Improving Sowards Coal Piles

I spent some time working on the Sowards Coal dealership on my HO scale layout. It started with my piles. Coal piles, that is. ARK Hanley Spur project group member Greg had mentioned that the angle-of-repose didn't appear correct. And of course, he was right! See top photo - I called them ziggurats because they were so pointed! So, I re-shaped them:

I'd thought originally it would be a good idea to use plastic container lids as the basis for the piles. That was part of the problem. So I removed them from under the modelling clay ziggurats:

After re-shaping, I used black acrylic paint to coat the piles, then sprinkled black-coloured dollar store sand on them while wet:

I added board-fence sections that had an interesting back-story! I 'piled' the coal right up the fence bases:

I also built a Sowards office/shop building from a structure (earlier ready-mix cement, before that self-carwash) that I'd previously scratch-built. You'll have to crane your neck a little:

Putting details back in place - foliage and signage:

Some vintage-look photos:

 The Sowards Office sign is from a vintage photo of the original!

And as the local passes by, I feel much better about the dealership and my piles. Coal piles, that is!

Vessel TRINA winters in Kingston harbour

Over the winter of 1963-64, a notable vessel made Kingston harbour its home - the TRINA. Newsworthy, but I wondered why. Well, it was controversial and and made the news when it broke loose from its moorings at the Kingston Shipyards around January 26, making it out into ice-choked harbour before being rustled back into place. While in Kingston, she wore the Lakes Ocean stack markings of a circled-L, though she had several previous 'identities.' The 'TEXACO' letters on her side could be seen painted-out. Below is some background on this vessel, from the Great Lakes Shipwreck Preservation Society Facebook page, beginning at 1959 in the vessel's history:

The 1959 sailing season, a major change came to both the The Texas Company and the MICHIGAN. The Texas Company, popularly known as Texaco by the public was adopted as the official name of the company in 1959. With the name change occurring, the MICHIGAN quickly followed with the new name TEXACO MICHIGAN appearing on the side of the vessel. Close to four short years had passed on the TEXACO MICHIGAN was sold to Lakes Ocean, Inc. with the fourth name change to the vessel, now known simply as TRINA. Once the change in ownership was official, the new owners urgently attempted to get their new investment off the lakes before closure of the Seaway would take place. The new owners attempted to take 200,000 bushels of corn bound for a port in the Gulf of Mexico. Timing was not on the side of the new owners and the Seaway closed, stranding the TRINA in Kingston for the 1963 – 1964 winter layup. 

The cargo was removed and sent via Montreal. The stranding caused a strenuous financial burden on Lakes Ocean, Inc. The TRINA was eventually sold for $36,500, well below its value, by the Exchequer Court of Canada. A public auction in Kingston took place on August 18, 1964 and William Brooks of Corpus Christi, TX paid cash as the high bidder. Before leaving Kingston, the vessel was scheduled for an 10-day overhaul at the Kingston Shipyards. Renamed CORPUS CHRISTI, she left Kingston flagged for Panama. A 20-man crew, mostly from Trinidad, arrived after the sale and remained aboard until her departure.

The TRINA was sold to William Brooks for $36,500 who in turn resold the newly named CORPUS CHRISTI to the Panamanian based company known as  Panama-Florida Shipping Co. The fate of the vessel was last known as sailing as a tank barge after conversion to a tank barge took place in Houston, Texas in 1967 for the West Indies Transportation Co., Ltd. located in the British West Indies. The last known date for the vessel was 1970 when the barge was purchased by the West Indies Transportation Co., Ltd. It is not known if the barge is still sailing the Caribbean or if scrapping has taken place. 

West Indies Transportation Co. also bought the former Cape Transport (formerly Northcliffe Hall then Wittransport II) which was a laker-turned-eyesore at the LaSalle Causeway in the 1980s.

A complete lineage of the TRINA:

U.S. Transportation Company  (1902 – 1911)

Great Lakes Steamship Company (1911 – 1939)

Merritt, Chapman & Scott Corp. (1939 – 1941)

Marinette-Escanaba Transportation Co. (1941 – 1941)

The Texas Co.  (1941 – 1959)

Texaco, Inc.  (1959 – 1963)

Lakes Ocean, Inc.  (1963 – 1964) ***Sold off Lakes***

William Brooks  (1964 – 1966)

Panama-Florida Shipping Co. (1966 – 1966) ***Panama***

Texas Coastal & International, Inc. (1966 – 1966) ***Panama***

Pullman Bank & Trust Co.   (1966 – 1970) ***Panama***

West Indies Transportation Co., Ltd. (1970 – Unknown) ***British West Indies***

Length: 370.00

Width: 48.16

Depth: 24.00

Gross Tonnage: 3860.00

Net Tonnage: 3057.00

Hull Material: Steel 

Built: 1902

Rebuilt: 1915

Drink, Eat and Get Gas!

