| . . . through the Heart of Texas |
|
|
| Fast Freight to or from your dock |
New developments for the
Brazos
Valley Railways . . .
in addition to stuff to
Buy, Sell, Trade (scroll to the bottom),
...or
just talk.
Everything rolling is N-scale.
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Found
a place for my very own model railroad after being confined to arm-chair modeling for 58 years. If you
don't already know, arm-chair modeling means all you get to do is read about railroading and modeling. So, while moving
my day-job support stuff about 3 years ago, I saw (for the very first time) a 38-foot-long space on my steel
storage shelves, screaming to me,
" Look!!! Build your very own N-scale railroad here!!! "
The Finest New Hobby Shop in North Texas:
Gerry's Greenville Hobby Depot
.
| Necessary storage for day-job |
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| I fround a place for the Brazos Valley Railway in my cave. |
| Honoring the Railroad Fallen Flags of Southwest |
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| Dick Burt, named at birth: Franklin Richard Burt, one of six in family line named Franklin. |
| Kato Unitrack laid for all rails. |
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| My actual experience on the Texas & Pacific Railway had long, flat, nearly level track surfaces. |
Now here is what I have for a good time
on the N-scale Brazos Valley Railways in my Storage Shed, and a bit about my travels around the Southwestern
U.S.A.
I was born in Little Rock, Arkansas, in
the evening shadow of the State Capitol. Times were extremely hard, for this was the middle of The Great Depression, following the Stock
Market Crash of 1929. My father was an outstanding telegrapher with Postal Telegraph, but Postal's bankruptcy
put him out looking for any work that would sustain us. Odd-jobs came and went, often as low as 19-cents per hour.
When he found work with the Cotton Belt, he became a member of the Engineering Department's surveying
crew, keeping the railroad where it belonged. Dad liked the work and the men with whom he shared the ticks, chiggers,
and mosquitoes.
My grandfather was a Car Man for the Cotton
Belt, so I had two elders now working on the railroad. In the late 1930s, the Navy was preparing for war, and a
full Commander from New Orleans came to find my father, for Dad was known as an excellent click-click telegrapher
and was also a licensed amateur radio operator, W5EGX, meaning that he knew both of the Morse codes.
My grandfather and father often took me
with them around town, and to the Pine Bluff Cotton Belt Shops and Yard, where I saw erection of some of the
first ten 4-8-4 Northern L-1 class steam engines. I was impressed. Everything about those huge engines was
interesting, and I liked them very much.
The railroads were never far away in my
childhood, ...and I was hooked on trains: Saint Louis-Southwestern Railway (Cotton Belt - Pine Bluff),
Missouri Pacific Railway (MoP - Pine Bluff & Little Rock), and the Rock Island (Little
Rock) could be seen and heard morning, noon, and night.
The Navy moved us to New Orleans
before World War-II started. Our Naval duplex apartment was only about 40 yards from the New Orleans Belt Railway
connection that ran across City Park, past Higgins PT Boat plant on the Bayou Saint John, and parallel with Florida Avenue.
We had a live experience of the "railroad running through the middle of our house."
I prefer to model the steam-era into the steam-to-diesel
transition following World War-II, from about 1920 to about 1950-ish. I have always been facinated by the action
of the drive rods and monkey motion. Instead of a gleaming silver streamliner, my fondest memory was a hand full
of Pullman-green heavyweight passenger cars behind a high-stepping Cotton Belt Big Six USRA Ten-wheeler, built by Baldwin.
