In November 2007 T&DMRC took delivery of Johnshaven, the OO layout of Richard Parker, a founder member who died in 2005. When the Club started in 1961, Richard and his father Les were building a permanent layout in their loft which a freelance model of the fictitious ‘Richards Castle and Johnshaven Railway’.

When Les decided to extend the layout by the building of the branch station, he decided to model a typical Great Western line. At the outset, the branch was designed and built to be portable. From the station end of the layout, the first three boards were used with the loft layout, but to make it a self-contained exhibition layout, a hidden traverser board was constructed.

Johnshaven is loosely based on Ashburton, with the engine shed from Moretonhampstead. The plain track is Gem flexitrack and the points are Marcline built using copper clad paxolin soldered construction. All the buildings, built by Les, are models of actual ones found in a number of places including Windsor and Teignmouth. Richard was knowledgeable on signalling and was instrumental in the layout having working signals, operated mechanically by wire in tube from a Gem lever frame.

Eventually, the layout was extended with the addition of four extra baseboards, all of which were angled so the layout could be exhibited in many different configurations including bent through 90° in either direction, or straight with a ‘wiggle’. It was in this extended format that the layout was shown at New Horticultural Hall at the Model Railway Club’s 1969 exhibition. Johnshaven appeared at eight T&DMRC exhibitions and featured in the February 1981 issue of Model Railway Constructor.

T&DMRC is indebted to Richard’s widow, Brenda, for her generosity in donating the layout to the Club. T&DMRC will, where necessary, carry out remedial work to restore the layout to its former glory and plans to put “Johnshaven” back on the exhibition circuit as soon as possible.