Welcome to the original Delaware, Maryland, New
Jersey and Pennsylvania model railroad open house site.
2018 brings the quad-state open houses back to the site that
was started in 2006! You will find listings of open
houses as you always have on our easy to navigate pages.
This year will
bring even more information than before. We will be
including a picture of the layout owner, along with a brief
description of their layout, and a layout picture in the
rotating images at the top of each page.
As always, the process of collecting dates
for the 2018 open houses will begin in August of 2018.
If you've never held an open house, and would like to,
please contact either Joe Walters (DE), Fran Giacoma (MD),
Earl Paine (PA) or PJ Mattson (NJ)
from the links below.
Thanks to all who
donated so generously towards the maintenance of this site.
We hope your generosity will continue this year. Look to the
left side of this site for a link for your donations.
Our Facebook page is very active with visitors posting
photos. Layout owners are also able to post pictures of
their layouts to entice visitors. The Facebook page is "Model
Railroad Openhouse Schedule." Please join our social
community and participate.
Meet the Model Railroad Open House
team:
|
Joe Walters
|
Joe is the head coordinator for the site, and the
Delaware coordinator. Joe
has loved trains most of his life. After serving in
the Marines, he started working for the Reading
Railroad. For the next 32 years he worked for
Reading, Conrail, and Amtrak in the Mechanical Dept.
His layout, the Northeast lines, a freelanced short
line is an operating railroad, that meets once a month. Joe has Easy DCC and has sound in 90% of his
locomotives. Joe is an active member of the NMRA,
Philly division. |
|
|
Fran Giacoma
|
Fran is the Maryland Coordinator and the
administrator of our Facebook page. Fran has
loved trains since getting his first set at 4. He
turned that passion into a 35 year career with
Conrail and CSX. His 12’x 20’ layout depicts the B&O
RR Shenandoah Subdivision set in the fall of 1956.
It is an all diesel (with sound) operation using
wireless DCC (Digitrax) and run by timetable & train
order. It features 4 working CPL signals, 3 grade
crossing flashers, and has 95% of the scenery
complete. |
|
Earl
Paine |
Earl Southeastern Pennsylvania
coordinator. Earl Paine
lives in Skippack, PA, and has been active in the
Philly Division since 1988. He has served on the
Philly Division Board and has been active as the
division newsletter editor since 2007. He currently
is involved in the NMRA AP Program, and helps
coordinate the AP application process through the
area MMR’s. Since his retirement from public school
education, he has been modeling the Reading Main
line in 1976 from Conshohocken to Reading, PA. |
|
PJ
Mattson |
PJ is the New Jersey coordinator.
I'm a Master Model Railroader #467. At present I an
the President of the MER. My railroad
Raccoon Valley was featured in Model Railroading
in November 2005. I am the NMRA/MER NJ Division AP
director. I coordinate the Friday Night operation
sessions for our Friday Night Operators group. I
have been retired for 15 years and enjoy working and
operating on model railroads.
|
|
|
Karen Darling
|
Karen is the internet coordinator. Karen
has been a raifan as long as she can remember since first seeing her
grandfather's American Flyer layout that took up two
spare bedrooms. Her other grandparents lived
along the Penn Central line outside of Newark. Hear
a train coming, she'd be found at the end of their lane
waiting. She now lives along the Delmarva
Central/Delmarva Secondary
just north of the C&D canal and has a garden
railroad. She originally started doing a
website for "G-Day" for the garden guys and offered
to do the same for the November open houses back in
2006. |
NOTE: If you are hosting an
open house and have NOT sent a picture
of your layout that you would like featured in the rotating pictures
at the top of each page, please email it to Karen. Each picture
should be in a "landscape" format. I'd prefer you send the full size image, let me do
the cropping. Keep in mind
that I need to use a portion of the picture that will show your
trains and/or layout in the 500 x 200 pixel area. I'll let you
know if it is acceptable. Due to the large number of folks
participating, only one picture from each person will be used. If
your layout has a name and website, please let me know and I will
include it in the listing.
We are also working to include a photo of the layout owners.
Please send a picture of yourself along with the layout picture.
A picture taken of you in front of your layout with no others or
bright lights in the background is best.
