A Neophyte's Take on the Amherst Railway Society Railroad Hobby Show

So, can you point me towards the nearest CSX interchange?

By Peter Mumby.

George and I attended the 53rd annual Amherst Railway Society Show ( a.k.a. "The Springfield Show") on Saturday January 25, 2020.  I had heard a lot about this show from local hobbyists who attended on a semi-regular basis and were enthusiastic about the experience.  However, for years I had been attending local train shows as a vendor, and had a show which conflicted with the Springfield date.  When I retired this small business at the end of 2019 after 40 years of operation, I was ready to give the big show a try when George indicated he was planning to attend.

You are well aware of the scope of this show long before you see your first train display.  Consider the length of the line-up of cars waiting to turn into the Eastern States Exposition lot, the multiplicity of police officers on traffic duty, and the number of ticket booths where you line up to purchase your admission arm band.  Also consider the cost - $5 to park, and $15 for admission.

We were on site before 9:00, so we were present for the air horn blast that signaled the opening of the doors.  Yikes!  How many decibels was that?  There were a few outdoor displays, so we decided to check these out and avoid the initial entry queues.  A cold rain was in the forecast for mid-afternoon, so this was the right time for outdoor photography.  The Wiscasset, Waterville and Farmington Railway Museum had a narrow gauge locomotive outside the Better Living Center - under steam, yet!  Also present was an interesting MOW truck in New Haven lettering.

Our friend Luc enjoys collecting photos of railroad service vehicles.  This one should be right up his alley.

Railway societies representing many lines from the Northeast were present at the show.

The show itself featured 415 exhibitors spread out through 4 separate buildings.  Before we started our tour, we had agreed to aim for a 3:30 quit time as a way to avoid the exit stampede from the parking lot, so we knew we would not be able to see everything.  As it turned out, we only visited three of the four buildings.  If we saw half of the displays in each area, that means that we took in about 40% of the show - 166 of the booths.  Sounds about right.

There were lots of vendors of the ordinary plastic locomotives and rolling stock which you will see at any train show.  I was expecting to see lots of the latest and greatest releases, but was surprised to see that a large proportion of what was on offer seemed to be older stock.  The prices also surprised me.  I was expecting to see more mark-downs and clear-outs, so I found both new and used items to be a bit expensive, even before I calculated in the differential between the Canadian and American dollars.  The flip side of this is that it is a wonder we don't have more American visitors at our Southern Ontario train shows where they would certainly get more bang for their high-powered buck.  But I digress.

Our friends Clare and Andy were taking care of business at the Sylvan Scale Models booth.

There were smiles all around, since George had just ponied up the cash for his Central Vermont membership.

Many of the structure kit manufacturers ( think Fos Scale, Railroad Kits, ITLA, and Hunterline, for example) had very impressive displays.  Manufacturers/Distributors such as Walthers, Athearn, Rapido Trains, and Atlas had booths.  Scale Trains was probably my favourite in this category.  Prototype and historical groups were well represented and offered books, calendars, and clothing for sale.  We spent a fair amount of time checking out the HO scale vehicle displays in the Mallary complex.  In this same venue there were a variety of kid-centric displays, including a huge Lego display layout and stage shows by Maggie the Train Clown.  Something for everyone, indeed.

If I had a complaint about the show, it would be that attendees of a certain age could really use more places to sit down for a few minutes.  We were fortunate around 2:30 to find a couple of seats in the Bar Mills clinic area where we could rest our bones and take in a few tips and modelling tricks at the same time.

So, that was my first visit to the Springfield train show.  As far as the exhibits were concerned, I feel like I barely scratched the surface.  I will definitely have to consider a return visit!

George was discussing an upcoming article in Railroad Model Craftsman magazine with editor Otto Vondrack.

Four year old Jaxson, my youngest grandson, is a real Lego aficionado, so I took this photo for him.  The entire Lego set-up was very impressive.

Busy times at the Rapido Trains booth.