TODAY, UNION PACIFIC’S articulated M-10000 train is quaint, in an odd but wondrous, Buck Rogers sort of way. But in 1934, the turret-topped train had the impact of a Concorde SST jetliner on rails. The M-10000 and the Burlington’s Zephyr were the first gleaming streamliners in a world of ponderous smoky-black steam locomotives pulling long […]
THE PENNSYLVANIA RAILROAD had two major challenges: The Allegheny Mountains and a primary commodity of coal. This double-whammy resulted in some of the most impressive non-articulated steam locomotives ever developed. And rest assured, when the line found an engine that “worked,” it cranked out a ton of them. The I-class 2-10-0 Decapods are a case […]
SOME OF THE slickest-looking steam locomotives were the streamlined Atlantics and Hudsons that served the Milwaukee Road’s speedy Hiawatha passenger trains. During the Great Depression, competition for diminishing passenger traffic was intense. Some roads, such as the Union Pacific, opted for cutting-edge diesel streamliners. Others, such as the Chicago & North Western and Milwaukee Road, […]
ARE WE IN THE midst of a revival of the trolley car on tinplate layouts, or what? For years we’ve had trolleys by Lionel and Bowser, but recent months have seen new trolleys offered by MTH, K-Line, United Models, and Marx. Now Western Hobbycraft has jumped into the mix on O gauge track. I can’t […]
GETTING BACK INTO the hobby in the early 1990s, one of the engines that impressed me most was the postwar Lionel turbine. I loved the prototype and thought that this was such an amazing locomotive that I just had to add one or two to my fleet. My Lionel turbines are real workhorses; the only […]
HOW OFTEN I CAN remember the late Frank Pettit complaining about how quickly Lionel had pulled the plug on what he insisted was among his greatest inventions. Frank, who served as a one-man research and development department at Lionel during the postwar period, was talking about the no. 38 operating water tower. According to an […]
THERE ARE PLENTY of great-looking steamers on the market. Walk into any hobby shop and you’ll see row after row of these beauties. So amid a virtual sea of four-cylinder, huffing, puffing black giants, what can make another big engine stand out? Try mixing in a little color. MTH has modeled a brawny green champion […]
MTH IS OFFERING two starter sets that get away from the typical “seen-it-all-before” consists common in the field: the Alaska F40PH and US Army F40PH sets. North to Alaska This set models an Alaska Railroad rig that in reality is a red hot train for nature lovers and cruise ship passengers. In 1999, the railroad […]
MY OFFICE WAS hotter than a jail cell in on the wrong side of the border. I sat in the dark with my .45 on my desk, enjoying a lively conversation with Misters Jack Daniels and Jim Beam. Then I heard it. That rumble, those voices. It was haunting. Almost like the faded memory of […]
S GAUGE ENTHUSIASTS who have a fancy for passenger trains will want to take note of the release of Budd passenger cars by American Models. The basic set has four cars: a baggage/coach combine, coach, diner, and observation car. The car shells are made of plastic, and the tooling is terrific. The cars are smooth […]
AS FAR AS STEAM switchers go, the Pennsylvania Railroad B6-class 0-6-0 may be the most recognized locomotive in model railroading. The humble little steamer could likely have been found at any freight yard anywhere on the railroad, from New York to St. Louis. Images of it dotted the pages of the Railroad Man’s Magazine (later […]
THE POSTWAR LIONEL GG1 is one of the most widely venerated toy trains ever made. Popular in its original incantation, it spawned similar, non-scale-sized copies by Williams, MTH, and now K-Line. K-Line has made some key modifications to its GG1, which puts this new O gauge version at the front of the pack. K-Line has […]
