maybe we should auction the desserts next year!!

A brief Business Meeting was held after the Auction.
1. In this morning's balloting, officers and directors were re-elected with one exception.  Tiny Lee has chosen to leave the board of directors, and Norman Waycott has replaced him.
2. Jeff Jacobs spoke briefly about the Maine Layout Tour coming up on September 19-20. Scott Gould is participating.  More information has been posted on the blog.

After adjourning the business meeting, it was time for the auction winners to line up and pay up for their winnings, and for everyone to say goodbye and head for home. Some cars had trouble fitting the riders back in around all that auction loot....