We rode Missouri Pacific heavyweight passenger trains, and long heavyweight passenger trains behind Southern Pacific's 4-8-4
GS-1s (to and from California in 1945). I never saw Cotton Belt pulling reefers in their head-end revenue cars, but
my earliest memories of a typical passenger train were heavyweight, non-air-conditioned cars, until arrival of the American
Flyer air-conditioned cars in 1937. An up-grade in passenger power arrived with some refurbished
Florida East Coast 4-8-2 mountain engines during World War-II. The service men and women had to be moved,
in great numbers.
| Rock Island FA |
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| Classic heavywght Passenger trains. |
| Trains run over rolling hills; not around them. |
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| BNSF near Bellview, Texas |
| Blue Texas Norther |
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| When the cloudy sky to the north turns dark blue, head for cover; it will be cold very soon. |
I thought that a Rock Island heavyweight passenger
train would be excellent for riding the rails around theEast Loop. Back in 1963, I commuted from Houston to Dallas
every Friday evening to be home with my family, and rode the Burlington's Texas Zephyr back to work on Sunday evening.
Right now, I have a Bachmann 4-8-2 light Mountain engine to pull one of my heavyweight trains, representing The
Valley Route from Fort Worth and Dallas to Houston. These trains were the modern railways from the
original Trinity and Brazos Valley Rialway, founded not long after the War between the States was
settled in the mid-19th Centurty.
Greg Nevels and I traded some rolling stock.
Now, a Rock Island E-8 pulls this train. I put some more effort into this idea, and three passenger trains are
running now.
| Light Mountain 4-8-2 with typical 1920-1930 train. |
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| This was the East Loop, 2 years ago, when I started. |
My plain old flat-top railroad was okay to
get some trains running, but the model railroading rag journalists keep enticing us to detail the layout so it looks something
like what we may see in and around a real railroad.
| Foam packing used as a hill. |
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| The East Loop, perfect place for a hill. |
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So, I chose to try setting a house on a hill with trees all around it to enhance
the sight of a train "comin' round the mountain, when she comes."
I collect stuff, all kinds of stuff, that
might help the scenery on the BVR. So,
a glob of plastic foam came one day packed around some speaker drivers for a fine new digital organ system, and it fit in
the middle of the East Loop. Kuh-PLOPP.!!!
.
| East Loop Hill with house and trees |
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| This is the same hill as shown on the left. Looks much better now. |
This scene shows my first experiment with a house
on a hill, trees all around it, and a rocky edge made of real Texas sedimentary crystaline rock. The trees will provide
shade for the family living there. As the work developes in the futue, I will add animals, a tractor, car, truck,
people, a barn, (maybe) an out-house, and a road down to the main level west of this scene. Improvements are always possible,
even for those who build museum-quality scenery.
| Area of railroading interest |
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| I grew up in the South and Southwest, from the Mississippi River to Albuquerque. |
I do not know exactly what captivated
me about "...going west," but a half-dozen of my friends at church went to investigate Hardin-Simmons University in Abilene,
Texas. Their reports inspired me, and, without having set foot on campus, I thought "that's for me." Thoughts
of University of Arkansas or Ouachita College faded, and I set my mind on ". . . goin' to Texas."
At age 17, with $25.00 cash in my pocket, and a one-way
ticket from New Orleans, Louisiana, to Abilene, Texas, I left on a Texas and Pacific passenger train for Hardin-Simmons
University on the promise of a scholarship and an on-campus job, choosing to cast my lot with Texas and her people.
I Spent six very fine years in Abilene and married a wonderful woman, with whom I have lived for 58
years. We have four grown children, and several grand children. The pioneering mentality of the people in west
central Texas was very refreshing to me, for a person was accepted at face value, unless we proved ourselves otherwise.
I like these people.
