Modelling the CN Telegraph Repeater Station

The CN telegraph repeater station was co-located at the Outer Station site on Montreal Street. According to Smithson (see below) the repeater station was built by CN in 1928, at a pre-Depression cost of $60,000. Located amid CN's pole line, poles were spaced 48 to the mile, with a double-pole H structure every quarter-mile. Once fibre-optics were installed along CN's Kingston Subdivision, the pole line was transferred to the CN Signal Department.

Telegrams (below), Telex and Teletype were still important means of doing business in Canada when this booklet was printed (below). Becoming part of CNCP Telecommunications, subsequent owners were Unitel and AT&T Canada.

The current state of the repeater station is rough. This September, 2019 view shows the structure is still in place, though boarded-up.

Gordon Smithson, author of the seminal volume At the Bend in the Road - Kingston worked at the station, and included a photo in his book, as well as several interior views. For this build, I used the ubiquitous Pola/Tyco factory building - one I'd picked up at a train show - that had been equipped with a neat curved, green balsa wood roof and interior:

Neat roof and details! This structure matched the limited footprint I had available for the completed model. I would maintain the irregular window heights and wall pilasters. I must say I'm not completely happy with the finished product's fidelity to the original. It's a marshmallow structure - I had to squeeze it quite a bit in its dimensions! The prototype is 70 feet in length and 30 feet in width, roughly twice as big as mine.

The Dremel tool took off the false front ends, and I used scrap styrene to form the new roof:

But it's a four-sided roof and tricky to get the right look. So I used paper templates to get the ends cut:

That went well, though the roof sits up a bit high on my marshmallow! Like a top hat! I trusted that the roofline and the dormer-type rooftop windows would carry the day and make it believable.

I decided I'd use cardstock to produce a shingle roof. Final view before roofing began:

I used the same technique as the Woolen Mill - sacrifice the natural brick colour to get mortar. Paint the whole structure a light colour! Then, dry-brush the brick colour on:

Strips of 'shingles' applied up from the eaves. I shingled the dormers separately, then cut the strips around the dormer, reuniting them with a contiguous strip at the roof peak:

Final painting included the sides of the dormers, white eaves, windows light grey, completed interior window glazing, steps, added cardstock lintels above the windows. The finished structure is shoehorned between the Kingston Subdivision mainline and the Hanley Spur continuous-run trackage:

But I thought it was important to have it near the station, as was the prototype! More details, scenicking and signage were to follow. I photographed, copied and printed some CNCP Telecommunications and Telex 'signs', adding lettering for a bilingual CN Telecommunications Repeater Station sign:

 Then I cut out and added the signs and some other small details to the scrapbox to the structure:

The previous owner added the fan an open doors to the structure, having removed two windows and bricked one in:

As mentioned previously, the builing has only a small footprint. The eaves must be positioned clear of tracks at both corners! I'd like to add more H-poles and even small microwave dishes, as long as I don't hit them with my arm when operating - a current hazard to other buildings along Montreal Street at layout edge!

 Link to photos of the Kingston repeater station here.

Re-lettering Millard & Lumb

Millard & Lumb was a marine industry located on Kingston's waterfront. I used this second-hand, train show-find enginehouse (top photo) for the build. At that time, it was a place-holder structure - OK for now. But the lettering I'd applied, printed on paper from Paint software, was still not quite what I wanted. So I got out my ruler, pencil and fin-tipped black marker:

A prototype photo (below - curvature due to photo, though bottom of lettering does curve upwards) came in handy, and it seems there was some sub-lettering between the 'arrows' there at one time! See the end of this post for more lettering iterations on this long-term operation. I drew the rectangle shape, based on the room I had available on the structure itself. Then I drew top and bottom lines in which to draw the lettering, then I drew it, largely by trial-and-error. The next step was colouring around it with the marker - filling in the spaces between the letters. Previously, I'd tried painting white lettering on black paper, but this technique is much more modeller-friendly! It makes the re-lettering quite enjoyable!

Before photo - I added the window shades that were on most windows of the prototype office:

After photo:

Some on-layout views of my Millard & Lumb in place. This is one of the first structures one encounters upon entering the layout room, and I think it now makes a better first impression. Making it easy on myself - I photocopied the sign, made a few revisions to both, and used a tape runner to attach the lettering to the building.

