For the child in all of us

In all of us, I believe, is a child's fascination with trains. This weekend myself and a friend went to the Citadel Mall, Charleston, SC, and visited the Charleston Railroad club house and The Best Friend of Charleston temporary museum. Both of these are in former stores' spaces and a delight to visit and spend time. The RR club has a great display of all scales* of tracks and trains on hand and the museum is dedicated to preserving the history and memory of the Friend of Charleston, the first railroad engine to see service in South Carolina back in 1830.

*Scale is the reduced size relative to the original item being reproduced. The most common model railroad scale is HO. This is 1:87 in relation to the real thing. This scale is used by maybe 70% of model railroaders out there.

Other common and easy to find scales include N(1:160), O(1:48), G(1:24) and Z(1:220).

Clicking on the link above will take you to some pictures we took during our visit. You may view these as a slide show by clicking on the appropriate term on the left above the first picture.