Saturday, March 22, 2014

A discrete turntable

 
 
Found in the August 1950 issue of The Model Railway News, is this fantastic turntable. I love the neatly made curtain around its perimeter, not just a plain cloth but something carefully tailored and ruched.
 
The layout belonged to PH Leigh and was built to a 6 inch track gauge in 1896 by Messrs. Lucas Davies of Farringdon Street, London at a cost of £3,000. According to the Internet, that would be worth £83,000 today. Quite a tidy sum for a model railway!
 
Not only did he pay for the railway, it was housed in a room 24 by 30ft and featured 520ft of track. There were 2 stations, a tunnel, signal boxes and goods warehouses complete with loading bank.
 
Coaches were detailed inside with mirrors, goods van doors slid and the loco ate real charcoal.
 
What an incredible model - sadly it has long since vanished. The article is written by the owners son who entitles the piece, " A forgotten model railway", but doesn't mention what happened to it. 

2 comments:

Matt Dawson said...

Found it!

http://www.gutenberg.org/files/29716/29716-h/29716-h.htm

Matt Dawson said...

And here's one of the engines:

http://www.paulfrasercollectibles.com/News/Memorabilia/2010-News-Archive/This-'mechanical-marvel-of-its-day'-could-chug-to-%C2%A335,000-at-Bonhams/4270.page