The E. L. Moore eBook is done….and it’s free!

First things first. The book is available in two formats: pdf and ePub. Download whichever one you like, or both, they’re free:

The Model Buildings of E. L. Moore (pdf)

The Model Buildings of E. L. Moore (ePub)

The eBook is 225 pages long and contains 617 high resolution images. The pdf version weighs in at a hefty 278.8 MB, while the ePub is a slightly slimmer 249.3 MB. It also has chapters discussing E. L. Moore’s life as a model maker, raconteur, accidental kit designer, and folk artist, as well as a bit of his personal history. An extensive bibliography finishes things up. 

I’ve chosen to produce an eBook at this time and wrap up what’s been found about E. L. Moore as I’m concerned that one day soon Google, or Alphabet, or whatever they’re called these days, will pull the plug on Blogger, and the E. L. Moore content I’ve posted here for the past 10 years will suddenly disappear. An eBook will help it live a bit longer.

Also, the eBook format allows the information that has been presented as a sequence of posts in time to be structured into a more logical narrative. Now, the book isn’t just posts that have had covers slapped on them; no, the posts formed the source material, and all the information has been rewritten, cleaned up as best I could, and reorganized.   

Sample pages

As a child in the late 1960s, and on throughout the 1970s, I loved to read and write. I’d read just about anything I could get my hands on. When I first ‘discovered’ Mr. Moore’s work in the summer of 1973, it was in the pages of a magazine, and for years I continued to read all the model railroading magazines I could find. My introduction to model railroading was via the written word and photographs, and later the hobby shop - there weren't any near my house. Those old articles also introduced me to the idea of exchanging technical information and discoveries via articles and papers, which helped to set up the beginnings of my career in science and engineering. 

While on the E. L. Moore trail for the last 10 years one thing I found quite interesting that was new to me was that Mr. Moore was also a voracious reader, not to mention a regular writer who seemed to have his fingers glued to his typewriter. At one point in the 1950s he claimed to have a library of nearly 1,000 volumes, and I later learned he was a regular patron of his local library, didn't watch or own a tv, and read a newspaper or two every day. And we know he was a dyed-in-the-wool lifetime letter writer with an extensive correspondence. I kind of feel a Fellowship of the Word with him :-) So, look, if you want to compensate me for this book, why not send some money over to a literacy charity in your part of the world. The ability to read and write is just as important today as it has ever been, and still has the power to unlock imaginations.

Well, that’s it for me for awhile. I hope you enjoy the book, and happy Saint Patrick's Day!

ELM Epilogue: 2 outta 3 ain't bad

That's a photo of the Iron Age Mfg. Co., built by D. Russell Young, Jr., winner of the RMC / Dremel Kitbashing Award in the November 1976 issue of Railroad Model Craftsman. Of the three plastic kits that form the basis of this project, two of them are AHM E. L. Moore kits: the Gruesome Casket Company and the Molasses Mine. The third is Revell's classic Superior Bakery. The project is an excellent example of '70s style kitbashing based on three of the era's most popular and commonly available kits - although the Superior Bakery kit originated much earlier. Also, I was surprised to see the Molasses Mine in a project where it seemed like a perfectly sensible component :-)

ELM Epilogue: Did E. L. Moore get a D- in Structural Engineering?

This refers to E. L. Moore's Car Repair Shed described in the November 1969 RMC (page 34). I was quite intrigued with the model and decided to build one myself. However, I found that Moore's model had rafters spaced 12 feet apart which, in real life, would not be practical as the roof would become "wavy" in a very short time. Hence, my rafters have three foot centers, and the uprights are five feet apart.... From a letter by R. Vergeylen of Quebec and printed in the Safety Valve column of the March 1970 issue of Railroad Model Craftsman. Turns out that back in the '70s I wasn't any better. My engine house would have collapsed under the first snowfall....

ELM Epilogue: E. L. Moore, a frustrated Nader Raider?

We note that Ralph Nader has criticized the railroads for dumping toilet wastes over some quarter million miles of railroad right of way. Unlike airplanes and buses, which dump human excrement into chemical tanks for disposal at the destination, most railroad equipment just flushes the waste on the right of way. And, here, all these years, we've clamped down on our beloved E. L. Moore who has been hankering to do a bit on outdoor privies. Moore, an expert on the subject, has made them in many variations, including one made of bricks and another with wagon wheels. So sayeth Harold H. Carstens in the Notes on an Old Timetable column in the March 1970 issue of Railroad Model Craftsman.

ELM Epilogue: The Case of the Photographer's Doppelganger - Solved!

[On the left, E. L. Moore's photographer figure, whose construction he described in Put Your Figures to Work published in the July '57 issue of Model Railroader and appeared in a number of his published photographs - photo from E. L. Moore's archives. On the right is an homage to E. L. Moore's photographer figure built by Bob Hayden from a Revell figure - photo courtesy of Dave Frary (the original was in colour; I created this trimmed black-and-white version for comparison purposes.)]

Last week I was reading through some issues of Railroad Model Craftsman from the '70s. In the February '77 issue I came across a photo by Bob Hayden that included the ELM-like photographer figure I chanced upon in his and Dave Frary's Elk River Line article in the May '70 issue of RMC. I figured I'd try and contact Mr. Hayden and see if he could shed some light on whether the figure was influenced in any way by E. L. Moore, or maybe was simply a commercial item, or maybe something else.

I contacted Mr. Hayden via his online bookstore, and he graciously answered my question. Below is a slightly edited version of his reply,

I do remember that the figure was based on the one in E.L. Moore’s photos. I think it started with a Revell figure, one of the few to-scale figures that we had back in the days before Preiser, Merten, and the others. Wire tripod legs, a little block of wood to hold them together, and a bit of cloth or tissue for the cover. Probably took more time to paint than to make. There may have been a tiny reflective jewel on the front to suggest a lens.

Mr. Frary provided confirmation, and kindly provided a colour photo, a black-and-white converted snippet of which I've included in the introductory photo to this post. He also mentioned that he too had built a photographer, but based on a Campbell figure.

A small mystery solved and another addition to the E. L. Moore story.