A thread on someone’s current first layout (plus some red wine) got me reflecting on my first layout. I’d guess about 1960-1961, in a NYC apartment. My brother was off in college and I must have convinced my parents I should build a layout in our bedroom. I presume we kept a bed for my brother so we must have had 2 twin beds plus the 4’ x 6’ layout I built, somehow fit in. I don’t recall how I got interested, but I assume it was the RR walking I did with my gradeschool chums on the nearby NY Central, plus my family heritage on the UP and Baldwin. Plus the Lionel O27 set that came out at Christmas-time that was set up on a 4’ x 8’ plywood on the floor (with cattle car). I do remember fondly MR and MRC, purchased at the news store.
Well, I clearly recall the 4’ x 6’ Atlas snaptrack layout I built, from the little blue booklet about 5" x 7". It had a loop that crossed so it did an internal (I’d guess 18"r) internal loop with a 22" outer loop, plus a siding off the inner loop. The inner loop had an engine shed from Revell, maybe. It had snap switches controlled with Atlas buttons, several DC sections controlled by an Atlas selector(?) with green buttons and no reversing loops. I built the layout with a hand drill (still ahve it), and a set of Sears drillbits in a silver case that I still have (I’d guess some of the bits are original but dull). I got blisters on my palms hand screwing the benchwork together. When we moved to NJ on high school years, it went to the apartment basement and was expanded to 4’ x 10’ by lengthening the outer loop. I got a $9 B&D drill that only lasted 40 years. I joined the Madison model RR club, a bunch of older guys, with me a Jr member. They had a neat large layout in the basement of an old house (a Dr’s office)
Well, just a few years (50+) later, what’s changed is I’ve b
My first layout came with the used Lionel set my folks got me, pre-memory. (Think my folks like of trains came in there somewhere) The only place there was room for the 4’x7’ table was in their room. It was painted tan where the tracks and roads were, with green dyed sawdust (I presume) over the rest of it. Survived a number of moves. HS years I got a room in an old chicken house, added a 3’x10’ pallet and 5’x5’ piece of luan to the benchwork. Never did get much scenery other than a few buildings. Don’t know where that first 4’x7’ table went when I went off to college and a four year stint with Uncle Sam.
After two sons came along, built a small HO layout in the old coal bin (not an ideal place). I had much more interest than they did. Moved, no time or place. House fire took a lot of Lionel and most of the buildings. Started collecting HO for dream layout. Currently have a 4’x6’, as the room for the dream has been taken over by returning son. Hope to make better use of it of the room it is in, now that I know it is “the” room, at least until we find him a new significant other and he moves out again. (Dreamer.) My collecting has gotten me enough stuff to build a rather large layout. Will gradually figure out what I want to use in my smaller room. Do plan to make it semi modular so that IF the oppertunity ever comes, it can be moved to the larger room quickly, so nothing else happens to the space.
That old layout, despite it’s plainness, still holds a fond spot in memories.
You took me back, can’t remember the year but can remember the Christmas I received a Tyco Trainset. It was just a loop of track but my Dad set it up on a table on a 4x6 piece of plywood. I added some switches and some extra track and it was hours of fun. Even started building some of those Tyco kits that still live on as Model Power Kits today.
I was introduced to model railroading at the age of 7, when Santa put a Marklin starter set under the tree. In the following year, each Christmas and birthday saw additions, sometimes a loco and a few cars, or track and switches. I did not have a permanent layout, but a little layout was assembled on my bed in no time, a green, woolen blanket acting as scenery, with boxes put underneath it to simulate hills. It took a good 5 years, before I was able to actually build a layout, after we had moved into a house with a spacious basement.
My first layout was not much of an affair. A table, roughly 2 by 1 m, built of 1 by 4´s covered with a sheet of chip board. It had a fairly simple track plan, just an oval with a small junction station. A branch line climbed up the hills to a small mountain station. I used a jig saw and plywood for the grade, set on pieces of that 1 by 4 lumber left over from building the frame. Scenery was made of card board strips, with a newspaper shell covering everything up. Ground cover was that awkward tinted saw dust. The layout was, viewed with today´s eyes, not really a success, but back then I was really proud of it - I had built it without any help and it was mine.
The layout lasted for only a few years. Education, job and family got in the way. After a 25 year hiatus, I re-started again, building a number odf smaller layouts in various scales - from Z scale all the way up to G scale live steam. I am right now attacking what will most likely be my final layout - a layout in a box in On30!
I remember my first layout, I was about 7 and my parents bought me a Bachman Santa Fe set. My dad cut a piece of plywood big enough to run a small layout but small enough to slide under the bed. It had a few structures and a tunnel I made from wood and plaster. I added this green painted splinter like grass and a small siding. My cousin would come over and play with them, the trains would never run right after he played with them.