Bring your young Thomas fans out to meet Thomas at the Orange Empire Railway Museum!
(Southern California's premier railway museum!!)
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The annual November visit of Thomas the Tank Engine is scheduled for November 9-10-11 and 16-17. Thomas is shown above at the main loading platform at the museum. This is the largest single event held annually at the museum and there are a lot of other attractions, including some good food and snacks plus the museums fleet of antique Los Angeles area streetcars.

This little blue engine is so popular with the younger children to get to watch Thomas & Friends on their television sets almost every day. Each child can get his picture taken with Thomas.

Thomas the Tank Engine is a small fictional steam locomotive in The Railway Series books by the Reverend Wilbert Awdry and his son, Christopher. He is the titular character and became the most popular character in the series, and the accompanying television spin-off series, Thomas & Friends. Thomas is a tank engine, painted blue with red lining, and displays the running number one. All of the locomotives in The Railway Series were based on prototypical engines; Thomas has origins in the E2 Class designed by Lawson Billinton in 1913. Thomas first appeared in 1946 in the second book in the series, Thomas the Tank Engine, and was the focus of the four short stories contained in that volume. In 1979, the British writer/producer Britt Allcroft came across the books, and arranged a deal to bring the stories to life as the TV series Thomas the Tank Engine and Friends (later simplified to Thomas & Friends). The program became an award-winning hit around the world, with a vast range of spin-off commercial products. The Thomas stories were a feature on PBS shows such as Shining Time Station (original runs from 1989-1993 with re-runs until 1997, then Fox Family 1998-1999). Every episode of the show would include a few Thomas The Tank Engine and Friends stories. The series started Ringo Starr, George Carlin, Didi Conn, Brian O'Connor and the Flexitoon puppets. Ringo had already been providing the voice of the storyteller for the British series, agreed to be the on-screen character, Mr. Conductor. He was later replaced by comedian George Carlin.

So call the museum or go on-line and get your reservations now. Seats on the trains are filling up fast. Tickets range from $19.00 to $25.00 and are available at the museum (951-943-3020) or you can get tickets on-line at www.ticketweb.com. However, although convenient, there is a ticket processing charge added using Ticket Web.

The museum always puts it's best foot forward for this event so you will not be disappointed. The museum volunteers try to plan for every eventuality except the weather, which nine times out of ten is beautiful that time of year.

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LACMTA comes up with yet another LRV paint scheme!
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In our September issue, we showed you car 148 of the Los Angeles Country Transportation Authority in a new paint scheme which we called the "cockatiel" scheme. Just when we thought we had the complete story, we spotted car 154 at the Culver City Station of the Expo Line. Before we could report this to you we spotted car 100 in the very same scheme. You tell us how you like these two. To be fair, we were told by an LACMTA official that there are more decal applications due on both cars, so they are not complete. We hope to show you the cars again when they are completed. First, we look at car 154. This is the first car of the fifteen 1995 built Nippon-Sharyo cars used to initially open the Green Line (Redondo Beach to Norwalk):

Another view of this car:

The other car recently repainted is car 100, the first car in the fifty-four 1989-1990-built Nippon-Sharyo cars

Another view of this car:

One last thing, the belt line yellow-gold striping is very reflective even in the light of day as illustrated on car 154:

On Tuesday, October 29th, we spotted another car, Car 103, in a new paint scheme, similar to Car 148, with the large silver/white Metro letters on the upper side. Unfortunately, we did not get a photograph of that one. Obviously, the Blue Line paint shop is very busy these days.

Model Traction Action at the Orange Empire Railway Museum!
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As reported in our last edition, the Southern California Traction Club (SCTC) was able to set up its modules for nine straight days at the Orange Empire Railway Museum from October 19th to October 27. They had only the NMRA LA Division's Lloyd Lehrer to thank for making the club available for this great opportunity. This long a set-up is a dream for a module club and they took advantage of it, working on the modules on both Tuesday and Thursday between the weekend public performances.

The Museum had received two very large collections of railroad books, VHS tapes, DVDs, magazines and periodicals from two sources in August of this year. After selecting those items appropriate for their soon to be constructed Archive facility, the remaining items were made available for sale. The SCTC offered to help with the sales and they were conducted on September 12, October 19, October 20, October 26 and October 27. John McWhirter and Pete DeBeers are shown in the next photo as they were preparing for the sale in the Museum Town Hall.

Some of the action on the layout are shown in the next photos. First, a Toronto CLRV model, produced at one time by Eric Courtney, is shown in front of the City Hall building.

Second, a short freight train pulled by a Ken Kidder model of a CL&E Box Motor 642 passes by.

Models of both the the Chicago, North Shore & Milwaukee "Electroliners" were on display at this club appearance. The 803-804 is sitting on one of George Jones modules when the C&LE Box Motor train passed.

An another area of the layout, the next scene was snapped:

Of course, deep in P. E. country, no traction layout is complete without one of Pacific Electric's diesels with trolley poles (for highway crossing actuators) pulling a freight train.

In the next photo, the preproduction sound-equipped model of the Bowser New Orleans 900 series streetcar was on display during the appearance.

This car was equipped with the latest ESU Lok-Sound sound decoder. Sounds included are the doors opening, doors closing, air compressor, passenger signal, fare register, conductor bell, wheel squeal and motor/gear noises. All sounds were recorded at the Pennsylvania Trolley Museum in August of this year. Thanks to Scott Becker at PTM for his assistance in this project. The car has the same automatic start/stop sequences as the Bowser PCC car along with headlights, destination sign lights and interior lights. The car was tested on the Southern California Traction Club Test track and easily negotiates 6 inch radius curves.

The SCTC has among its membership, two modelers who are citizens of Japan, Toshisuke Matsumoto and Akihisa Saitoh. During the last day of the appearance at the Orange Empire Railway Museum, Akihisa visited the set-up along with two of his friends from Japan, Akihiko Tsuge from the Kushu Institute of Technology (Chemistry Department) and Kouichi Yoshisato, Kobe Subway Station Staff. Because this was the last day of the appearance, both of the guests helped with the teardown of the layout late on Sunday, October 27th. All parties present posed for the next photo prior to final teardown.

Shown left to right are: George Jones, John McWhirter, Akihiko Tsuge, George Huckaby, Kouichi Yoshisato, Pete DeBeers and Akihisa Saitoh. Club members not present at the time of the photo were Byron Brainard, Dave Garcia, Fred Gurzeler, Dave Lyman Dick & AJ Staley!

Just outside of the layout, the real thing kept passing by, full of happy riders!

This set-up is ideal for any modular club, who would like to work on their modular layout, so expect to see the SCTC at OERM as often as they can schedule it. Any other clubs that are interested in displaying at the museum should contact the Museum and ask to talk to the Museum President. Something just might be able to be arranged.

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