Lionel Days

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I still have some of the old catalogs from when I was a kid and I can remember how I loved searching through all the pages and studying the advertisements with great detail! I could spend hours dreaming about things in the catalog.   It was fun.  Many of us had our introduction to model trains when we were young and it has stayed with us over the years.   Jeff's open house got me thinking about my old layouts again.   If I can make it, I would love to see his trains run.  I think he said that he can run 5 or 6 at once.  It sounds like an excellent way to start off the new year.  Thanks Jeff for inviting us.  By the way, look at those prices from 1954. Wow!!  Talk about the good old days.

Easy Pic

 We have taken lots of pictures of this years train display.  Here is a quick and easy way to scroll down and go through them quickly.

Start by Clicking Here:
   

hey John, did you include this person as one of the helpers today?

Take Down Day!

 
I counted twenty different members who showed up early the day after Christmas to help take down the layout in Center Court at the Maine Mall  Thursday morning.  With incredible teamwork . . . Zap!!!  3 hours later I took the picture below:  Amazing!

Special Thank you for following members:  Carl, Mac, Mike B, Tiny, Art, Phil, Mike T, Terry, Sue, John M, Jeff, Maurice, Dennis, Dave F, Ernie P, Scott, Norm, Paul, John J and one unrecognized man (maybe Santa Claus).

Maine Garden Railway Society wishes everyone a

   

Thank you to all the people who stopped by to see the trains run during the 2013 display.  We are sorry that we have to say goodbye for now to the many viewers who enjoyed this years show.  This was our fourth consecutive year at the Maine Mall and tomorrow we will pick up the track as the Mall needs to get ready for 2014.  So as we conclude another very successful and happy season we would like to pause and thank the public.  The MGRS members greatly enjoy taking part in this show.  But,  it is the enthusiastic response and the appreciative comments  from you, the viewers that makes it so worthwhile!  

  Thank you to the many people we had the chance to meet.  
Wishing you all a very
Merry Christmas from the Maine Garden Railway Society. 
  

Channel 8 at five and ten PM tonight

The News Crew was in today taping the Mall Train Display.  They told Carl it would be on tonight at 5PM and at 10PM.  

Nice Fit!

  Scott's pictures always look like Christmas Cards.  Here is an interesting one.
 " One nice thing about the Bachmann track is that the ties fit perfectly into Lionel’s No. 280 Standard Gauge bridge.  The width is also just right for g gauge cars.  Here’s a picture. "

Thanks Scott!  Merry Christmas

From the Gorham Times

  This appeared in the Gorham Times last week.  Spotted and sent into us by Doug Johnson.  You will need to click on the image to make it large enough to read.  Thanks!

Along the same lines:  Mike told Carl that Channel 13 was in today to take a lot of pictures of the layout.  Keep a lookout on the news.  We may see something about the Mall display.

Christmas Kids

When Carl Churchill and John Jackson first tossed around the idea of a train display at Christmas time, they were thinking of days gone by when they were kids and stared wide-eyed at train displays in big Department stores.  Christmas of course has a deeper meaning than electric trains, but all of us were ourselves once Christmas kids, and what fun it was to see the Mall so full of Christmas kids watching trains today.  Here are just a few, assisted in the morning shift by Mike Cury, Dick Rubin, Ben Jewitt, Jake Brewer, Sarah Sherman, and Scott Gould.  Hunk Erskine, Terry and Sue Norton, and Carl and Pat Churchill joined the fun in the afternoon.  A wonderful time for all of us.

Confirmed Winner!

Carl just called and we have a confirmed winner for the Percy Train raffle.  He just spoke with the mother of a family of four.  They have two sons ages 3 and 4.  That is the perfect winner for a Thomas train!   Awesome!  The father will pick it up on Monday from Carl at the display and have it just in time for setting it up for Christmas.  That is great news!

And the lucky winner is S.J. from Bath, Me.

  A large box containing thousands of raffle names hoping to win a G scale Thomas's friend "Percy" train was gathered together today by Carl, Mac, and Phil under the direction of the Mall to pick a winner.  A gentleman was chosen at random to reach in and make the selection.

The winner still needs to be verified by responding to the Mall e-mail which was sent early this afternoon.  If she does then S.J. from Bath, Maine is the lucky winner. A runner-up was also picked and if necessary they will be notified.

                                                                                     Today marked the 40th day of the Maine Mall train display.  After Christmas is over the layout will be taken down and returned to its owners.  Much of it will go back to Buxton Maine where Carl Churchill MGRS president operates his own outdoor railroad.  It serves as the home base for meetings, outings, picnics and trail rides with land owned by Carl and Mac.  A dozen different groups benefit all summer long from these and other activities of the Maine Garden Railway Society.
     

WW&F ~ Victorian Christmas ~ Saturday 12/21 Combine real trains with the fun of G-scale

December 21:   Victorian Christmas.              
Museum grounds open 9am - 5pm                        
Steam and Diesel trains 11am - 4pm.                     
 Sleigh (or wagon) Rides 11am - 3pm.                   
The Museum thanks its supporters, neighbors    ,  
 and community with train rides, a horse-drawn    
 sleigh/wagon, and Santa Claus.                            
NOTE: This is a FREE event, but donations        
are gratefully accepted.                                             

         

Eric will be setting up a G-scale track at the WW&F for running trains right there in the engine house.  All are welcome, steam, battery, and electric if you bring along a transformer.  The real trains will be in operation too.  Free train rides for all are run all day on the full scale main line!   All welcome to join the celebration of WW&F  Victorian Christmas!

The WW&F runs its annual Victorian Christmas trains on Saturday December 21st all day...

