Last month we took a look at modeling urban scenery. This time around, we’ll step back from the big city and focus on rural scenery.
I spent my formative years in the Red River Valley of the North, which was dotted with small towns up and down the Minnesota and North Dakota sides of the region’s namesake river. During the summer months, my parents, brother, and I would follow the rail lines that served these rural communities. By the mid- to late-1980s, many of the branch lines and towns were on the decline. However, we were occasionally treated to first-generation diesels leading short trains (still with cabooses!) over jointed rail. Some towns still had a depot, even though most of the agents had been centralized years (and in some cases decades) earlier. Wood- and metal-sided grain elevators stood tall against the largely table flat horizon. The main streets also had some cool architecture on display.
Upstart shortline and regional railroads have breathed new life into some of these towns. The smaller carriers are willing to handle the loose-car shipments the big railroads have largely shifted away from. Shuttle-loading grain elevators and fertilizer plants have also started to locate along these lines. The ripple effect has rejuvenated nearby businesses, too. The juxtaposition of new railroads against century-plus-old small towns creates some interesting modeling opportunities.
For more ideas on rural scenery, check out Contributing Editor Tony Koester’s book Guide to Prairie Railroading and the Digital Download collection “Modeling small towns”. Both can be found online at Shop.Trains.com.
Prairie skyscrapers
When starting a modeling project it’s important to do your homework before you start cutting plastic. With the help of a local friend, Tom Johnson, I found many grain elevators to photograph that stood in the 1950s. Tom has lived in northern Indiana his entire life and also models grain elevators. I found other grain elevators using the Internet, especially Google Maps.
Using this information, I traveled around the Midwest on grain elevator photo safaris. I photographed the structures from all sides and then took detail shots. I would often take 500 to 1,000 Without digital photography, this documentation wouldn’t have been practical.
It was also valuable to talk to farmers, truckers, and elevator workers. They gave me insight into how elevators were built and expanded over the years, as well as how they operated. The elevator that influenced my model the most was the one in Thornhope, Ind. This vintage elevator still stands today and was once served by a spur track off the former Pennsylvania RR main line that ran between Indianapolis and Chicago. — Jim Six, from “Kitbashing a 1950s grain elevator” in the February 2011 Model Railroader
Down-and-out depots
For decades, depots were the focal point of rail-served communities large and small throughout the United States. As passenger service declined in the 1960s, and railroads began centralizing agents in the 1970s and ’80s, the need for depots in nearly every community declined. Some depots were razed immediately, while others served out their last years as bases for maintenance-of-way crews. The latter was the look I was after with this HO scale Rock Island depot. For the project I used Blair Line’s Gerald Depot kit. The laser-cut wood kit is based on a prototype structure in Missouri. It features a hip-roof design typical of many Rock Island depots.
After studying prototype photos online and in books, I noticed several depots had peeling white paint, revealing the original tan and Rock Island Maroon paint underneath. A tattered roof and boarded-over windows would further reinforce the structure was on its last legs. Even if your layout doesn’t have passenger service, you can still justify a depot along the right-of-way by modeling it as a maintenance-of-way building. You can still find examples on Class 1, regional, and short line railroads today. — Cody Grivno, from “How to model a weather-beaten depot” in the March 2018 Model Railroader
Farm fields
My freelanced N scale Cedar River & Iowa Central Ry. is set in rural Missouri and Iowa in 1968, so it shouldn’t come as a surprise that much of the scenery is farm fields. Though some 1:160-proportion crops are available commercially, the quantity I needed made this approach cost and time prohibitive. But after looking around, I found items at hardware and craft stores that make great starting points for fields.
In the Midwest, most areas are plotted on a grid, so farm fields are typically big rectangles. When I started work on my N scale model railroad, I made the fields 42” long, which looked too big. I now make the fields between 30” and 36”.
I found that my fields look best with the long side running parallel to the contours of the hillside. Having the short side of the field run up the hill and away from the viewer adds depth to the layout.
A rule of thumb when laying out fields is to always have the rows follow the contour of the hills. I set the rows across the slope, or parallel, with the hillside rather than running perpendicular (up and down) the hill. On full-size farms this is done to control topsoil erosion. — Patrick G. Lana, from “Modeling fields in N scale” in the October 2012 Model Railroader
Small-town structures
Though Seline’s Hair Parlor is freelanced, it was inspired by small town buildings I’ve seen on my trips to the Midwest. Many of these buildings have a brick facade and side and back walls built from block or other cheaper material.
Fortunately, my parts boxes contained the materials I needed to capture that look. I found a partial sheet of Monster Modelworks clean brick Lazerboard [resin-impregnated cardstock. — Ed.] from a convenience store that I scratchbuilt a while back. There wasn’t sufficient material for an entire building, but enough for a facade.
I also found some concrete-block wall panels from Pikestuff that I could use for the side and back walls. In addition, I found two doors and an air conditioner that would look appropriate. — Pelle Søeborg, from “Build a simple structure from leftovers” in the August 2016 Model Railroader.
Tractor loads
During the post-World War II era and through the 1970s, the United States was dotted with farm tractor and implement dealers selling and supporting such names as Allis Chalmers, Case, Co-op, Farmall, Fordson, John Deere, Massey Ferguson, Massey Harris, Minneapolis-Moline, and Oliver, among others. These machines were built in plants located mainly throughout the Northeast and Midwest. These equipment manufacturers used the nation’s extensive rail network to supply their dealers with large and colorful tractor shipments, first in boxcars and then on flatcars.
By the late 1950s farm tractors and implements had become too large to be shipped inside boxcars and gondolas. These irregularly shaped and brightly colored loads had to be handled out in the open on flatcars. Since the tractors were embarking on a life in the great outdoors, they typically weren’t covered while in transit.
Tractor and implement loads tended to be relatively light, so longer flatcars were preferred. To optimize car utility, multi-stop tractor and implement loads usually involved interchanging cars with one or more railroads. Compliance with Section 3 of the Association of American Railroads (AAR) Rules for Governing the Loading of Road Grading, Road Making and Farm Equipment Machinery on Open Top Cars was therefore essential in keeping the loads moving and in assuring timely deliveries. [Rulebooks like this one can be found with Internet searches. – Ed.]
Each railroad had to verify that these loads were secured properly before they were switched into a road freight. This job fell to car inspectors employed by the receiving railroad. The car inspectors checked for compliance with the aforementioned rules and how well the blocking and bracing held the tractor(s) or implement(s) in place after each stop. — Mont Switzer, from “How to model a flatcar full of tractors” in the February 2016 Model Railroader
