John Allen * was a pioneer in the field of model
railroading - as a professional photographer he had the
artistic talent and attention to detail to create and
document incredibly realistic scenes, and did so in
numerous articles featured in Model Railroader, the
NMRA's Scale Rails and Railroad Model Craftsman
magazines. He developed a wonderful story of origin,
including humor and numerous references to his friends
in the model railroading and model railroading
publishing industry. He designed and built numerous
buildings, engines and even "people".
He is perhaps best known for his layout - The Gorre &
Daphetid, also known as "The Gorre" or just "The G&D,"
which was actually three successive model railroads. The
first two smaller versions were built at Allen's home in
Monterey. The final version of the G&D, which
incorporated the earliest layout, was much larger and
built over a period of twenty years also at his Monterey
home. The final G&D layout is considered one
of the greatest layouts of all time, and has several fan
websites and a devoted Yahoo discussion groups.
Here are some photos of it:
* source Wikipedia
The First Gorre
and Daphetid
The original Gorre and Daphetid was a relatively
small layout built on a typical 4' x 8' sheet of
plywood. With the state of the hobby at that time, there
were very few switch turnouts available and no pre-made
sectional track. John did a lot of his own track
work and in the original layout this meant there were
some very sharp curves. But since John was running
late 1890s branch line type steam engines, these tight
radii did not concern him much. In TrainPlayer,
you will find a modified version of John Allen's
original layout in your WEB\Layouts\101 Plans by Linn
Westcott as Plan 17
The Second
Gorre and Daphetid
John
Allen's second version of the layout was certainly
larger in scope, design and capabilities. He clearly
moved on from a beginning layout to a layout which
exhibits that the railroad was an attempt to mirror its
full sized inspiration. There are several industries
along the various routes with allowances to switch
freight cars in and out. There were also several
passenger stations to provide service points for that
traffic as well.
You will find the Gorre and Daphetid 2 plan under
WEB\Layouts\Standard\User - file name is Gorre and
Daphetid 2. Here are some screen shots
Action at the Engine House in Gorre
Train meet near Skunk Flats
Recently another version of the G&D second layout plan
was found and it incorporated a "module" on its right
side to service Andrews Logging camp. Here's a screen
capture of that new area:
Another of our users, Bill Westbury, has provided the
complete plan along with a script of a coal run. It can
be found in TrainPlayer at:
WEB\Layouts\Standard\User\gorredaphetid2 w extension.
It is worth noting that the extension was never added
because Mr. Allen had already decided to proceed with a
new layout design of the G&D.
The Third and
Greatest Gorre and Daphetid
This third version of the Gorre and Daphetid took over
much of John Allen's basement which had been specially
excavated to accommodate it. Much of the track
work, engines, rolling stock and buildings were re-used
on this layout.
Overview of The Gorre and Daphetid version 3.
Artwork by Nicolas Villarreal Kwasek
Action at the main freight
yard
The main engine house in
Gorre.
Working the graveyard shift in Canyon
Inside TrainPlayer, you will find both a "daytime" and
an "evening" version of this third verion as interpreted
by
Nicolas Villarreal Kwasek at
WEB\Layouts\Premium\nicolas
If you want to see yet another interpretation of version
3 which includes a photo mosaic treatment, then visit
the web site of Ian McGregor here:
http://www.doug56.net/GD/page31.html
Gorre and Daphetid
Rolling Stock
If you have not already found them, you can run many
virtual examples of John Allen's engines and various
freight and passenger stock by selecting from the
WEB\Cartypes\Defaults\g_d steam set.
These cars were specially made by one of users -
Larry White, a G&D fan, for use on any layouts. Thanks
Larry!
Another our original car/rolling stock designers -
Peter Lee, has also contributed a fine set of cars for
the G&D and they can be found in TrainPlayer under
WEB\Premium\PLL\plgorredaphetid. Here's a screen
shot of Peter's work:
John Allen's
Timesaver
Another of John Allen's famous "layouts" - the Timesaver
is not really a layout at all but rather it was intended
to help new and experienced users hone their skills at
operations and basic switching. It is a switching puzzle
that has thrilled and infuriated many people since its
original appearance more than 40 years ago.
You can find examples of it in TrainPlayer here:
Here are some screen
shots of those various plans:
Layouts\Standard\User\timesaver_comstock
Layouts\Premium\Mark Johnson Designs\mj timesaver
Layouts\Premium\Mark Johnson Designs\Marks Doodles\mj
timesaver ii
For More Information on John Allen
Visit this site, managed by long time TrainPlayer user
and friend, Peter Prunka, for more details on John
Allen in general and his life's work - the Gorre and
Daphetid and Timesaver in particular -
http://www.gdlines.com/
Visit this site by Ian McGregor, another TrainPlayer
user, to see a video of John Allen's magnificent Gorre
and Dapthetid -
http://www.doug56.net/GD/page78.html on his Welcome
page
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