Texas provides a wide variety of flatlands, gently
rolling hills, small bumpy hills, butes, and, in the trans-Pecos region, we have some real mountains. In the BNSF picture
(above), the railroad Fort Worth and Denver City builders chose to lay the rails in a straight line across the prairies
south of the Red River, and the trains ran over the hills, but they built minimal fills and cuts to keep
the grades reasonable. The trains often look like caterpillars, hump-backing over the changing landscape. N-scale gives
us a good option to be more prototypical in modeling long, straight tracks. While moving a substantial inventory
from one storage unit to another, I discovered that I had room to build a rather long N-scale model railroad through
the shelves at 3-feet above the floor. Sharing the space with my day-job vocational storage needs, the shelf space is
about 40 feet from one end to the other, and then I made room for a 36-inch diameter loop on each end, giving
about 2 N-scale miles of mainline and room for a double-ended yard and passenger stations, businesses to serve, and facilities
to service the engines and rolling stock. In my opinion, this is a bit more like prototype railroading where tracks
were laid where they could be or had to be.
Fresh out of high school in 1951 and enrolled
in Hardin-Simmons University, I heard many stories of the changing weather patterns in west Texas, among them the Blue
Texas Norther, often accompanied by a swiftly blowing wall of dust. My first true encounter was on a Sunday
afternoon in Abilene (mid-May 1952), when one of those dust storms blew into town with a howl, and we could not see more than
about 30 feet through the windshield of our car. As soon as we arrived at the church where we would lead in worship that
evening, the first order of business was to turn on the heaters. It was suddenly very cold.
Dust storms differed from Blue Texas Northers only
in that the wind was laden with thick dust; thick like a San Francisco early morning fog. While I may muse about having a
dust or sand storm on a model railroad, I can tell you that a Blue Texas Norther can still happen at my Storage
Shed, and when it turns cold, I retreat into arm-chair modeling mode in the comforts of our home in Garland. We had a wet
winter, but it's spring now, and I find that the warming days feel good to my bones. I retreat to the house
to stay cool from summer heat or warm in sudden Blue Texas Northers, and my cardiologist approves.
| Blue Streak Fast Freight - Cotton Belt 1931 |
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| Blue Streak Fast Freight began with LCL cargo; first for all railroads; a top priority-named train. |
| Mortive Power in the Yard |
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| Modeling era is from 1920 to 1960-ish. |
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Brazos
Valley Railways
...through the Heart of Texas
Post Office Box 450522
Garland, TX
75045
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I have been digging to make a reasonable
replica of the Cotton Belt's very early Fast Freight, 1931, ...when they introduced Less-than-CarLoad (LCL)
overnight freight service from Saint Louis. Over-night deliveries began in southeastern Missouri, northeastern
Arkansas, and on down to Pine Bluff. This was the first railroad to offer LCL services, causing quite a stir
from other railroads. The U.S. Highway System was still a future-convenience for much of the land west of the Mississippi
River. So, Cotton Belt set up the Southwestern Transportation Company to deliver
from the freight depots to their Missouri and Arkansas merchants early the next day.
The Fast Freight was an instant
success, and later became the Blue Streak Merchandise (BSM), a freight train with top priority on the
mainline, rivaling the famous passenger trains of other railroads. After Southern Pacific acquired control of
Cotton Belt, fast freight from Saint Louis, Memphis, and New Orleans expedited delivery service to Arkansas and Texas,
and expanded quickly with priority through-trains to southern California.
I plan to gradually build the BSM
on the Brazos Valley Railway, based on documentation in Fred Frailey's "Blue Streak Merchandise,"
pulled by Cotton Belt's "Big Six" Ten-wheeler 659 with 13 box cars of LCL merchandise.
This first Blue Streak Fast Freight makes an interesting priority named-train for my
Brazos Valley Railway, and will keep it as one of the feature trains. Bachmann came out with a 19-th Century ten-wheeler.
Now that I have seen it, I will "cheat" and substitute the Bachmann 2-8-0 consolidation. This engine looks
much more like the real Cotton Belt ten-wheelers, so enjoy this bend in realism. The Baldwin Consolidation is only
6 inches longer than the Baldwin 4-6-0 Ten Wheelers would be if scaled down properly, and you can't see that little bit of
difference from more than 3 feet away.
