The Detroit and Yukon Mining Company, remember?
A LONG time ago I was working on an 009 project called Dawson Creek, inspired by the narrow gauge mining railways in the Klondike - and area of the Yukon in northern Canada...
This layout was built in a period of great upheaval in my life, and when things settled down I just didn't have the space for it, so the layout itself, with it's lovely Shinohara track and turnouts, was sold. The stock though, that lived on!
In recent times I've even added to it with the cut down 'Yellow Aster' Porter I offered in the EuroNG range... but equally, this Porter, number 1, had lost its chassis to another project (the Huwood mining engine if I remember, and then that ended up under the Jung!). However, I picked up another wonderful Bachmann N gauge Percy earlier in the year. I've finally got around to re-fitting the parts to the chassis, it runs beautifully and seeing it posed here, on Coalbridge, with the autumnal colours has me hankering to do something more with it... the thing that has always put me off, is the type of layout I would need to build could be somewhat of a caricature... but Chris's wonderful G-9 experiments and looking back at these hand crafted models has reminded me of something about me, that these models are as much of me as the rather neat N gauge examples of more recent times... maybe a little bit of the Klondike could be quite an enjoyable little distraction? For now, I'm enjoying myself and what else matters... until next time, more soon...
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Does it have to be mining? Have you come across the two portable railways?
ReplyDeletehttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Huntsville_and_Lake_of_Bays_Transportation_Company
https://ginosrailblog.blogspot.com/2017/12/the-marion-carry-railroad.html
http://www.carendt.com/small-layout-scrapbook/page-44-december-2005/
And one of my favourites, the Sorrento tramway in Australia:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/uon/19719685869/
*portage railways
DeleteYes aware of those… yes mining, I’ve a connection to the Yukon, it’s nice to consider that in miniature and perhaps reimagine it slightly in more of a caricature manner.
DeleteSorry Stuart if this sounded abrupt, I think I was typing my reply in haste and didn’t add the polite flourishes we tend to heap on a message afterwards! Re-reading it now I sound a right idiot!
DeleteThese little Porters have a charm all of their own...I've owned one in LGB which I repainted in a similar scheme to yours, also an early Bachmann 0n30 example, and there's a Grandt Line 0n30 kit (without drive) lurking in the garage which I will probably sell as I'm unlikely to build it.
ReplyDeleteI rather like the idea of a little mining layout, though I really need to get rid of some rather than add more!
Thanks Simon. They’re characterful little things aren’t they!
DeleteThat Porter also looks like those on the sugar cane tramways in Hawaii although many were 0-4-2. In that case it could Detroit and Kauai Milling #1 and far removed from the frozen north
ReplyDeleteBest regards
Alan
Interesting idea Alan, thank you,
DeleteHi James, I made a model of this same engine in Sn3 over twenty years ago! It was my first steam engine, and I started with a Backwoods Miniatures kit. Lovely kit, and I intended to build it straight from the box, but at the point where you had to decide on running board placement, I started to look for a prototype. Enter Brian Pate, who was our local narrow gauge aficionado at the time. He was able to point me at DYMCo #1, which is preserved in Dawson City, where he frequently visited his family. Brian modelled the Klondike Mines Railway, and had a scene at Bear Creek that portrayed the massive gold dredges under construction. I can't recall if he ever got around to modelling #1 and her sisters, but they were used at that construction site after the mining company gave up (If I recall, the DYMCo was about coal, not gold), and it was always his intention to have them buzzing about the site delivering dredge parts. Brian's Dawson City is now at the visitor centre in town along with his wonderful dredge model. Eric L Johnson's book, Mining Railways of the Klondike, has several photos of these diminutive engines dwarfed by the construction site.
ReplyDeleteHi there, thank you for the wonderful comment. I’m familiar with all of the mining railways at Dawson - I have Iron Horse to the Klondike which mentions all of them I think. I am rather taken with Alan’s idea on re-purposing the initials though. We will see…
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