Allen McClelland and His Virginian & Ohio

by Tony Koester

Overview

Few people have had as profound an impact on model railroading as Allen McClelland. In Allen McClelland and his Virginian & Ohio, Tony Koester explains how Allen and his model railroad set scale model railroading on the path that we take for granted today. Allen's pioneering ideas on operation and design-and, most importantly, the execution of those ideas-in the 1960s and 1970s made him one of the hobby's most influential figures. From model railroading's early days, most layouts were simply collections of models without coherent themes, often with fanciful or pun-based names. Allen changed that, first by encouraging modelers to look at their layouts not as stand-alone entities, but as links in the North American rail system- looking beyond the basement. Allen showed us the advantage of using inexpensive plastic locomotives and rolling stock to save time and money while creating layouts that represent railroads, not individual models. Allen became well-known not just for his V&O's realistic scenery, setting, and theme, but for showing us how to: Use walkaround command control to take advantage of linear track plans, Choose a railroad name and theme that reflect prototype regions and railroads, Adopt operating procedures based on prototype practices

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781627009225
Publisher:	Kalmbach Media
Publication date:	12/23/2022
Pages:	112
Product dimensions:	8.10(w) x 10.50(h) x 0.30(d)

Table of Contents

Introduction

The revolution began here 4

The Virginian & Ohio led to dramatic changes in the hobby

Chapter 1 Beyond the basement 8

Allen taught us to think of our railroads as part of the continental rail network

Chapter 2 Linear layout design 20

Allen McClelland didn't invent it, but he made it practical

Chapter 3 Walkaround command control 26

In one stroke, Allen created the way we'd control our railroads in the future

Chapter 4 The development of Centralized Traffic Control 30

Running the V&O realistically meant wiring decks of rotary switches

Chapter 5 The debut of plastic models 40

Allen saw them as timesavers to better enable building a large, operating railroad

Chapter 6 Plausibility over showmanship 56

Modeling the ordinary made it easier to achieve a believable model railroad

Chapter 7 What's in a name? 64

The era of punny and whimsical names ebbed when the V&O debuted

Chapter 8 The "Good Enough" Principle 68

Set the bar reasonably high, and bring, everything up to that level

Chapter 9 The Appalachian Lines and subsequent V&O railroads 74

Tales of a model railroad merger and two relocations

Chapter 10 The McClelland legacy 84

Testimonials from modelers who were influenced by Allen

Chapter 11 Photo gallery 104

More V&O photos worthy of review