Back to the mid-1930s, when we needed
to go somewhere (Arkansas), we took a train. Roads were poor, at best, and the paved U.S. Highways were just beginning
to move through our part of the country. Cotton Belt had their hospital in Texarkana, and we went there for our care,
as needed.
When we moved to New Orleans in 1941,
we rode Missouri Pacific from Pine Bluff, through Monroe, Alexandria, and on to the west bank in Algiers. A T&P
ferry carried us across to the T&P and MoP station. Their passenger trains resembled the models that I am running
on the Brazos Valley Railway today. I am pleased with how "long" a 10-car passenger train appears on the Brazos
Valley Railway.
In 1963, I commuted weekly between Dallas
and Houston via the Burlington and Rock Island railroads. The Rock Island was still running their heavyweight passenger cars,
with some of the finest soup and steaks ever prepared for hungry men in the diner.
Now, take a look at my Storage Shed (top
of page). A long shelf at the 3-foot level offers a space that is somewhat prototypical, straight and mostly
smooth grade transitions, where trains travel many miles just to get to the next town. So, my emphasis is set: make
the Brazos Valley Railway look like a small Texas junction town; not a well-equipped division point. I have
the privilege of running trains typical of the Cotton Belt (SSW), MoP, T&P,
Santa Fe, Katy, Frisco, T&NO (SP), Fort Worth
& Denver (Burlington), Rock Island, etc., from about 1920 up though 1965-ish, and any other
era, if I "feel like it."
I like to experiment with ideas.
My shelf railroad mainline is 1 (one) N-scale mile long, end to end. By having the track laid in a continuous loop,
this means any train dispatched on the mainline can run 2 N-scale miles before it gets back to where it started.
In the back of my mind, I may eventually elevate a second loop to really get the feeling of time and space.
Look at the photo of BNSF freight
on the mainline (top of page) from Fort Worth to Amarillo (formerly Fort Worth and Denver City RR). The rolling
hills were crossed by the 19th Century railroaders in an almost straight line, wherever possible. It was their objective
to connect Denver with the ports on the Gulf of Mexico via central Texas quickly. The roadbed followed the
level of the widely spaced "little" rolling hills. This is a fairly good representation of the nature of many railroads
in Texas. Sometimes, it is less expensive to maintain the original roadbed level than to build deep cuts and
high fills.
I learned a lot about how important it
is to have smooth transitions between the joints of Kato's sectional Unitrack. Misalignment
of the rail in the joiners can cause top-of-rail "breaks." These sudden, abrupt changes of the railhead-level
may only be 1/32-inch. Not much, but it can be compared with a difference on a prototype railhead-level of 3 to 6 inches,
...or more, proportionally much greater than allowed on a real railroad.
The engines buck when they run over the
railhead-level breaks, and sometimes, they lurch enough that the pony wheels run off the track. The pony
wheels don't always jump off, but I can hear the buzz of the pony trucks on the ties.
A mostly "flat" model railroad is a much
simpler hobby than having one that has lots of grades, as in Wes Carr's BNSF photograph above. However, to get
the roadbed and track-level aligned in much smaller spaces, hills are a challenge for almost all N-scale engines due
to lack of wheel-traction. For the sectional track joints, 1/64th or 1/16-inch (actual measurement in inches) is a huge bump
or drop in the top of the railhead. I will make smooth grade transitions in the railtop level, but to allow
slight grades up or down over 4 to 8 linear feet to introduce some realism. A truly "flat" small-scale railroad
with smooth rail-rop level is much more difficult to build than I first assumed.
Screwing the track sections to
the topboard is possible, but I enjoy rearranging the layout to see how my ideas look with my own eyes. My base-board is now
stabilized and I topped some of with pink foam, 1/2-inch and
1-inch. Ground top levels will be varied above
the roadbed, but I don't have much room to cut below the roadbed for the way the Brazos Valley Railway looks in
N-scale.
