Crawford & Cherokee (HO) - Robert J. Thomas

[BillyJoeBob]

Thanks Bob --

I checked out the site - they do gots lots of stuff! Great tip.

I too am a Frisco fan - from the days of the black and yellow F-units units to the vermilion and white. Grew up in Springfield. My granddad was a forman of some sort in the back shops and dad knew people there and we visited once in a while.

Thanks again
BJB

[Josef2618]

Great eye level photos. The work reminds me of Bill Henderson's Coal Belt. The ballast and roadbed profile in the prototype photos is more tahn I would have expected for the time.

[KansasBob]

A new release from Rapido, an X23 PRR Boxcar...



-Bob T.

[Cody]

That is one bright car, especially for the steam era.

- Captain Obvious

[KansasBob]

We'll have to tone it down with some weathering.

[cduckworth]

Rapido did a nice job on this model; read recently that they hired Ted Culotta so we’ll be see more steam era freight cars from them.

[KansasBob]

Parade of early 1900s gondolas. These are Westerfield resin models. The one on the left was a gift from Jim James and the Zalma Branch, the center was a build from a year or so ago, and the one on the right is my most recent build and needs some decal work for completion, along with clear and matte coatings.

Take Care All,

-Bob T.

[Cody]

Those look nice. Neat illustration of the impact of a clear coat and weathering.

[KansasBob]

I have been working on a plan for another Crawford and Cherokee (v3) as a lower deck for the new outbuilding that will also host the Wichita & Northwestern project (another thread here). Based on the town of Cherokee, but the NW quadrant of the map shown earlier in this thread, and moving around a few industries. Here is the current draft (more to come, I'm sure). This fits along two walls of the new 14 x 14 ft structure (minus wall thickness). Set around 1905-1910, it is a switching layout local to a single town at the intersection of the Parsons Sub and the Afton Sub of the Frisco, just after the acquisition (merger?) with the Kansas City - Fort Scott - and Memphis. Comments are of course welcome. (Note: North is down here)



-Bob T.

[KansasBob]

Reference map for above.

[KansasBob]

Another option that I am noodling... the reuse of several sections from the current layout, focusing on the Weir City branch line. At the time of the transition from the Memphis (or "Gulf") line to the Frisco, the town of Weir was the busiest location on the line except for KC area..... As always, comments and input are welcomed.

-Bob T.

[TimMoran]

Good evening Bob. Would this likely be a 1 train a day line? Or 3 times a week? Can't wait to see it come to life!

[KansasBob]

Tim, I’ll try to find a timetable, but in this era, there were several trains daily. Coal was marshaled from the area to a yard in Cherokee and near Pittsburg. There was also passenger service…

[Paul S.]

Coal in Kansas, that still astounds me, but the Midwest is one huge coal field under all that corn and soy beans.

[KansasBob]

[KansasBob]

Taking stock of ~pre-1915 equipment as we prepare to build the Crawford & Cherokee v3.0....

[Paul S.]

Looking forward to this, Bob!

Hey, just a small ask, would you OK with starting a new topic for V3.0? The photo you posted above would work well, too, for lead photo.

[KansasBob]

No problem! I'll do that sometime in the next week.

[KansasBob]

To answer TimMoran , here are a few artifacts:

1923 ETT courtesy of Karl Brand (a bit later than my time period, but good for the v2 of the layout). Note that originally, there were the separate KC-FS&M and the Frisco lines into town (merger around 1900), hence the Coal Branch and the Weir Branch TT. A busy place....


1905 and 1906 schedules from the newspaper (passenger)





-Bob T.

[JerryZ]

Hi Bob:

Nice photo spread of your earlier (well era later) efforts on "Running Extra".

Regards,
Jerry

[KansasBob]

Shout out to the guys here (Allen especially) who helped with the background sky on the Baldwin shot. Joe Fugate asked if he could use a few photos, and I obliged. However, I did not know which ones until the article was published.

[KansasBob]

NOTE: I have moved the version 3 build to a new thread at the request of the admins here on RMR.

https://realisticmodelrailroading.ne...okee-frisco-v3

Please join me there for future updates....