I will have a track set up in Bay 3 in the engine house. For some model steam fun.  I hope you guys can come and run along side the real thing!  All train rides are free, both model and full scale!  Dress warm as the engine house is not heated.  there will be a heated space though where we can warm up and service our little dragons!  give me a shout for more information!  Also, check out the links below:  

Photos of WW&F Engines 

WW&F Home Page

Day-37 Trains at the Mall

Tuesday was an easy day at the Mall.  I ran the "standard" trains that are run the most.  The only thing I fixed was to replace the switch box on the Sawmill track so the little engine goes back and forth on two different routes.  I even took a ride on the escalator.  See video:  

And thank you to Sue and Terry for the pictures!  

John at the mall

Mr Jackson is always there with a smile and a word of encouragement. Thank you.

Veterans Visit MGRS at the Maine Mall

 Carl made sure Santa was there to meet each Veteran with a special "Hello and Thank you". 



Maine Mall management made sure they had hot chocolate and chairs to sit down and enjoy the train display and the concert.    

 MGRS presented a large screen TV with a built in Disk Player to the Veterans.  The Mall added a nice set of 48 Classic Movies and all time favorites for them to enjoy. Brian is shown accepting on behalf of the Veterans

Many MGRS members were on hand to meet and greet the Veterans who are also very familiar to us from their summer outings and trail rides at Carl's. 

There was plenty of singing and laughing as everyone enjoyed the music and song.

They were toe tapping and "dancing in the aisles".   There was even requests for more hot chocolate.     

Don Campbell a well known local entertainer put on a great performance especially designed for the Veterans at Christmas time.

Don also served as Master of Ceremonies as well as providing great entertainment.  

The Veterans enjoyed their visit and had a very good time. Thanks to them, the Maine Mall, Don Campbell and Maine Garden Railway Society for putting this all together.  Merry Christmas to all! 

See video of the events of the day!  Click here:

   

Stormin' Norman

Norm Waycott beat the storm this morning and managed to open the Mall display within one minute of the scheduled time.  Yeah, Norman.  Could be the discipline he learned from 33 years delivering the mail.  Or maybe from one of the other forty-seven jobs Norman has had since the 1950's, from handling snakes to working circuses.  In fact, the circus layout at the Mall is Norman's handiwork, including any number of circus wagons he has either kitbashed or scratchbuilt.  The wagons are especially fun to see because they are accurate models or equipment Norm has seen and used. Here he's showing two of the most intricate cars in his collection.  Thanks for being there for us, Norman.

Reminder ~ Monday Dec 16th Veterans Visit

 At 10am Monday morning the Maine Veterans Home of Scarborough will arrive to visit MGRS at the Maine Mall.   They will be met out by the Food Court entrance and escorted down to the display where there will be a place for them to sit down and enjoy the display, receive Christmas presents from MGRS and be entertained with songs and music by Don Campbell.   There may even be a surprise guest.  Please come and join us as we hope for a good turnout of MGRS members to help wish the Veterans a Merry Christmas.

Possible pin to commemorate this year at the Mall

It may be to simple.  But I wanted to stress the fact it was our fourth year,  plus indicate the actual year, show the "Maine Mall sign" emblem and emphasize our own Logo.  2 pin holders would be good to hold it in place.
If you feel creative, please go ahead and experiment with  "Paint" program.  You can click and copy a picture of anything to paste in as part of your design.  Andy can turn any drawing into a pin or a patch.

After another successful display we need a little reminder of how good it was.  This year we were cut back to 'only' 44 days.  10 hrs a day is quite an accomplishment.  But we seem to have the secret!  

Day-34 Saturday at the Mall

 A busy Saturday,  Bill & Robin have planned to stay overnight to ride out our first big snowstorm.  Bill was joined by Carl and Mac this morning as a big crowd was in the Mall today.    There was one special little boy who showed me exactly what needed fixing!   He was very smart and really cute to watch.  Plus he new what he was talking about!  Sharp eyed he noticed the Amtrak was running through its station stop.  And he noticed the flashing signal was not working properly!   I had to take his picture.  Then the  MGRS crew went right to work to remedy the problems and they got them all fixed!  Nice work men.  Good thing you could respond so well.

In the afternoon Hunk and Sue and Terry came in and they went right to work.  It was fun to see so many people and everyone wanted to talk about the layout or trains and so many stories make the time fly by.  I think this has been one of the best years and personally I have enjoyed it more than ever.

It seems like there are more people who are more interested in what we are doing.  

There are more pictures added to the Slideshow and I have a short video of clips from the past two days.  Please click here:

Day-33 Maine Mall Road Trip

Day-33 at the Mall was a busy day.  Dave and Grace got everything running in the AM.  Dave noticed the Amtrak coach was uncoupling so he reversed the car and that solved the problem.  I guess a tree had fallen over onto the track of the elevated loop and caused another problem.  Gremlins I guess?  Murphy's law was demonstrated when the Gondola ride just happen to stop where the Caboose top could hit it. I thought it was the Friday the 13th curse, but Dave fixed it with the press of a button.





We were having fun but Grace ignored are play and spent her time talking seriously to people.  It was a fun day.

Then in the early PM  Bill and Robin pulled into Center Court with a gigantic load of trains fresh off a road trip from Cape Cod!   They are amazing as they travel the long distance and come up every year to support the Mall Train Show.  Not only that but Bill takes tremendous videos and pictures and has made official videos of our show each year.

They will be handling the layout this evening and be back in again tomorrow morning!  Thank you both very much you are another example of our great members and we love your enthusiasm!