Prototoype copies Gamages 50's Xmas layout?

This section allows guests to comment or ask questions. Posts from guests require explicit approval (which generally takes a day or so), before they appear, so that we can prevent unwanted spam.

User avatar
grovenor-2685
Forum Team
Posts: 3918
Joined: Sun Jun 29, 2008 8:02 pm

Re: Prototoype copies Gamages 50's Xmas layout?

Postby grovenor-2685 » Mon Aug 16, 2021 6:13 pm

So what is the connection to Gamages?
Regards
Keith
Grovenor Sidings

User avatar
zebedeesknees
Posts: 330
Joined: Mon Jul 12, 2010 5:15 pm

Re: Prototoype copies Gamages 50's Xmas layout?

Postby zebedeesknees » Mon Aug 16, 2021 6:45 pm

grovenor-2685 wrote:So what is the connection to Gamages?

The extent of it possibly Keith. I remember it well, my parents took me there for several years consecutively. It was the most vast model railway I had ever seen, impressed a sub-teen mightily. The quality did not compare with the Gorre & Daphetid though..

Ted.
(A purists' purist)

bécasse
Posts: 377
Joined: Sun Jun 17, 2018 8:26 am

Re: Prototoype copies Gamages 50's Xmas layout?

Postby bécasse » Mon Aug 16, 2021 9:18 pm

The Gamage's model railway featured Lionel American O (sometimes called Q) gauge tinplate models and Gamages also sold Lionel items. The layout was certainly large and impressive. For a period in the 1950s it was managed by Frank Briggs who was then a prominent member of The Model Railway Club (and, indeed, subsequently Chairman thereof) and the Crawley Model Railway Society.

I have heard it said that Bertram Otto, the entertainer, was involved in the initial set-up of the Gamage's railway, which is possible, he was a lifelong model railway enthusiast and certainly later exhibited a large layout at various seaside locations, but I have seen no actual evidence that that was the case and certainly Frank never mentioned it.

The Gamage's store at Holborn Circus closed in 1972 but I suspect that the railway had gone long before that.

Enigma
Posts: 533
Joined: Tue Aug 13, 2013 2:49 pm

Re: Prototoype copies Gamages 50's Xmas layout?

Postby Enigma » Tue Aug 17, 2021 1:10 pm

I hope they didn't run these on there!

Gamages.1.A.jpg
You do not have the required permissions to view the files attached to this post.

User avatar
BryanJohnson
Posts: 181
Joined: Wed Jul 23, 2008 7:45 pm

Re: Prototoype copies Gamages 50's Xmas layout?

Postby BryanJohnson » Tue Aug 17, 2021 1:58 pm

Taking a 1 foot radius curve in O gauge with no control over the speed doesn't sound good.

proto87stores

Re: Prototoype copies Gamages 50's Xmas layout?

Postby proto87stores » Tue Aug 17, 2021 3:57 pm

I was struck by the article's real vistas of towering mountainsides alternating with deep gorges and spidery railroad bridges crossing between. That very popular display layout concept was very cleverly modelled on a floor to ceiling section of the aforementioned Gorre and Dapheteid. And the Gamages layout strove for an obviously commercially limited similar impressive effect. But even, so it inspired me and I suspect a lot of other Home Counties then pre-teen youngsters, to labor away making some sort of scenery on their own train sets.

One awkward problem is that such real life vistas are in mostly uninhabited areas, so the modelling of also usually desired busy train stations, freight yards, urban and industrial landscapes can't be believably modelled in close proximity. You need a space such as "Miniatur Wunderland's" to achieve it in a really credible way.

Andy

User avatar
Tim V
Posts: 2868
Joined: Tue Jul 29, 2008 4:40 pm

Re: Prototoype copies Gamages 50's Xmas layout?

Postby Tim V » Tue Aug 17, 2021 6:28 pm

Ah yes, the Gory and Defeated (that is how, apparently, it was pronounced), stunning model making full use of vertical as well as horizontal real estate. I was reading in Model Railroader that it was destroyed by fire a couple of days after the owner's death.
Tim V
(Not all railways in Somerset went to Dorset)


Return to “Guest Book”

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: ClaudeBot and 0 guests