Exclusive photos of Graham Leather's layout from last month's WMRC layout hop

Check out the action on Graham Leather's layout! Note the Winnipeg skyline, which includes Brandon's Mackenzie Seeds building, and Graham's model of Seattle's King Street station.

At our members-only layout hop last month we dispatched our chief correspondent Murray Brown to investigate Graham Leather's layout, and the results were very impressive! Graham inherited this layout from his father, the late, great Norm Leathers, who was a WMRC members for almost 70 years. Graham has not only maintained the layout but has made several changes and added his own person touch. 

Long time fans of Norm's layout will notice the seismic shift from running the Pennsylvania Railroad to Great Northern and . Even the huge UP articulated steamers run great on this layout! WMRC membership has many privileges, and one of them is joining in on the fun on our layout hops. So if you want to see some of Winnipeg's finest layouts in action, then join up!

Graham enjoys running UP's huge articulated steamers, which run smoothly on his layout.

Graham has a very impressive collection of  Great Northern motive power and rolling stock.

If you don't want to take the train you can always go Greyhound on Graham's layout.

Graham designed and built the shelving to hold all of his rolling stock. The shelves slide out smoothly, providing convenient  access to all of his trains.

Spend a night at the Lake Superior Railroad Museum with the Winnipeg Model Railroad Club on January 14

Ken Beuhler, Executive Director of the Lake Superior Railroad Museum, is seen in front of Union       Pacific's Big Boy, which made a stop in Duluth at the museum in 2019.

The WMRC having a night at the museum! Ken Beuhler, Executive Director of the Lake Superior Railroad Museum is going to conduct a tour of  this spectacular museum just for us! The museum was founded in the late 1960s and gained traction with the preservation of the Northern Pacific's Union Depot in downtown Duluth by the Museum's founders. They saved the building and created an Arts Culture and History Center. It made the front cover of TIME magazine when it opened. USA Today voted the Museum the "Best Transportation Museum in America." The museum has become one of the major tourist attractions in the Duluth Superior Region. In 2019, it hosted the Union Pacific’s “Big Boy”, which attracted 12,000 rail fans.

Dave MacLean, long time member and past president of the Model Railroad Club of Toronto, will showcase his club, one of the oldest in North America. Having forced to move in 2013 from its former 67 year run in a former WW2 era munitions factory, the Club is now in its fourth home. Since 2013, Club members have been building a new 3500 square foot layout featuring multiple deck construction, mushroom design concepts, soaring bridges over aisles, and walk in design to all areas. The Club  embraces traditional and new technology such as DCC/JMRI/WiThrottle to allow use of handheld devices for control of trains and turnouts. Recently 3D printing has been adopted. The layout features a mainline length of over 8 scale miles with full staging yards, with two major terminals to allow transition era Canadian railroad operations, with walk-along timetable passenger and waybill freight operations. The layout is fully signaled according to the 1960 Canadian Railway Operating Rules with full dispatcher functionality. 

The meeting takes place on Friday, January 14 at 7:00 PM. Due to COVID concerns, this will be an on-line only meeting on Zoom. We will be holding our member’s monthly model display. All members have received a Zoom link for this meeting. If you are not a member and wish to receive a link, email us at wmrc.train club@gmail.com and we will send you a link.

      An O scale CP passenger rounds the corner at the Model Railroad Club of Toronto's layout.

Felix Lesiuk's springtime rail fanning reaps a harvest of great shots

Felix Lesiuk always has had a great eye for the unique rail fanning shot. Pictured above is a coal train coming down the track with a strong wind blowing an enormous cloud of coal dust from the open hoppers. He also captured a unique CP consist featuring a Milwaukee Road passenger car, a bunk car and a converted heavyweight passenger car seen outside of Rosser. He has also taken notice of the proliferation of Union Pacific motive power recently seen on the CP line. 

 

Union Pacific releases its Big Boy summer schedule

Union Pacific has just announced its schedule for their legendary 4-8-8-4 steamer, also known as "Big Boy". There have been occasions where the mighty brute has traveled as close to Winnipeg as Fargo, North Dakota. Unfortunately, it won't be getting that close this year, as its main destination is Ogden, Utah, where it will participate in the 150 anniversary celebrations of the golden spike in May.

The Big Boy will travel from Cheyenne, Wyoming to Ogden and back, with stops in Rock Springs, Rawlins, Laramie and Evanston. For more information, you can go to the Union Pacific website by clicking here.