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| The white substance is unpainted Sculptamold which will eventually be covered with dirt and growing things. |
Running out of shingles can sure put a damper on a model's progress. I thought I had enough to finish the new Howe and Smallwood grain warehouse but I did not. Even though I ordered more, it took a few weeks to get them made and in my hands. The material I use is from Minuteman Scale Models (
www.minutemanscalemodels.com) and is a very good product. I have used them on several of the buildings in Oakdale and elsewhere. They come in strips and have a peel-off backing so the strip can just be stuck down on the roof of the model. I highly recommend them.
Casting the grain sacks to populate the warehouse took a bit of time as well. I used up the last of my casting resin which, fortunately, was enough to finish the job. In the 1890s, before forklifts, warehouses generally only stacked things about eight feet high. That was as high as a man could reach. A few hand trucks completed the interior.
The terrain on the warehouse site was not quite level so I used some Sculptamold to fill in the low spots. It still needs to be painted and have dirt, etc. applied. There's still a bit of scenery work need plus a wagon or two delivering grain to the building.
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| An 1885 bird's-eye map of Oakdale yielded this view of the warehouse. With the side of my model cut off, I could only show one door and one window. |
The prototype of this warehouse was built in the early 1870s and was a brick building like the model. It was 400 feet long while my model was cut back to 200 feet. They must have moved a lot of grain in those days! By 1895, the building was gone, probably due to fire although I have found no confirmation of that. I would probably have to go to Oakdale and read through the Oakdale papers to see if there was any mention of a fire. Although the prototype building at this site was one of the Stanislaus Warehouses, I used the name of another warehouse in town just to give some variety to the scene.
Love the look of the Warehouse. The other thing I am seeing in my photos of the large buildings in 1895 is the amount of advertising painted on the roofs of the buildings in "that" part of town.
ReplyDeleteCan you do a post on the casting of the grain sacks.
Recently the CM crowd has located a large number of the Annual Reports on Freight Traffic and low and behold, the movement of flour is much greater than any of us realized. At the July CMQ Leadville Convention these reports are going to discussed in one of the clinics.