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| Image sourced Narrow Gauge and Short Line Gazette, Nov / Dec '92 |
At the OVAR swap meet a couple of Sundays ago I bought a small collection of back issues of the Narrow Gauge and Short Line Gazette - 50 more-or-less random issues from the mid-1980s to the mid-2010s for $3. I've been spending some pleasant evenings leafing through their pages, seeing the sights. I was quite happy to find an article in the Nov / Dec '92 issue called The Influence of Hugh Boutell by Bob Brown, the magazine's longtime editor and publisher. You may recall I wrote a little about Boutell awhile back on his use of Pretty Village cardboard cutout buildings on his layout. Although the NGSLG didn't answer all my questions about Boutell's use of structures, it did answer a few other ones.
The NGSLG article showed a high resolution version of the photo that appeared in the August '34 issue of Popular Science - that's the one I've shown above. It allowed me to get a better view of the buildings, and the image strengthens my opinion that they are Pretty Village items, which I've noted in the image with red boxes
Second, it's mentioned that the layout in the photo is 1-1/4 inch gauge. His pioneering OO layout (which I erroneously thought was HO), was built much earlier between 1925 and 1929.
Mr. Brown ends the article by noting he acquired Boutell's structures along with his other models in 1979. That's a long time ago now, but I wonder if he still has them?
This was a good article, I remember reading through it and being memorized by the many small structures he had built for his model railroad. I didn't recall, but I did visit the link you provided and it seems I made a post about this article.
ReplyDeleteThose Narrow Gauge Gazette back copies are priceless. All of my collections of NGG followed me to my new home, where as many of my other publications were either given away or donated before we moved.
I'm wondering if any of those buildings still exist. Boutell's layout may have been one of the first so-called 'scenic layouts'.
DeleteI suppose we know of a few that survived. That reminds me, you wrote an article sometime ago, where you used "paper" to create a office building, I will need to search for the article, but it got me wanting to use paper again for a structure. And I had wanted to try other materials. ;)
DeleteDoes the office appear in this post:
Deletehttps://30squaresofontario.blogspot.com/2022/03/my-lot-in-life-memories-of-toronto-in.html
Funny you should mention using paper to build office buildings. Today I pulled out the drawings I did for the Hartley Tower (an office tower very similar to one in Chicago where Bob's office was located in the old Bob Newhart Show). I spent a lot of time thinking about how some strategic use of paper panels would simplify construction. I'm thinking that might be my next project if I can get the construction details settled in my mind.
Aha! Here's the one and only post I did on the Hartley Tower way, way back in Jan 2020, just before it all broke loose pandemic-wise:
Deletehttps://30squaresofontario.blogspot.com/2020/01/hartley-tower-drawing.html
I found the post I was referring to: https://30squaresofontario.blogspot.com/2021/04/scrap-building.html. Thanks for being so inspirational.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the kind words!
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