Lots of folks have offered practical
suggestions. Thanks. Will continue to work all ideas into my mind to resolve what works best in my Storage Shed.
The hardboard (masonite) is still there
(brown color), but I now have a layer of Hardie-board on top (blanched limestone color), ...but not screwed down. By
letting the Hardie-board "float," it provides grades with very little variation in short distances. So far, the
results with the Hardie-board are satisfactory enough that I may keep it at this level for "ground zero." I added
pink foam to the loops and some of the other places in between.
Finding hobby space in a work-related
storage shed is an idea that may benefit many wannabee model railroaders. We all need storage space at home, but we may have
glamorized model railroading into an idea that captures whole rooms in our houses.
Reconsider what I have done. I must
have the storage space for my day job. So, by having many shelves, 9 feet high and 40 feet long, reserving
the third shelf from the floor in these knock-together steel racks is a small space to place a model railroad. The
height is perfect for my padded roll-around desk chair. The rent is paid for other reasons; not my hobby. My stuff is
stacked and safe, the Brazos Valley Railway is coming together, and I can keep my promise to the cardiologist, ...you know,
to "rest" when I get winded from "working" in the Storage Shed. <grins>
After being an arm-chair modeler for
60 years, having the trains gives me a restful, recreational advantage in the Storage Shed.
My residential garage space needs a major
overhaul, and by using knock-together shelving at home, I may have an improved amount of storage space and
a model railroad, too. Still thinking about how this could happen with my wife's cooperative approvals, etc.
My essential three R's:
Remove, Re-assemble, and Re-arrange available storage space to gain recreation time and place. Then, maybe my
rented Storage Shed could be returned and my overhead substantially reduced. <saving $$$> How's
that for an alliteration?
Browse through the new pictures, ...and
don't forget that I have some stuff to trade or sell now and then.
Dick
F. Richard Burt
Brazos Valley Railway
...through the Heart of Texas
.
The Brazos Valley Railway is a free-lance
cross-section of Texas railroading from about 1920 to 1950-ish (just ignore pictures with modern diesels in
them). Most emphasis will be on steam railroading, but the fulfillment of this idea is still very much in my head.
This modeling effort began while
moving my storage and work shed into a different, smaller space. After the knock-together shelving was in place, I saw
(for the first time, ever, ...picture at top of page) that all of the shelves aligned horizontally pretty much as I placed
them. The vertical support-joints were all at the 36-inch level, and this looked good. So, ...why not? It is now the
place of the new N-scale Brazos Valley Railway, ...through the Heart of Texas model railroad
pike.
More, later,
Dick
F. Richard Burt
Brazos Valley Railways
.
. . through the Heart of Texas
.
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I claim this to be the Brazos Valley Railways, ...plural,
for I found out that one of the very first railroads chartered in Texas was the Trinity and Brazos Valley Railway.
This suggests geography predominantly in the eastern half of Texas (which had to be spanned as soon as the southern transcontinental
railway was started). My cap is shown in honor of the fallen flags of many of those reailroads that prevailed until
the mega-mergers of the late 20th Century by BNSF, Kansas City Soutern (KCS), and Union Pacific (UP).
The top-center herald is for Saint Louis-Southwesten
(SSW) or the Cotton Belt Route, highly esteemed in my family.
Across the second row are heralds for Railway
Express Agency, Southern Pacific Lines, Texas & Pacific Railway (T&P - one with which I actually worked
as a switchman in 1959), Missouri Pacific, and Rock Island.
Third row shows heralds for Santa Fe (ATSF),
Missouri, Kansas and Texas (the Katy or MKT), Saint-Louis San Francisco (FRISCO), and the Burlington Route (Chicago,
Burlington, and Quincy).
Maybe the Pullman herald ought to be included, for
they were part of almost all passenger traains, expecially before the modern automobile and the interstate highways.
What I have in this, my free-lance fantasy, is the
privilege of running anything that suits me, regardless of time and era.
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