DAVID TUTWILER - PROGRAM 602

CINCINNATI HOLIDAY LAYOUTS - PROGRAM 608

It was a gorgeous day today as we left northern Indiana.  The trip was uneventful down to Cincinnati except for all the traffic around Indianapolis.  I remember when I first started going to “Circle City.”  There were no motels that I could find, and certainly no freeways.  Of course, that was back in the 1960’s, so times have certainly changed.  We arrived in the Cincinnati, and checked into the hotel.  We then went up to Duvue Park, for some shots of an overview of the city.  It really was a great looking place to get the overview called for in the script.  I guess Cincinnati will always live in our memories of TV crews as the home of "WKRP in Cincinnati."   It was a TV show from the 80’s.  It gave Howard Hessman and Loni Anderson career boosts, but it was a special series for all of us in broadcasting.  Because while the general audience laughed at the characters, we all worked with them.  We then had a dickens of a time finding the hotel recommended place for dinner. I don’t know what we did before cell phones.  A call on the mobile, and we were directed right to the place. It was an Italian place called Pompillios. And it was quite good.  I’d recommend it.  If you can find it. 

It is definitely looking like winter. The weather days that there is a storm moving our way, and should get here in time for our trip home.  But today, we headed off to the Cincinnati Union Terminal, which houses two Dunham Studio designed layouts. One is a permanent S gauge layout called Cincinnati in Motion, and the other is a seasonal layout called Holiday Junction.  This one is actually the old Doug DuBay layout from West Des Moines that was featured on Tracks Ahead a few years ago.  First, let me talk about the Union Terminal itself.  Built in 1932, it is a prime example of Art Deco at it’s finest.  The structure was almost lost, but various restoration projects and civic endeavors managed to keep in intact.  And then sixty million dollars in renovation money was found.  It is currently the home to several area museums, and still functions as the Amtrak stop on the DC to Chicago run.  The rotunda is amazing, and even the old president’s office and board room have been restored.  The design was akin to a giant funnel laid on its side.  All bus, auto, and streetcar traffic was such that the roads and lines entered the building and funneled passengers to ticket windows and then down to the concourse and tracks.  The concourse and track platforms are gone, but the main building remains.  The permanent display, Cincinnati in Motion, is a seven thousand square foot S gauge layout.  Originally designed for O gauge, space considerations dictated a switch to he slightly smaller gauge.  The layout depicts the Cincinnati areas at various historical points.  The downtown is set in the 1940s, while other areas are set in different historical periods.  One note is that the whole thing can be seen, and controlled, by a webcam at www.aroundcinci.com/inmotion/.  The staff was of extreme help in removing the Plexiglas panels so that we could get good detail.  Once we finished the layout, we headed down to the Holiday Junction layout.  Working on the layout were two of our companions from the China trip, Dale & Miriam Brown.  The layout is only a part – although it does have center stage- of several holiday themed layouts.  There are also some static displays of Carlisle and Finch tinplate trains, as well as a several very nice dioramas, which model some of the 1950 Lionel catalogue artwork.  One thing that is a big hit is the camera train.  One of the locomotives has a small camera in the nose and you can get an engineers perspective as the train moves through the layout.  It sounds rather hokey, but it really is mesmerizing to watch the engineer's perspective.

Again we started with a somewhat gray and rainy day. While the overcast was anticipated, we will keep a close eye on the weather as we expect a winter storm to blow through late in the day. We headed off to Cinergy Corporation in downtown Cincinnati.  The company has been setting up a lobby display for the holidays for the last 58 years.  It’s an O gauge layout, which actually started with a contest by the B&O Railroad. The railroad wanted a model of their Royal Blue train set, and several of the winners ended up on the layout.  While the track plan stays the same from year to year, the scenery varies depending on the whims of the volunteers and employees who set up the layout.  The snow is particularly well done, and consists of diamond dust, either scattered or fixed in place with spray snow.  The railroad has a nice mixture of old and new, with some of the original cars from the 1930s still in use as rolling stock.  One thing of particular interest to me was the fact that the railroad is an O gauge layout, but is only two rail.  When the layout was originally built scale layouts of this nature used an outside third rail.  So if you look closely, you’ll find that there is an outside third rail that provides the power for the trains.  Transfer to the engines and tenders are provided via outrigger feelers on each moving unit.  The layout really gets a lot of traffic, and we were told that after school is out – right before Christmas –you can hardly move through the lobby. 

Everyone we worked with couldn’t have been more helpful. Special thanks go to Kathy Meinke, Mike Palmisano, and all the staff and volunteers that work on this holiday tradition.  We finished about 1 PM and headed on out.