MARPM 2022 Open House

The current state of the Richford Branch

Well, the Mid Atlantic Railroad Prototype Modelers (MARPM) meet is in the books. 

And that was but one part of a whirlwind of stuff going on both in "real life" and model railroading over the last month. 

I managed to:

• Get a fair amount of scenery to "Phase 1" completion on the layout
• Stic Harris came by the week before the meet to at long last wire up the turntable and get some lighting installed in a couple of buildings. 
• Clean up the basement and layout (an almost overwhelming task considering the fact that I haven't had any kind of formal layout visits since pre-Covid!
• Finished up my Getting Real column for Model Railroad Hobbyist
• And that doesn't even include cleaning the garage, fall yard work, etc...!!!

I had a great time at the meet itself taking in some great clinics, looking at some great models in the display room, and reconnecting with old friends and making new ones. I even managed to run over to the Great Scale Model Train Show at Timonium and purchase a couple of goodies. 

I gave my Building and Researching Prototype Structures clinic on Saturday afternoon. It seemed well attended although I didn't get a head count. 

Once my clinic was completed I headed back home to make final preps for the open house on Sunday. For example, I remembered on the drive home that I had taken every piece of rolling stock off the layout. So I spent 30 minutes Sunday morning setting up a display train... I also needed to finish cleaning the track - and with all the scenery work I'd been doing there was a fair amount of dirt on the rails... 

I'd heard Iain Rice had passed away a week or so before the meet. So it seemed appropriate to have this locomotive on display. 

I didn't take any photos of people looking at the layout - but according to our guest book we had about 15 folks stop by - exceeding my expectations (we are, after all, located more than 70 miles from the hotel where the meet was held!) 

I really enjoyed visiting with everyone who stopped by here and the folks I spoke with at the meet. 

And thanks to Stic Harris for all his help both before and during the open house! 

LaFramboise Implement dealer needs some tractors and other farm equipment to display! 

The next goal is to keep the layout in its current state until after the next open house - scheduled for November 19. 

I'm pleased with how well the cannery fits in this spot (compared with the feed mill).