Beer, bread, donuts, Coke and gasoline. Three Hanley Spur-related changes in Kingston business news this week, and one more in November, 2021 (see update below)

• Weston Bakeries closing. Warehouse to remain open, but outdated bakery equipment affects 35 jobs. (Global Kingston photo)
  
• Cataraqui Street Beer Store closing. Neighbourhood beer drinkers will have to travel 2 km to Princess & University or buy pricey beer at the downtown LCBO. Just as KT bus fare has increased to $3.25 and can you even take any quantities of beer onto a city bus? (Whig-Standard photo) 
  
• Shell (and Tim Hortons) being removed from the Ontario Street Wolfe Island ferry dock redevelopment area. (Whig-Standard photo)
  

The trains may be gone, and another layer of post-railway history gets lacquered onto the Hanley Spur. Perhaps papered over. Paved paradise and put up a parking lot!

NOVEMBER 2021 UPDATE:

Coca-Cola on Railway Street makes a 'job-neutral' move of 80 jobs to a gigantic new distribution centre at 800 Innovation Drive, near the John Machin Soccer Park in Kingston East as of May, 2022. (Global News photo, viewed November, 2021). In October, 2023 the vacant building became the area distribution centre for Amazon drivers and packages.

Layout Industry List

This week I added yet another spur to my HO scale Hanley Spur layout. On the prototype, spurs could be as short as one car. So, I don't feel any apprehension about putting in extremely short spurs. Such was the spur I installed to serve the Bailey boom factory property, nominally Queen City Oil Co.

It also seemed like a good time to update my list of layout industries. Each is shown, whether served by CN or CP, with inbound and outbound commodities and car types. Of course, subject to change as additional prototype information dictates.

Whig Up, Enginehouse Down

It's November, 1963 and this frame appears to show the demolition - two bulldozers and the rubble being hauled away by a dumptruck - of the limestone enginehouse located behind Kingston's Outer Station on Montreal Street.

This is from the first box of the Kingston Whig-Standard fonds at the Queen's University Archives. Having completed an interesting trip through the George Lilley Fonds - all 51 boxes of them - these 127 boxes(!) are next.

Less well-captioned but at least dated, and just as engrossing, if this initial frame is any indication, it's going to be a bumpy ride.

Modelling a Gravel Pit or Brownfield

Sometimes we over-reach in our modelling. We do big bridges, vast vistas, giant structures and huge freight yards. But there are simple scenes, quiet corners and other layout spaces where the exception proves the rule - where a little scene makes the big scenes. Such was my thinking when facing this 'dead space' between the CN (foreground) and CP (coal dock). It's well known that Kingston's waterfront was dotted with contaminated industrial operations, now called brownfields! 

My first inclination was to use some leftover limestone-rock cut-paper to represent a gravel pit. Or perhaps a failed or delayed construction site. Or a 'Clean Fill Wanted' site that I don't see much anymore. The space was flat, so I had to build it up vertically to provide the rock face that had been excavated. I sliced a block of modelling clay latitudinally, tacking the rounded rock face onto the opposite side. Leftover modelling clay was used to form 'dumptruck loads' (top photo) then added the paper to the rock face and actual limestone around it:

I also added some 'Super Trees' and low foliage. Another before-and-after set from the opposite side, now with CP in foreground and in background:

The scenicked rock face, dump truck loads and stuck-in pieces of limestone into the modelling clay. It's easier to stick things into than plywood, that's for sure!

I've been working on the railroad. And so is this guy - toiling in the brownfield from layout-level!

Locate Your Industry in Kingston!

The above sign was installed at Kingston's Outer Station circa 1958. It was parallel to Montreal Street and readily visible from passing trains on CN's Kingston Sub. The implication was clear - Locate Your Industry Here! Similar signs were in Brockville and Belleville, either sponsored by local business interests or CN itself. This was era before the internet, so seeing was believing in the world of business!

Using the above image, I created an HO scale version using Paint software, built a billboard with simulated lighting and located it across from my Outer Station. The main challenge being that if I had located it facing the track, the lettering would not be visible. So, my version is visible from the layout aisle, as well as still being visible to HO scale passengers.

