Well I've been right here at home in Maine for the past few months but personal life has taken me through a few detours from my modeling. First and most important is that my wife has undergone a major surgery and I had to make some changes in schedule. Cleaning house, preparing meals and general care giving has replaced sitting at my model bench and the computer. To set minds at ease, my wife is recovering well and will be back to her energetic and active self quite soon. The other chief reason for my hiatus is the lack of heat in my office/work area. Trying to model in 1/87 scale is next to impossible when shivering from the invasive Maine winter cold. My solutions to this have been temporary and expensive. OK, so much for my excuse list and now on to what I have been able to accomplish.
I was able to complete the module for the Springfield show and got some terrific response to it at the show. It was great to meet and speak with all those there and discuss 1/87 scale modeling for the three days. I added a small rural gas station to the module which is constructed of the same Evergreen styrene clapboard as the farm house. I would invite you to view some photos of it as it was displayed at the show on the new Route 87 web site that was created to give modelers a chance to participate in this endeavor. Many thanks to Andy Madden for his work on this site.
I've had a figure of a lady carrying laundry for quite some time and had to work her into a scene so I made a clothes line and some hanging wash for the back of the farmhouse. The shirt and pants are painted tissue paper. There were several new vehicles made that I placed on the diorama that include a Model AA wrecker with a little more accurate version of the Weaver Auto Crane than what I have done before. This is of course the Jordan Ford as the base model. I also built a wrecker bed and wrecker unit for the Sylvan '47 Ford cab over out of styrene. And lastly, what would any respectable farm be without a decent truck for hay, grain or livestock transport? For this I used the Sylvan '50 Chevy cab over with a metal sided body suitable for any of these duties. I went to my model building friend Ralph Ratcliffe for the great set of wheels for this model.
Aside from all that, there are some pieces on the workbench ready to be finished and lots of unbuilt kits sitting in the shelves at the moment. Hopefully with the advent of warmer weather I will be back in full swing soon. Thanks to all who have written with their concerns and well wishes. More to come.....
