“
How are you going to attract newmodelers into the hobby?
”
“That’s not what we do. They used to call us the anti-club. Look,
anybody can get an op session invite, but if they come down,
we’re going to put them in some kind of a job. They’re going to
run a train or help out in a yard. We don’t see model railroading as
a spectator sport.”
“
But you don’t let people join . . .
“
“Had to. We operate two days a month. People got unhappy
because they were standing around. There’s a sign-up sheet and
there are almost always more than 20 names on it. We can run
the railroad with 14. Some guys want to run more often but they
haven’t set anything up.
“And the county has pretty clear limits on how many people can
be in the place at one time. So we took a vote a couple years
ago, set the membership limit at 30, and we filled up just a
month or so ago.”
“
All that operations stuff sounds kind of intense.
”
“We have a lot of fun. This is a hobby. Some of these guys have
physically strenuous jobs. Some of them are running companies.
They come here to unwind. It’s not always one big happy family
– there are lots of discussions on how to do stuff, like some guys
want to jump right in and some of themwant to plan forever – but
we all get along. People go on trips together.”
“
What about somebody who wants to join?
”
“Well, people move away, or quit coming down. People don’t drop
out very often, but it happens.”
“
Dues must be pretty high, if you don’t do shows.
”
“We have a swap meet every year. One guy does a great job of
managing it, and the rest of the club pitches in to run the kitchen
and for set-up and tear-down. It works really well and always
draws a crowd and lots of good vendors.”
“
So you have modular trains running and tree-making dem-
onstrations and stuff?
”
“Nope. We don’t do that. If we had more floor space, we would
sell more sales tables. Look, people can find trees and scenery
and weathering on the Web. Any time we spent on how-to clin-
ics would take time away from planning and building the lay-
out. It’s a big job.
“The NMRA organizes meets around here a couple times a
year. Some of our people get involved in those. People read the
magazines, they have videos, they have friends . . . “
“
But you’re not nurturing the next generation of model rail-
roaders . . .
“
“Well, we’re not hand-holding them. We’re not running model
railroader day care. We’re not in the entertainment business.
“But we have people driving a hundred miles for the op ses-
sions. They bring people with them. It’s not a day out for the
bambinos, maybe, but everybody who visits says they get some
new ideas.”
MRH-Dec 2014