I'd previously improved the end-of-building lettering, at left, using the same technique:

West end, possibly 1940's

 East end, 1950's

 South side, 1951

 South side, 1960:

East end, 1967: 

Modelling the CN Express Shed

In 1965, CN relocated its freight shed from downtown on Wellington Street to the Outer Station property on Montreal Street. The shed was rail-served, with doors and docks for truck loading (yellow arrow, 1978 top photo). I've seen at least one similar shed, built by CN at Morrisburg and still standing. The Kingston shed is now demolished - part of the concrete dock is still visible, but that's all. CN MoW trucks were at the shed decades later:

The building I used has been repurposed over my various layout iterations. Built as an Esso agency, there was a loading dock at the front....

....and a boxcar door on the back. I removed the remnants of the Campbell siding from the roof, adding a new styrene roof, a portion of a Tyco loading dock, and a new rail-served door:

The dock is covered by a heavy steel framework. I've removed the former truck loading dock and I've assembled some leftover pieces from an inexpensive thrift-store town hall kit:

I assembled the framework over the dock. The roof is covered with a paper printed image of rusty corrugated steel. Part of me wanted to leave the framework exposed - so the roof will be removable to show dock operations. I've also added a paper 'concrete foundation' here. Rail-served side:

Truck-loading side:

A word about scale and placement. The prototype shed is well over a hundred feet in length, not counting the dock. My available space is less than that, including the dock! I want to leave room for truck access. Also, the prototype shed's spur approaches from the opposite side of the building. As I've found with my National Grocers building, having the spur on the far side of the building makes the freight cars less visible and less interesting! So, practising selective selectivism, I placed the shed on an existing spur, leaving the cars visible.

Imagine it's a hundred feet long! I added some dock details, shown here with the roof off:

A view of the other end, with shed access and stairs. CN baggage cars were spotted here for extended periods, providing extra storage. Initially, shipments arrived by rail, but in later decades, by transport truck for transfer and delivery by CN Express trucks.

Trackside views (below). Operationally, I'd originally conceived this spur as the Chown Hardware lumber shed (watch for an upcoming post). But I already have two consignees that receive lumber, so I didn't need another place to spot lumber cars. Instead, CN boxcars, baggage boxcars, baggage cars and insulated cars and occasional refrigerator cars. Bringing in cars of express shipments, the cars are often redirected to the downtown freight shed to be loaded and sent off the layout. (Is that weird, sending cars between two sheds when only one was in existence at a time? Hmmm...) The prototype had a large CN-Express-Freight-Kingston-CN sign on it.

All that's currently left of the prototype - the concrete dock being engulfed by vegetation - September, 2019!

Prototype cargo truck box:

And for some time, a track machine donated to the Canadian Institute of Guided Ground Transport (CIGGT) was stored behind the shed with MoW cars - online auction site photo: 

Modelling C. E. MacPherson

C.E. McPherson, a steel manufacturing operation began business in 1913 on the west side of Rideau Street, south of the intersection with Montreal Street. Currently operating as a division of Conrex Steel, they manufacture head shields for pressure vessels and tanks. CP crossed Rideau Street to reach the plant, at bottom centre of this 1950's aerial photo:

An 'early-Photoshop' relettered ground-level view of the MacPherson building when it was operated by McKelvey & Birch, a local hardware firm:

A major windstorm struck downtown Kingston in early 1950, peeling off the roof of MacPherson. This interior view (above) shows the roofless plant being inspected, with head shields on the shop floor, an overhead travelling crane, and a power shaft providing belt-driven power to the various machines in use. This vintage building disappeared sometime between 1998 and 2004, based on the city's Snapshot Kingston website. Comparative views 45 years apart:

In model form, I'm using the Walthers/POLA Cornerstone American Millwork structure as a basis for my model. This was a $12 train-show find! This structure fits the space available, and I'm going to mainly modify the roofline to represent MacPherson.

The Before photo...notice the central, short clerestory on the kit as built:

Ideally, I would have increased the footprint of this building, making the two outer 'wings' wider - if I had space! I decided to keep the original intact, removing the old clerestory, and preparing to add a new, full-length one made of styrene:

The clerestory is added, with a hole for some end-windows. I found some suitable styrene from another kit for the clerestory roof. It included skylight windows:

 Another roof view:

Instead of cutting holes and adding windows under the clerestory, I simply glued some printed images of windows on paper. I still wasn't happy with those end windows:

I painted the structure a lighter grey and added three paper windows to the end. The prototype included several smokestacks and a couple of end smokestacks:

There was some painted white lettering on a black background on the end of the building, between the three upper windows and the main-storey windows:

My photos of two small photos from Gordon Smithson's At the Bend in the Road - Kingston book  This second photo shows the lettering:

The After photo - I added three windows to the end, also gluing the hand-painted sign on the end, largely imagined from the above two prototype photos. Just some final scenicking remains to be done.