This is in the spirit of “Philosophy Fridays”.I’ll call it “Philosophical Sundays” Or Just “The hobby as to…”.
Today’s theme is “names”.
Many place names in the USA are named after people who settled or owned land there{like Smithville}, or for an “Old Country” locale, name {Like Athens, Georgia} for example.
What is your “theory” behind names you have chosen on your MRRing pike?
This includes “the railroad name”; “town names”, “business” in town or served on the pike.
There are some “general theories”:
1} named after 1:1 real railroads and railways
2} named after 1:1 real railroad towns/service facilities
3} named after local locales in your area
4} named after family members {such as Toddland}
5} named as to “silly” titles {titles such as “Grimy, Black & Sooty” railroad, “Bottom & Out- Undertakers” Or “Blooms Galore, flower shop”}
Are there more “theories” for naming People,places and things on a layout?
I am not exactly looking for a laundry list of your “names” on your pike {although you can provide a few examples}, rather I am wondering what your “theory was” when choosing names for things on the layout.
For example, I started off with the “theory” of “Making it Cute” and chose “GB&SRR, theGrimy, Black & Sooty railroad” for the railroad {pike’s} name. {I later changed my name and now is "unnamed’ as I want to expand it and don’t yet know what to call it} I “protolance”.
The layout I am currently working on is based on the Pennsylvania-Reading Seashore Lines, the railroad that ran through my home town of Magnolia. Legend has it that the name Magnolia was given to the station stop by the President of the Reading Railroad himself, after viewing a magnolia tree on the property of the founding father of the town.
The problem is the town I will be modeling is generic, and meant only to evoke the feeling of several different small towns in South Jersey. So it did not feel right naming my model town Magnolia.
Then I remembered that prior to incorporation in 1915, Magnolia was also known as Greenland because of the green clay found in the soil of the area.
So Greenland my model town has become. It frees me up to be more creative as I model, and those in the know will get the reference!
[:)]My railroad is the “Grande Valley Railway” and is based in Grand Rapids,Mich.The name comes from the fact that the city and my railroad are in the Grand River valley.The landscape is somewhat hilly but there are no tunnels on the GVR because there are exactly two tunnels in the state both go under a river and come up in a foreign country.(Canada [:)] ) these tunnels are also on the other side of the state where I do not model.
My layout is based on the Portland Oregon area. The first name I came up with was the G&E RR (grandpa and Elijah) But I have 3 grandsons now so it’s called The Willamette River Rail Road (river in Portland) Usually I just call it my layout…
My second layout was the Inner Springs and Sleeping Creek Railroad - it was in the master bedroom. It was 6x6.5 ft and had 2 towns - Inner Springs and Sleeping Creek of course. It only lasted a short time before we moved.
I never had time to build a layout, but for many years I worked on the concept of a railroad from Norfolk Virginia to Chicago via Pittsburg and Erie called the Virginia and Lake Erie Railroad.
Once I finally had time again for a layout I had moved on to the PRR and then to the Maryland and Pennsylvania.
Fun idea, Galaxy. Thanks for stating thread. … Suggest including # 6 for a descriptive name.
My Heartland Division is a fictional division of CB&Q. It’s a #6 because it describes CB&Q’s location.
My city of Heartland is also descriptive.
Town of Valley Heights is #5 whimsical. (Valleys do not have heights)
Waterfalls is called Standing Falls … #5 whimsical.
Valley Heights and Standing Falls remind me of a real place I saw many years ago. It was a housing development, devoid of trees, where the houses were built close together & all houses looked the same. It was called Walden.
My own planned railroad will feature real locations in northern Ohio. It will feature track arrangements and customers that really existed. Since the modeled time period will be 60 years ago, I expect that there may be some customers that can’t be identified. I’ll cross that bridge when I come to it, but when I’m forced to make something up, I plan to use names that have a connection to the local Indian tribes (Huron, for example), or the early settlement of the area (Crawford, named for a British officer who was killed by the Indians in colonial times), local waters such as Erie and Sandusky, or for the mineral & agricultural products of the area. Of course, I’m not completely closing the door on a bit of whimsy here and there.
I model the Milwaukee Road, but I’ve chosen a fictitious location in the midwest that I call Moose Bay. I just liked the name when it came into my head. The part of town down by the carfloat terminal is called Mooseport. There’s a factory on the far side of town called Moose Mills, and I’ve named my subway system the Moose Bay Transit Authority.
The small railroad that actually operates the carfloat terminal at Mooseport is the Westport Terminal Railroad, a tribute to our departed friend Wolfgang Dudler.
I like to use a blend of real business and place names that people will recognize and ones that might make visitors chuckle, like the Powder Milk Biscuit Company, the Gump Forest National Park, the Sal Monella Ice Company and Beaver Liquors.
My layout is known as the ‘Pecatonica’Division’ - It a proto-freelance or ‘what if’ interpertation of a Milwaukee Road secondary line from Dubuque, IA to a connection with an exisiting Milwaukee Road branch line to Janesville, WI. The inspiration came from long-time friend John Dhols who wanted to model the SW Wisconsin lead mining area. Also, Paul Larson and Gordy Odegard ‘rail-fanned’ this area and did several MR articles based on what they found.
