Every town has a church. Do you have a church on your layout? You little people need one! Let's see it. Wolfgang
In my dismantled layout was a church based on the one where my mom and dad were married. The prototype was (and still is) located fifteen feet from a railroad track, much closer than the distance two-blocks-from-the-tracks where the model was placed. My dad built a model about O scale of the same church in the late 1940s. It was used as a propr for a fund raising effort to build a new bigger church building. I once wanted to build a HUGE layout which would have taken a 30 foot square room in N scale and had several towns, with different churches representing the ethnic backgrounds of different parts of Texas. The east Texas town had the Methodist church shown above. A German heritage town like Brenham would have a Luthern church with a high pitch inverted V roof I have seen on many Lutheran churches. I think German-Americans and Scandinavian-Americans came from snow country where the steep roofs help keep snow from piling up and collapsing the roof. I shot pictures of a Lutheran church two blocks from my childhood home as a basis for the model but never got that 30 foot square train room and didn't start the church. My big city, Santa Vaca, would have had the industrial and natural features, but a Spanish background more like San Antonio-- and a Spanish mission-style station which could almost pass for a church. But I thought of a Catholic church for Santa Vaca- which gave its name to MY version of a part of the Santa Fe system... The Legend of Santa Vaca In one of the early Spanish missions established in Texas to convert the Indians, a priest was telling his congregation they should give to the church even though they didn't have much to give. He said that God can use our gifts more than we know, and he told the story of the cow who gave up her feeding stall to make a place for the Baby Jesus to lay. He said the cow's gift-- the manger-- became more a part of the Christmas scene than even the expensive gifts of the Wise Men. But the Indians confused the cow in the priest's Christmas story with a buffalo cow who was worshipped in their pre-Christian native religion and they began to bring back the cult of the Holy Cow. The Church tried to discourage the practice but could not stop it entirely. The village near the mission took on the name Santa Vaca, and it grew into a major city served by a subsidiary of the Santa Fe Railway. At the cathedral in Santa Vaca near where the mission once stood is a stained glass window with the manger scene featuring the Baby Jesus, the Virgin Mary and the Holy Cow, each with a halo. My layout currently under construction represents an island seaport like Galveston. I have several large church buildings but I am not sure yet where to locate them. I have a really small church, a crude wooden model I picked up on the island of Mikonos in the Aegean Sea. It is an inch-square approx HO proportion model of tiny church that would hold only half a dozen people. Mikonos has over 300 tiny churches built when sailors made a promise to God to build a church if they were rescued from peril at sea. I plan to keep the core of the simple model but make it an N model of a still fairly small Greek Orthodox church that might hold two or three dozen worshippers at most. I found a historic reference that said Galveston had a tiny Greek Orthodox community in the early 20th century-- some justification for a might-have-been structure.
Yes I have one, sorry no camera. As God has become important in my life, I try to reflect some of this in my layout. Soapbox time I believe god should be important to everyone, after all the Bible says. No one shall come to the Lord but through me Jesus Christ. Meaning that in order to get into Heavan you must believe in Jesus Christ, and that he died and rose again on the third day . He did this to forgive us our sins. If we believe in Jesus and repent to him our sins we are born again and will never have to suffer in Hell. The world could come to an end at any time, I feel more comfortable now that I believe. Now I realize that a lot of people don't have the same beliefs. Only YOU can decide for yourself. But if ANYONE would like to know more about being saved and the comfort it can bring to your life, please contact me off line. ....Mike
Well said Mike! Here is a church I put on the clubs layout. I added stained glass windows and when lit up looks great. The church I attent makes CD's and DVDs of the services and since I sing in the choir when we do specials or it seems like a service was especially good I get the CD or DVD. During our next show I am going to bring a portable CD player and put it under the layout by the church with a CD in and play it during the show. When you stand in front of the church you will hear the music or sermon going on.
The only churches I have had were painted into the backscenes. It still counts :tb-biggrin::tb-biggrin: Mike
Yes, but no good photos Can be seen on the left side of this photo. Not sure if that is were it is to be. Seen at back center here as seen on layout before railroad was moved from house to train building. This was my first attempt at making a rock wall Gary
Not since my days of Lionel and American Flyer. Somehow, most of my modeling is scenes of rural places. Where there is a logging activity, but no population center and so forth. I am planning a couple of small town scenes on my T-Trak (N scale) modules. Does anyone know a manufacturer who'd have a small wooden church building, such as you might see in a tiny northern Great Plains type of setting, circa WWII era? Often a one room afair.... Perhaps an 18 by 24 +/- footprint? Laser kit or flat plastic is fine. Boxcab E50
No. I also don't have a jail on my layout. It's off-topic, but my simple "no" wasn't enough to post a reply.
There are probably as many different reasons to have or want a church on your layout as there are for having anything else. I model a prototype scene so I model what is actually there.
Yes, but not in a structure most would recognize. There are no crosses, pentagrams or golden calves in / on my church. When in need of a spiritual connection I go to the woodlands. In the peace and quiet I can talk personally with, (in my mind), an "Earth Mother" type of figure. She asks nothing of me save only that I "do no harm" and I ask nothing of her save only for someone to talk with. If any would like more information on this perspective feel free to shoot me a private note. So, yes, I will have a vast church likely covering 10s, (100s?), of square inches. Still I do agree with the original poster and those that followed that churches / synagogues / temples etc have a special place on / in / near a town on a model railroad. Peace be with you.
I wanted for my narrow gauge town Salina a church too. So I started to scratch build my own church. Here's my How To. It's not yet finished, but ... Wolfgang
