HO Scale - Scratchbuilding with Detail

Growing up in the East end of Louisville, Kentucky during the 50's and 60's gave me lots of opportunities to watch the Louisville & Nashville trains pass only 200 feet behind my home. My first real layout was an HO scale beauty that my father helped me put together when I was 8 years old. We built in on a ¾" sheet of plywood that would roll under my bed when it wasn't in use.

Fast forward many years to the year 2006 when the local lake near my Northeast Georgia home was so low after a two year drought that I couldn't use our boat anymore. Facing sheer boredom, I purchased the DPM "1st National Bank" kit and assembled it after reading up on construction and weathering. I enjoyed the experience so much that I bought another kit...and then another...and I was hooked.

With all the finished kits mounting up the only logical thing to do was build a railroad....and so the Richlawn Railroad was born. My wife Midge helps me with scenery and was the one who encouraged me to expand the layout into the present layout room. My favorite part of railroading is still structures, with scenery a close second. I love watching the L & N trains rumbling through the landscape set in the 60's and 70's as it takes me back to those sweet childhood memories

The railroad is a freelance HO scale of Kentucky in the 60's and 70's with 102 ft of mainline, a freight yard, a downtown area, and a mountain area. I've used Woodland Scenics products for a number of structures, the waterfall, figures, and landscape material. I find the quality and value excellent! I am currently expanding with another 30 ft of mainline and sidings for operations.

One of the photos is a kitbash of two (HO scale) B. Moore Catalog/Showroom kits...(that) won a second place at a NMRA contest in Birmingham, Al. The building has been narrowed both on depth and width, the overhead door removed, and additional floors added. The building has a complete first floor interior and interior detail on the other floors. Much of my downtown area on my HO layout is DPM and I love building the DPM kits. I have included below a picture of my downtown area that includes a number of your kits (and also kits from other manufacturers).