I named the towns for what I liked, so not to have to make them look like actual towns along the line:
Sinsinawa Yard - Small yard and operational hub for a couple of local ‘patrols’ that service the industries on the line.
Pecatonica - small ‘end of a branch’ town
Island Siding - Just ‘sounded good’(there was such a spot north of Red Wing, MN)
Strawberry Point - Another ‘sounded good’(a small town in Iowa)
Dhols Jct - A switch where the branch leaves a connection with the C&NW(named in honor of a friend)
The ‘industries’ include a Swift packing plant(my father worked for Swift & Co), a zinc mining operation, and several ‘ag’ related industries(feed mill, elevator, seed warehouse, canning plant, salting station, cooperage, & bulk oil distributor) .
Since I named my pike for a sliver of the B&O running thru the outskirts of Cleveland, I try to gives the small towns prototypical names in the order which a train would pass by them on its way into or out of the big city. As for business names, they are all fictional but plausible - no cutesy or pun names.
There is, however, one example that comes close: Houghschnaegel Pipe & Ductwork contractors. I threw as many random letters together as I could think of to make what resembled a German name so it would seem legit. My motivation was to see the expressions on the faces of my ‘newbie’ guest operators when they try to pronounce it.[:-^]
My RR is set in the mid-coast area of Maine, kind of between the MEC Rockland Branch and the ‘Lower Road’ which ran between Portland and Augusta
Town names are based on real town names or are freelanced. Sheepscott is an actual small town; I have taken the name for a city. Moscungus is another actual name, now part of Bremen, yet to be built on this verson of my layout. Greenvale is kind of a modification of Greenville, a town in norhtern ME.
Business names: G&L Hardware - me and my wide’s initials: Fortinbras Furniture - named for my son’s much loved dog who passed away a few years ago, Fortie is looking out of the store window; Al’s Cycles - for one of my brothers; a panel truck Dayscove Builders - the actual name of a friend’s company who built my house, Speedball Tucker Fast Freight - named from a Jim Croce song; Dragon Products cement - an actual cement plant in Thomaston, ME; Merrill Freight, Dysarts, Coles Express, Country Kitchen Bread, Poole Brothers Lumber - names of actual or former Maine companies
I model the old P-Line route between Portage WI and Plover WI, with the extension to Stevens Point.
1.) THe line is correct, but abandonment after WWII and the history from WWI to WWII meant that there was room for a little historical liscense. The liscense being that the line was sold in 1919 to the cities of Portage, Coloma, and Montello who have a board of 7. 3 (appt from the main towns) and 4 elected from the general populations of the 3 towns. It still shares much in common with the original Wisconsin Central/Soo Line (stations, signals, etc.) but an overhead has been added and industrial priming is on going.
2.)All the towns that are modelled are geographically correct. They are MOSTLY historically acurrate, they are not architecturally accurate, as finding photos or taking photos of the structures that are left while, not beyond the modelling skills I currently have, would chew up too much time to actually model. Instead they are modified from currently available structures. OR in the case of known industries and no known photos are modelled with little modification from exsiting kits.
3.) Industries are for the most part real life. Just more of it.
4/5.) No towns are named after family, but some locos are, and some industries are named after people that have helped with the creation and format of the layout (my niece has a used car and tractor dealership that is named (in the 30’s sign) Bug’s used cars. With the advent of the VW bug, the sign is changed to SQUASHED Bug’s Used Cars. There will be a couple of others, but as of yet no other silly titles. There is the Westover Coal, Coke and Chemicals (Walthers Coke Retort) named after my grad school housemate who was a chemist and also an avid model railroader. Smith Family Furniture and lumber
I wanted the feel of the real line, with a little bit of “what if” and because there are enough gaps in the historical rec
Most of mine are family based starting with my childhood layout, the M M P & R (initials of my dad, mom, me and my brother). My first layout was the P S S & M (the “Possum” line)(initials for me, my wife, my daughter, and my son). This evolved to the P & M (my son and I built this one together without the girls). Now it’s on to layout # 4, the East Penn, commemorating the area in the Delaware Valley where I grew up. Main town terminals are Philipsburg and Milestown and there are whistle stop platforms for Saraton and Sueville. Manyindustries are either whimsical or trigger some memory connection-- Mr. Peabody’s Coal Town brings to mind some great folk song nights with friends doing our “train song” set, Lehigh Cement provides my college connection, I have the ubiquitous Miracle Manufacturing, Empty Arms Hotel, and Slurps Soft Drinks, and a number of generic industries such as General Consolidated, Universal Export, Interstate Intermodal, Farmers’ Cooperative or chain brands such A & P, Mobil Gas (my Dad loved the flying red horse), Eastern Power (Reddy Kilowatt, another of my Dad’s favorites, is much in evidence) and Rexall Drugs. The road names on the freight cars remind me of the places I’ve lived or gone to school-- mostly Pennsylvania, Reading, Lehigh Valley, CNJ, Erie, Lackawanna, B & O, C & O, NYC, New Haven, Boston & Maine, Maine Central, Bangor & Aroostook, Central Vermont, and the Rutland. Makes me smile to see them.