Was E. L. Moore Gil Mellé’s successor?: A bibliography and some wild speculation

Awhile back I wrote about how jazz great Gil Mellé was also a prolific Railroad Model Craftsman writer in the 1960s. I spent a little time compiling a bibliography of his Railroad Model Craftsman stories as I want to have a reference when, hopefully, I get around to building a couple of his projects – I particularly like his Rail Cutting Shed  that appeared in the May '61 issue of RMC.

I thought compiling this bibliography would be a simple task, and maybe a little tedious. It turned out to be a bit more demanding than I had expected. RMC didn’t appear to have the highest standards for copy at the time. There were numerous instances of table of contents titles not matching story titles, mismatched attribution, and attribution given in the story, but missing from the table of contents. Hopefully, I’ve straightened things out for the Gil Mellé stories. In particular, I should note that as far as titles are concerned, if there was a conflict I’ve used the ones printed on the stories instead of the ones in table of contents. If you see problems with this attempt at a bibliography, please leave a comment so I can fix them up.

1960

Oct: Oldfield Coal & Supply Co.

Dec: Polyurethane for Scenic Construction

     Lehigh Valley Icing Platform

     2 single panel cartoons

1961

Jan: Lehigh Icing Platform, Part 2
     2 single panel cartoons

Feb: L. V. Sandhouse
     1 single panel cartoon

Mar: From Engine Shed to a Superdetailed Powerhouse
     1 single panel cartoon

Apr: Customizing Tru-Scale's Blacksmith Car and Jail House into a 

     Superdetailed Blacksmith Shop and Flat Car

     Customize Those Plastic Buildings
     1 single panel cartoon

May: Rail Cutting Shed

Jun: Black Bart Mine

     Transformer Poles

Jul: Gondola Loads
     2 single panel cartoons

Aug: Highways are High Points
     Park Statue
     2 single panel cartoons

Sep: Build this 50 Ton Composite Hopper
     Cartoon

Oct: A Dust Collector
     Industrial Chimney
     1 single panel cartoon

Nov: Old Time Sand House
     Industrial Smokejacks
     2 single panel cartoons

Dec: Vertical Tank

     Pump & Bolier House
     2 single panel cartoons

1962

Jan: The Security Fence

     Customizing and Superdetailing Suydam's Chemical Factory

Feb: Americanize the Airfix Traveling Crane

     2 single panel cartoons

Mar: Easy to Build Sound Light Unit

     A & S Wheel Foundry

     1 single panel cartoon

Apr: Horizontal Oil Tank

     Norfolk & Western Coaling Tower

     2 single panel cartoons

May: RR Police Headquarters

Jun: Customizing a Faller Freight Station

Jul: Quickie Quonset

     1 single panel cartoon

Aug: Wayside Stock Yard

     1 multi-panel cartoon

Sep: Water Car

     1 multi-panel cartoon

Oct: Lehigh Valley Office and Crew Quarters

Nov: Portable Car Jack

1963

Jan: Air Raid Warning Signal

Feb: 100 Ton Coaler

Mar: 100 Ton Coaler [JL: Part 2 of the Feb story]

Apr: Building a Split Level Lumber Yard

May: Operating Factory

Jun: Oak Hill Pit Head, Part 1 of 3

Jul: Oak Hill Pit Head, Part 2 of 3

Aug: Customizing the Oak Hill Pithead, Part 3 of 3

Sep: Scenery to Improve Your Layout

     Portable Studied Clutter

Oct: Mine Site Detailing

1964

Jan: Mountain Flotation Plant

Feb: Mountain Flotation Plant, Part 2

Aug: A Car Barn For Your Layout

Sep: Car Barn, Part 2

     1 single panel cartoon

Nov: Customizing a Tru-Scale Factory
Dec: Signal Tower, part 2

1965

Jan: Logging Mill, Part 1

Feb: Logging Mill, Part 2

Mar: Howe Truss Bridge

Apr: Build a Tie treating Creosote Plant

May: Los Angeles Junction Diesel Shed

Jun: Scratchbuilding a Styrene Arch Bridge

Jul: Diesel Fuel Tank, Part II [JL: Although it says Part II it's a single part story]

Dec: SP Parts Servicing Depot

If you drop by 30Squares frequently you know that I think everything somehow relates to E. L. Moore :-) and this bibliography is no exception. The thing that struck me as I was compiling it was that during Mr. Mellé’s high output years in the first half of the ‘60s, Mr. Moore’s publications were more-or-less equally spread out across RMC, Model Railroader and Model Trains. E. L. Moore wasn’t predominately being published by RMC; it was just a smattering of stories, and his output in RMC was quite low in comparison to Gil Mellé’s. But when Mr. Mellé’s run ended in ’65, E. L. Moore’s publication rate in RMC took off from then until the end of the ’60s. My speculation is that when Gil Mellé stopped publishing in RMC – likely because his musical career was taking off again -  E. L. Moore was his de facto successor since he could also produce stories at a high rate. Going further with the speculation: if Gille Mellé hadn’t left the scene, it’s an open question as to whether E. L. Moore would have had the impact that he did, and whether any of those AHM plastic kits based on a number of his RMC projects from ’67 and ’69 would have been manufactured.

Well, that's all for now. I leave you with Gil Mellé and his awesome Percussotron.

[4 March 2019 update: Vince cross-checked my list against the online model railroad index and found Mr. Mellé's Dec '64 story was missing from my list, so I've updated it. Turns out Dec '64 seems to be missing from my RMC collection :-( I note that the online index leaves out the Gil Mellé articles that appeared in RMC's Right o' way Models column. It's easy to miss because Mr. Mellé is only credited in small print at the bottom of each column, and not in the magazines' tables of contents - indexing tools would likely have a problem with that, score one for us humans! From what I've read so far, it appears that all stories that appeared in Right o' way Models were by Gil Mellé.]

[12 September 2020: Added references to cartoons Gil Mellé published in 1961 as well as a project from Nov '61 that I had overlooked.]

[14 September 2020: Added more cartoons to 1961 as well as 2 missing Right o' Way Models stories. He published 15 cartoons in 1961.]

 

[16 September 2020: Added 7 cartoon references to 1962.]

[17 September 2020: Added the article Portable Studied Clutter to Sept 1963.]

[18 September 2020: Added 2 cartoon references to 1960.]

[19 September 2020: Added a cartoon reference to 1964.]

[30 September 2020: Added a cartoon reference to Mar '62]