Prototype Rails 2026

This year’s Prototype Rails meeting in Cocoa Beach, Florida took place last week, and as usual, it was a thoroughly enjoyable and informative meeting. Long organized and managed by the late Mike Brock, Marty Megregian now runs the meeting, and does so very well. Jeff Aley continues to recruit and supervise the clinic presentations, and the variety and quality are high, year after year. This year’s attendance was about 210, as high as it’s been since the pandemic.  

I gave a talk to fit with one of Aley’s themes this year, operation. I tried to illustrate how one can learn about and reproduce prototype operating procedures, using the railroad I model, Southern Pacific, as an example. (For the handout, see: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2026/01/handout-for-modeling-sp-operations.html ). As always, there were lots of other really interesting talks. I just chose one to highlight, Rich Remiarz’s talk in his ongoing series about Great Northern freight cars. 

The usual arrangement of the hotel ballroom hosted not only an extensive vendor area, but also the usual model displays brought by attendees. It’s always enjoyable to browse new and continuing products, and I for one certainly examine the displayed models closely. 

In the model table area, there were several really excellent displays. Al Brown brought a complete set of Shake 'n' Take models (though missing, I think, the Kahn’s reefer). I always enjoy seeing good applications of the freight car graffiti of more recent times., such as the one below. This didn’t have a name card right next to it, but Butch Eyler’s models were nearby, so maybe it was his. But whoever brought the model, I liked it.

As he often does, Marty Megregian brought some O scale steam locomotives to exhibit. The one I found most remarkable was a distinctive and (I think) unique Southern engine, an 0-8-0 decorated for wartime. 

A model that I really enjoyed seeing was one that had been built by the late Stan Rydarowicz, kitbashed from a Funaro & Camerlengo end-door Wabash automobile car.  The 17 prototype cars were used to ship long aluminum pipe and extrusions from Alcoa’s large production plant at Lafayette, Indiana, to customers, including aircraft manufacturers, using only the end door (side doors were removed). The paint scheme was unique to these cars.

And I can’t resist closing with a fine sunset we witnessed one evening as we left our dinner restaurant, complete with iconic palm trees.

 We had lovely warm weather this year (certainly not a given in January). Florida can be really delightful in some Januaries, and this was one.

Tony Thompson