Traditional "Rough Castings" and Hand-Drawn Blueprints for Small-Scale, Coal-Fired Live Steam Locomotive Designs From the 1920s-1960s.
The "Wandering Locomotive Books" are now permanently housed at Friends Models. These historic albums from the 1930s were how live steamers shared their projects with other hobbyists in the days before the Internet.
The 3/4" scale "Yankee Shop Hudson", designed by Laverne Langworthy.
3/4" scale castings sets
Tom Thumb
Castings for Hiraoka locomotives
0-4-0 "Dinky" Shifter; an H.K. Porter type switcher
Charlie Purinton "ANGUS" 4-4-2
USRA 0-6-0 Switcher
Baltimore & Ohio RR 4-6-2 "President Washington"
New York Central 4-6-4 Hudson
1" scale castings sets:
1" scale Baltimore & Ohio "Ten Wheeler"
Twenty Six Years Ago.....
Summer, 1991: I snapped this photo of Mr. Charles A. "Carl" Purinton running a 7-1/4" gauge Pennsylvania E-6 "Atlantic" at a private track in Danvers, Massachusetts. I was about 19 years of age, and Mr. Purinton was about 93 years of age, at the time of the photo.
Mr. Charles Purinton runs an 1-1/2" scale 4-4-2 at Danvers, Mass. in 1991. Photo by John Kurdzionak.
Back in 1932, on a suggestion from "LBSC" in Britain, Mr. Purinton founded the "Brotherhood of Live Steamers". He died in 1999 at age 101.
The scene captured in the above photo is rare. Mr. Purinton did not run locomotives in 1-1/2" scale often, he most often ran 3/4" scale on a "highline". Nor did he wear his "wide brimmed" hat often. And, the date of 1991 is significant: by the 1990s, seeing Mr. Purinton run ANYTHING was a special treat not witnessed too often.
Mr. Purinton flew a primitive type of "seaplane" in the World War I era, and was based out of Pensacola, Florida. Later on, he was a fireman on the Boston and Maine Railroad, most often firing the "Atlantics" that traveled to and from his hometown of Marblehead, Mass. When promoted to "engineer", he did it for a day and quit his position at the end of that very same day. He just wanted to say that he had "done it", and once he had, he felt it was time to "quit" and to move on.
The private railroad in the above photo was abandoned some 15 years ago due to the health of the owner, and then removed entirely. The property was sold, the owner passed away, and today, nature is quickly reclaiming this very location. There are no more steamers running through here.
Enjoy this photo, folks, as there are not many like it. Thank you for looking.
It's June of 1987, and all is well. John Kurdzionak has just finished the 10th grade, and he is tending to his 3/4" scale "Friends Models" 4-6-6 Tanker at the Bass River Railroad in Litchfield, NH. It was John's love for THIS locomotive that began EVERYTHING you see on this website today. Thanks for visiting www.friendsmodels.com.
Individual Visitors ("unique users") since January 17th, 2008
