Page 12 - September October 2017

Quisling CA in 1954
Brian Moore
When I built my HO module, Quisling CA,
I wanted to have the option to run both post-1980 trains on it at the club and look the part, but, with minimal effort, be able to
operate my 1954-era Southern Pacific Railroad stock on a reasonably period-accurate-looking layout too.
This proved quite an easy thing to achieve. With a bit of thought and investment I was able to build structures that were common to both eras. The good news is that, upon examination of lots of pictures and videos of small-town central and northern California, covering the intervening 30-40 years, not a lot seemed to have changed!
The familiar type of semi-anonymous industrial structures formed a common background to the railroad in both eras. Sure, there were some subtle differences – for ex- ample, the amount of television aerials, electric and other cables strewn everywhere on vertical poles, and air-con- ditioning were the major changes. These features were too problematical to be swapped over easily, but thankful- ly not too “in your face” to notice immediately either.
The good news was further sustained by finding out that there were far more older-built brick buildings present in both eras than I originally assumed, allowing me to use
Train #99, The Coast Daylight, runs non-stop though Quisling
12 ROUNDHOUSE - October 2017
several DPM and other kits in my depiction of the main line running down the middle of a town-centre street.
The double-head flashing warning lights that I’d proto- typically festooned the street-running section with, were happily correct too, across the time divide. The street markings were copied from several pictures taken over the years of a similar US road junction with a railroad track, which also hadn’t changed between at least 1955 and 1981 – good enough for me.
Dual-control RSD-5 SP 5307 pulls a cut of tank cars
Motor vehicle type is perhaps the easiest marker of a specific time period, and it’s a doddle just to keep two sets of appropriate vehicles. For the 1954-California
time frame, nothing will say “early-fifties-SP” more than
a Pacific Motor Trucking truck-and-trailer combination in the pre-1955 original “daylight” colours – no silver paint anywhere. Several can be seen in the appended pictures. I picked up a good-looking “fifties” HO-scale taxi recently that I thought would fit in, but then noticed that it was a 1955 model, and cast it aside. Whilst there may be other bloopers I choose to make or don’t know about, that’s not one of them.
I selected a smattering of suitable figures, mostly Preiser, for placing across the layout. The great majority of figures I permanently attach to any layout are those which are standing still. Even then, I try to avoid them standing by
Two SP cab forwards travel past on a caboose hop photos by Brian Moore