Southern Utah

SOUTHERN UTAH - DIVISION 20

As expected, activities within the Southern Utah Division slowed this quarter because of the summer months.  Although we continue with our regular activities, attendance does drop significantly, but we have some die hard members that carry on rain or shine, hot or cold, school or no school.  Our Friday luncheons at Applebee’s continues to grow.  We started with 4 members and now get as many as 12 on some Fridays.  Our wives have even started their own Friday luncheon, but meet only once a month and they change their restaurant each time.  July’s luncheon saw 10 ladies attend.  We’ve found that including our wives adds to the enjoyment of an activity, be it lunch, summer BBQ or Christmas party.  Regardless of the event, everyone appears to have a great time.

In May, our N scale Color Country T-Trak club held their second annual Red Rock Rails Model Train Show in Hurricane, Utah.  Layouts of all scales from the Salt Lake City and Las Vegas areas were on display. Attendance was low this year, mostly because it was Mother’s Day weekend, so the club is looking to change the show date in 2015 to the month of April.  A sampling of the layouts on display appear below. Upcoming events for the club include participation in the annual Hurricane City Peach Days Festival where the layout has been very popular in past years.  They will also display the layout during the month of December at the Saint George City Annex building.  The layout on display at the Annex will include an expansion of the number of tables and modules used in previous shows.

June was a busy month with several of our members attending the regional convention in Salt Lake City.  The tours to the Golden Spike reenactment and the Union Pacific Training Facility were favorites of the convention as were the home layout tours, operating sessions and the banquet dinner.  

Our annual BBQ was also a feature event for this month.  These are always fun gatherings for our model railroad families.  We started with our usual short business meeting followed by a clinic on making canvas covered loads for freight trucks and/or rolling stock, and then of course, the BBQ.  As mentioned previously, the wives were involved.  They help with the food preparation during our meeting and clinics and then tend to congregate inside with the air conditioning for the partaking of the goodies while we men sit outside trying to follow the shade in the 100 degree temps.  Here are some photos:

Our HO and O scale groups are active building layouts for two worthwhile organizations.  After our success at last year’s Jubilee of Trees (Nov 2013), a charity event to raise money for the local hospital, we have been invited to participate again in this year’s event.  Last year we had a couple donate their HO layout to the division to be auctioned off at the Jubilee.  We refurbished the layout and it sold for $5000.  This year’s layout will also be in HO but will be built from scratch.  Work has already begun in a facility provided to the division by the City of Saint George (more on this later).  Here are before and after photos of last year’s project layout.

At the Jubilee of Trees last year, the director of the local Veterans’ Home asked us if we would be willing to build a layout for the Veterans’ Home. They felt something a little larger than HO would be more appropriate for this application so the Lionel members have agreed to take on this project and will be working in the same city provided facility along side the HO group.  Their plan is to have the layout complete for Veteran’s Day, Nov 11.  Much of the supplies, i.e., track, lumber, structures and rolling stock are donated by various members.  Lionel supplies are a little more difficult to come by so if any of you Lionel modelers have some structures you would like to donate to this layout, please contact me.

I mentioned the City of Saint George is providing us with the space to work on these layouts.  Why?  Because they want something, of course. This is stated with a sense of humor and not to be disrespectful or ungrateful.  We were recently approached by the city to do two things. First, they want us to provide an operating model railroad display at the city annex building during the month of December and they want us to participate in a partnership in the operation of a train that will run around an “all abilities” park they are building to serve the special needs population in our area.  This is not a small train, it will run on a 24 gauge track and is being purchased from a company called Katiland Trains.  It will be a steam locomotive powered by an electric motor and will pull three passenger cars, each providing wheel chair access.  Below is a picture of the type of locomotive that is being purchased, although it will have a different paint scheme.  More on this will follow as we get farther along in this partnership.  Finally!  The train comes to Southern Utah!

And that’s what’s happening in Division 20.  So until next time – Keep your hand on the throttle and your eye on the rail.

Doug Whetstone

Superintendent, Div 20