Two Geeps rumble out of the East Portal of Hoosac Tunnel with a 38 car extra in route to
East Deerfield Yard on my HO Scale Deerfield River Valley Division of the Boston & Maine
Railroad.  The Hoosac Route. Sadly the old wooden handcar tool shed that stood here is
long gone but is an old boarded up relic on my layout.
       Deerfield River            
       Valley Railroad
                  Boston & Maine In HO Scale
                         The Hoosac Route
                   East  Deerfield Yard to North Adams   
                      "Celebrating 50 years of Model Railroading"                                        
                            
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           Members of my Model Railroad group
Ed Richardson  -  Dean McGranahan  -  Phil Opielowski  
Brenda Opielowski   -  Sue Picone  -  Jamie Girouard
Marcy Bibbo
Without the help from these people this still fairly good size layout wouldn't be at
the point of construction that it is today, so I cant thank them all enough for all the
hard work that has gone into re-building  this model railroad.  Many Thanks to all.!


        
Its the 1970's and 4 Bluebirds with 74 cars are coming out into the daylight at the
East Portal of Hoosac Tunnel on the way to East Deerfield Yard. I operate a
wide veritey of old Athearn, Atlas  and also the newer same makes and also
Proto, Bachmann, and other makes.
Ed
Dean
Jim
Hoosac Tunnel is nearly five miles long and located in the scenic Western Mass
Berkshire Hoosac Mountain range in the towns of Florida and North Adams Mass.
It was once the longest tunnel in the world and even today is still ranked one of
the most famous.
Click onto the     
page box below  
and view more   
photos.
4 3/4 Miles Long
Hi I'm Jim Fuller from Monson Mass. and welcome to my Deerfield River Valley Railroad Website.
I grew up in the small sleepy hill towns of Conway and Ashfield, Mass and spent my youth around the
B&M Railroad and East Deerfield Yard watching trains come and go. I landed a job on the B&M for a
short time but boy did things change in 1983 when the whole company changed ownership.
My Model Railroading has always been a life long hobby for me that started in 1958 as an 8 year old
boy working on a 4 x 8 sheet of plywood with my uncle Gill Shaw to start my Boston & Maine Railroad
that I still have to this day!

Our group has a very relaxed approach about this hobby and we're here weekly to just have fun and
enjoy friendships. We're not obsessed or do we even care about anyone's definition of Model
Railroading perfection! Many of us agree in this hobby that the biggest critics are often those who
haven't built much or experienced the hobby in the old days when you had very little to work with
compared to today.  We create, build, and operate for our own enjoyment and not trying to impress
anyone or get into a magazine article.  While we can appreciate all of the advances in the hobby we've
seen come along over many years, with things like DCC and perfectly detailed structures and
equipment but how much money we can spend doesn't define the level of fun we pursue.

Portions of my layout are over 50 years old and it still operates reliably on all of it's original Atlas
Brass Fiber Tie code 100 Track and turnouts from the 1960's so I have no need to re-lay any of it for
DCC use. DCC is a thrill for many but I don't need it nor can I justify replacing the old fashioned DC
operation that works just as dependably well for us and I'm very happy and content with what I have!
Some of our friends, visitors, and advisors are old-timers in the hobby who run with some of the
masters of the hobby who share a lot of old Model Railroad wisdom and all agree with us on--just have
fun doing it your way for thats what a personal hobby is all about!

Our group has a lot of fun "Workin On The Railroad" and looks forward to getting together each week
to re-create this once very large full basement size layout into a much smaller compact and more
manageable size. Sometimes we do very little on the layout if the beginning of the evenings "bull
shooting" drags on! Who cares?!! It's all in fun!!  Thanks for taking a look and let us know what you
think by clicking onto the Contact us feature above.    


        Model Railroading is truly the greatest hobby in the world!          
          
Now and then I like to leave the big power in the yard and do some branch line type switching with a single
switcher and a few cars and yes, a caboose on the rear. You should see this scene set up as night-time
with all the building and street lights on and the overhead lighting off.
Now and then I have a steam day operation and bring out all the old 1940's
locomotives and rolling stock.
I operate a very wide time period of the Boston & Maine but my faverit years are the 60's
through the 80's.  The B&M's F units, RS3's, GP9's, GP38's, and GP40's are what I
operate the most but I have earlier steam and even Guilford units but no Pan Am.

A lot of people have gone crazy with the new DCC offerings but I'm quite happy to be still
operating some 30 year old Athearn GP9's that run as well today as they did when new so
many years ago.
Two rail-fans standing at a safe distance watch as a GP18 in
the lead and two GP9's clear the East Portal of Hoosac Tunnel
with 46 cars in tow.
The Grain mill you see in the photo was never in this actual
location but space was limited and I wanted to re-use a lot of
the structures from the old layout on this much smaller version.
A Little History.  This Model Railroad Layout is in its 50th year of operation having been started in 1958 and
finely finished in 1960 or so we thought.!  It's been moved a total of 6 times to different homes in the 50 years
of its existence and greatly changed over all those years. It grew from a birthday train set on a 4 X 8 sheet of
plywood to a 24' x 44' full basement layout and finely now has calmed down and been reduced to a much
smaller version but portions of the old 1960's creations are still in use to this day.
Iv had a lot of help over the years with this layout and wouldn't have enjoyed it as much without all the friends
involved throughout all those 50 years of each week getting together to create, build, and operate.
The years have changed, the layout has changed, and also the people involved in its creation but the one
thing throughout all those years that have never changed, " the Friendship's that were created along the way."
                        Other Thanks
Some other thanks are well deserved for all of what you see on this 50 year
old layout. If your planning on building a railroad layout visit these two Hobby
Shops and they will be glad to get you started.
      
               Tuckers Hobbies in Warren Ma.
Over the years since 1980 Iv bought a lot of what you see on this model layout
from Bob Buck's store. New or used Bob seemed to always have just what I
was looking for or he'd haul out his huge Walthers 2" thick catalog and we'd
order it up..!     Thanks Bob.

                          Pioneer Valley Hobbies
                                            West Springfield Ma.

Other long gone shops throughout the years that had a big part in this layout.

                  H.L. Child's Northampton Ma.
              Brown's Toy Store Greenfield Ma.
A big thank you to all these shops for being their for
all my modeling needs over the years.
We are featured this week in a nicely done article in our local Home Town Palmer Newspaper The Journal Register
published by Turley Publications. Iv wanted to do this for some time now to showcase the people involved in helping to
re-build my Model Railroad and re-create it as well. Without the help of these people I wouldn't have been able to get it as far
as it is now. Many thanks to Denise Falk and Doug Farmer from the Journal Register for doing this story and a big thank you
to Phil Opielowski for making it happen.
My Deerfield River Valley Railroad will continue to be worked on for the next two years till which time in late 2012 I will be
retiring from the workforce and the DRVR will retire as well and be no more.!  I'm planning on building a layout based on the
1960's TV show Petticoat Junction and the C&FWRR Hooterville Cannonball from Hooterville to Pixley.  Much of the layout
will be re-used but all the Boston & Maine will be retired because its time for a change,  50 years with the same theme is quite
a long time so moving on to something with one locomotive pulling one coach and how simple is that.!?!?