Very true, but with SOME overlap between two different hobbies--so much so that
it is sometimes hard to tell whether they really
are two different things or different aspects of the same one. There is
nothing wrong with PLAYING with TOY trains, although
there is always condescension among those who don't consider it a serious
(i.e., adult) activity toward those who engage in it.
On the other hand, there are those attempt at a few or many levels to replicate
a prototype (aka the full-size, real thing), often
of an historical period which can no longer be experienced directly. I might
suggest that someone who has exquisitely-detailed
locomotives and rolling stock and a compelling right of way with elegant
structures and scenery is still only playing with trains
if he doesn't attempt to simulate prototype operation, most especially if he
merely PURCHASED all the elements of his play rather
than actually creating them. On the other hand, someone may use mass-market
products bought off the shelf but put together
and used in such a way to suggest the prototype through operation. Ideally, of
course, the creative act becomes both fabricating
and using scale models in such a way to replicate railroading.
I suspect the animosity which some scale modelers feel toward toy train owners
comes from outsiders--non-model railroaders--
trivializing the efforts which go into their efforts by equating the two, as it
is a source of embarrassment to some people to have
it become common knowledge that they are related to malefactors or those
less-than-estimable (i.e. the family black sheep) or
to be tarred with less-attractive racial or national or ethnic stereotypes
owing to one's identity. Social scientists and philosophers
have studied the phenomenon of play, or leisure, or recreational activity, and
argued that it performs a necessary function in
human society and the individual personality, but that function is also
distinct from other kinds of productive activity. God bless
those who like to play with AF or Lionel, so long as we more serious types
don't have to be identified with them.
Jace Kahn
General Manager
Ceres & Canisteo RR Co./Champlain County Traction Co.
> Dear Tom and Monte,
> This is a very old discussion that pre-dates most of us in the
> hobby. I remember displaying a scatch built CNJ caboose at an NMRA
> regional convention (this was way before SHS). I was talking to an HO
> modeler and he felt that I had more in common with a Z scaler modeling
> the CNJ than some who collected AF. I always thought that was an
> interesting observation.
> Don
>
> On Feb 13, 2011, at 1:47 PM, Tom Hawley wrote:
>
> > We simply feel that our fellow modellers are the scale modellers of
> > all scales,
>
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
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