How to Become a Railroad Tycoon
By Master Gardener Virgil Jones
Well, maybe not like James Hill, Cornelius Vanderbilt, Jay Gould or some of the other 19th century railroad tycoons, but you can build and operate a railroad in your own backyard. Garden railroads are becoming increasingly popular all over the United States. This hobby originated in Europe, and has rapidly spread throughout the United States, and what a fascinating hobby it is since it combines all aspects of gardening with the mechanics of operating a railroad.
This is an entertaining hobby for the whole family, because it involves construction of the railway itself, as well as building scale-model buildings, bridges, scenery, mountains, waterfalls and other accessories and using plants that will be more or less in scale with the layout. Some members may be interested in one or more aspects of this great hobby such as the building of the railroad itself and operating the trains, while others might prefer to landscape, build scale buildings, bridges, tunnels and other features. It can be a hobby that involves both parents and children and makes a great family project that can occupy hours and hours of quality fun time for the whole family. Not only that, but it can be a year-round project. These trains will operate during rainy weather, summer’s heat and winter’s snows (just add a snowplow to the engine).
Building a garden railway can be as simple or as elaborate as your time, money and gardening and construction abilities will allow. Some of the equipment, landscaping materials and buildings, especially the engines and cars, is expensive so it is best to start out with a simple layout, then if your interest continues, gradually increase the size and complexity of your layout. Once you start this hobby, garden railroaders say you will want to continue building because it offers so many challenges in the way of constructing and landscaping.
For those who are not familiar with this fascinating hobby, you can learn more about it through the Ozark Garden Railway Society, whose members will be hosting an open house on Saturday, September 22, 2001. There will be 14 garden railways of members throughout the 4-state area on display free of charge, as well as some great raffle prizes of garden railway equipment and accessories. Information as to the locations of these garden railways on display will be furnished later to area newspapers, so if you are interested, you will want to check these papers for details.
There are a number of ways to get information about starting a garden railway. To see some in actual operation, many botanical gardens in this country operate garden railways and it can be a fun thing for the family to visit a few of these sites while vacationing. You may get more information by joining a garden railways club. One such club is the Ozark Garden Railway Society. Their current president is Joe Levanti, whose address is: P.O. Box 516, Mt. Vernon, MO 65712. His email address is: levanti@mntvernon.net. He may be contacted for more information about the garden railways tour. He also suggests those going on the tour may want to bring their video and snap shot cameras.
Mr. Levanti advises if there are enough people interested in forming another garden railway club in this area, he will be glad to assist in getting it started.
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