In the days leading I to Christmas I found something at work which may interest you guys.
Many of you may know that I work maintenance at a prestigeous school here in Melbourne. The school is now over 150 years old and most of our main buildings date from @ the 1870's.
Well this summer break the main job for me has been the lifting of carpets and flooring to enable the contract electricians to run an evacuation speaker curcuit as well as to prepare for the installation of a "Guardian" control system. I'm not exactly 100% sure as to what that does myself, but in this day and age being able to co-ordinate and control the school with almost 1200 students and 200 plus staff in an emergency is vital.
Anyway, I was lifting carpets or carpet tiles and floor boards in one area and came across heaps of sawdust between the floor joists [about 8" x 3"] and under the sawdust but above the lathe and plaster was some carefully folded newspaper used as a barrier.
I removed the sawdust and inspected the newspaper, and we found one page dated 18 April 1876.
The classified ads made for some interesting reading as there were details about goods landed and up for auction, there were details of ship sailing schedules as well as ads touting the various attributes of ships sailing between Melbourne and London. Several touted having an experienced surgeon on board and one in particular touted having a milch cow on board.
On an other page was an ad for the private sale of a residence near the school in St Kilda Road, Melbourne [a major road] with a 99 foot frontage and 330 foot depth.
Anyone wishing they had title to that land now?
There was also notice of a deceased estate auction, where the gentleman's property named Rosanna near Heidelberg was to be sold, consisting of 800 acres of prime farm land to be sub-divided. This is auction basically forms and dates the establishment of the current suburb of Rosanna near where I live and where I do much of my shopping. Anyone wishing they had title to that land now?
Bizzare that I should happen to pull out such a newspaper.
I have given the original newspaper pages to the schools archivist as it provides an accurate date for the building an a glimpse of Melbourne of the time.

Mark

This is a topic that has been discussed probably in every forum, but I'm not sure we talked about it here. From what I find, the "ideal" layout height is suppose to be between 42" and 48". I've seen where others talk about theirs being as low as 36" and a few going above 50".

My question is, what is the height of your layout, and are you happy with it that way and would you change it if you could?

Higher is great for viewing, but lousy to reach and work on. Lower is great for working. reaching and seeing what you're doing without using a step-stool, but you lose depth of view that way. I just destroyed my entire layout a few months ago when we thought we were going to move. I think it was somewhere in the 42" range, and I think I'll put the new one just about that high as well, but I'm curious what everyone else thinks is the right height for a single-layer layout and possibly the top deck of a double-layer one.

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The late style tank train is very tempting. Has anyone on Big Blue run twelve or more on their layout? Any issues running them?

Big Blue's annual maintenance is scheduled for December 31st. We will shut down at 11:59 PM and be back online January 1st, 2015 at 12:01.

New Federal laws also dictate that we shut down for a three-day period once every three years. Because of that, we are giving you advance notice that we will be offline during the period of February 29, 30 and 31, just as we did three years ago. We regret any inconvenience this might cause anyone.

Id like to attempt a double deck around the room shelf layout and have some questions: 1st is what is a good height between decks and 2 best way to reach the 2nd shelf minus the helix? Also any other tips or ideas will help. Thanks

The Drawing - Circa 1950
Leaving Chicago in a Winter twilight Great artwork;
great locomotive.............
(Please, it is artwork, not the real thing.)
Lawrence Baggerly collection

Let's share our favorite railroad photos from the past year. I'll offer a "14 from 2014," in no particular order:

1. <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/railohio/12042394725">https://www.flickr.com/photos/railohio/12042394725</a><!-- m -->
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3. <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/railohio/14950626256">https://www.flickr.com/photos/railohio/14950626256</a><!-- m -->
4. <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/railohio/14266114449">https://www.flickr.com/photos/railohio/14266114449</a><!-- m -->
5. <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/railohio/14652583954">https://www.flickr.com/photos/railohio/14652583954</a><!-- m -->
6. <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/railohio/14409449389">https://www.flickr.com/photos/railohio/14409449389</a><!-- m -->
7. <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/railohio/14461267919">https://www.flickr.com/photos/railohio/14461267919</a><!-- m -->
8. <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/railohio/14778065905">https://www.flickr.com/photos/railohio/14778065905</a><!-- m -->
9. <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/railohio/15075104098">https://www.flickr.com/photos/railohio/15075104098</a><!-- m -->
10. <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/railohio/14798622031">https://www.flickr.com/photos/railohio/14798622031</a><!-- m -->
11. <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/railohio/14859065724">https://www.flickr.com/photos/railohio/14859065724</a><!-- m -->
12. <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/railohio/15187984229">https://www.flickr.com/photos/railohio/15187984229</a><!-- m -->
13. <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/railohio/15404022545">https://www.flickr.com/photos/railohio/15404022545</a><!-- m -->
14. <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/railohio/15621541326">https://www.flickr.com/photos/railohio/15621541326</a><!-- m -->

For the rest of the 2014 favorites, see my flickr page.

This is a follow up to my thread concerning wheel sparks on my older Athearn diesels.
I took nachoman's (Kevin) advice and installed nickle silver wheels on one diesel to see how they worked.
I am happy to announce no sparks
Before ordering from Athearn I checked ebay and found them for $13 and change + $2.50 shipping. They come in a 6 pack.
I will someday order another 6 pack so I can do my other 2 diesels.
Again-thanks Kevin

Got this excellent book from a girl in my department at work for Christmas. Nice book. Covers everything from steam to electrics to diesels. Unfortunatly, they stop the steam at the Challenger, no Big Boys, but hey do have pics of the Alleghenies. And they stop at the GP-30's.
   
Now I feel bad. I just gave her a big box of chocolates.

I did a lot of online searching to find some suitable images for late 60's early 70's billboards. Here are what I've made so far. Oh, Peerless Appliance is my own made up company ...an off railroad industry served by staging track.



Some of them in their new locations:

The recently relocated and designed WM tower area





..and the Kings Port Area