Modelling the Bajus Brewery

This has been a long gestation period! It was back in March, 2019 that I published a post on Kingston's Bajus Brewery The inspiration was willing, but the kitbashing was weak! I just completed the kitbash - over the course of one day! Courtney Matheson Mahoney kindly gave me an interesting archeological profile of the site (top photo - 1 p.m.! At September's Napanee train show, I picked up a Pola/Tyco brewery structure from Peter Macdonald - Peter even caught up with me in the arena when he found an additional component of the structure! The previous owner had done some weathering and I wondered if this kit might work its way into the Bajus. It did! 

The other component of this build would be another train show find- Walthers' O.L.King and Sons coal yard office - I'd previously used it as Vulcan Iron on my Winnipeg layout, Dominion Bridge on my Vancouver layout, then part of the sizeable Howe Scale works in Rutland, Vt. So it didn't owe me a darn thing! The components, including a wall previously part of my Ogilvie Flour Mill, again Winnipeg, are test fitted (above - 3 p.m.), representing the three separately-built parts of the prototype, added over the span of 25 years in the 19th century (below - 8:30 p.m.). I've added windows, and the unique kegs in the east wall - still visible today!

Rear view. I'd keep the extra storey (four on the prototype) of the tallest part. This would be the side most prominent when 'entering' my Hanley Spur layout:

 At 10 p.m., I'd applied some 'limestone' grey paint:

Then, a major decision faced me - to take the easy way out and try to make the various finishes on different walls look like limestone with just the grey paint, or use printed limestone paper as I'd used on my Imperial Oil warehouse and Outer Station builds. The latter! To the printer, Robin!

I found a useful stock photo of a stone wall and by removing the colour, then copying and pasting resized images, I was able to end up with a whole sheet of 'limestone'. I would end up requiring nearly three sheets. The components are ready for paper (above - 12 noon the next day). The first paper goes on:

 One wall done. Note the contrast with the un-papered wall. I'm glad I revisited this technique:

 The mostly-papered back wall at 1:30:

 Two hours later, all papered, including the prototypically-brick north wall:

 The completed front wall - I need to touch up the grey-painted remnants. Nearly suppertime!

That looks better - two windows remain to be added to the tallest component, as do smokestacks and quoins onto the brick walls. It's 5:30 and time for leftover turkey with all the trimmings:

Smokestacks are in place and the brewery is in place on Wellington Street. Some final scenicking and detailing to follow....

Bajus Brewery feels the ground rumble as the CN switcher rounds the bend to the Wellington Street freight shed:

Merry Boxing Day!

Well, it was Boxing Day in 1982 when Don McQueen snapped, and kindly shared these photos that he took at Quattrocchi's Produce at Montreal and Railway Streets. Notice CN iceless refrigerator class RP CN 231034's rusty wheels. I guess this 1963 Pacific Car & Foundry-built yellow, weathered warrior was spotted a while before Don took this photo, and has waited to be lifted by a CN roadswitcher. Originally NIRX 16502-16579, the cars were leased by CN then bought, with the reporting marks lettering replaced by CN's 'wet-noodle' logo, and unusually, both sides read 'CANADIAN', without a 'CANADIEN' in sight.

Placing Place d'Armes

One of the largest swaths of my Hanley Spur HO layout is the central peninsula on which I've situated CN's Wellington Street freight shed and trackage extending through the scene to CLC and the Kingston Shipyards. But how best to utilize this fertile, fallow space? Today, I made some changes! The opening portal to the layout, nominally Place d'Armes is right at this corner, and the continuous loop (foreground, top photo) and track to the freight shed (curving, top photo) are very visible. Actual billboard and signage taken from vintage photos set the stage.

Place d'Armes, comprising paper, modelling clay and wooden timbers now opens the way to the peninsula, as CN 3120 'heads for the shed'. That grey structure will soon become the Bajus Brewery (above). Compare to last year's video capture in which Millard & Lumb occupied this space adjacent to Sowards Coal. Millard & Lumb, too, has been relocated to a more prominent place:

At road level, 3120 passes some sectionmen with Millard & Lumb and Sowards' visible down the track. I'm looking forward to showing more of life on Wellington Street through this portal.

Boats on Flat Cars

Back in the Athearn blue-box era, I always thought it was a bit hokey to see their Boat On Flat Car (BOFC) kit. No longer - once I came across this photo of the motor vessel Aylmer being loaded or unloaded from Chicago & North Western flatcar 42543 at the Kingston shipyards in June, 1949:

-from George Lilley fonds, Queen's University Archives