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Strasburg VA, layout and actual
On a recent trip, one of our members noticed he was going to be near Strasburg VA. The name sounded familiar! He wondered if it was the Strasburg on the Nordel layout and if there were any similarities. This is what he found.
One of the highlights was the Strasburg Museum. It is housed in a building that was built as a steam pottery in 1891 and used until 1909. It was purchased by the Southern Railway Company for use as a passenger and freight depot and used until the early 1960’s. The exhibits in the museum range from Colonial items, Civil War articles, a whiskey still, history of local architecture, a Southern caboose, railroad history and an O scale model railroad in a railway baggage car. The model railroad was featured the July 2015 Classic Toy Trains magazine.
Strasburg was served by Baltimore & Ohio, now CSX, and the Southern, now Norfolk Southern. The Winchester Stem left Harper’s Ferry WV and ran 51.4 miles to the Strasburg Junction where it interchanged freight with Southern Manassas branch line and ran 112 miles to a mainline connection at Harrisonburg. There had been a turning wye at Strasburg.
The Nordel layout is very similar. See photos. We have made contact with the man who built and maintains the model railroad layout at the Strasburg museum, John Schreiner. He verified Nordel’s Strasburg is very good, but the connection to a coal mine might be a stretch. There was a limestone mine.
Nordel's Strasburg above and Strasburg VA today.
This is the O scale model railroad in a railway baggage car. The model railroad was featured the July 2015 Classic Toy Trains magazine.
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