HIGH LIFE: A WEEKLY FORUM FOR HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS : Teen Finds History--and Himself--in Hobby

When most students want to see something of historic value or be reminded of the Old West, they travel to Santa Ana’s Bowers Museum or Mission San Juan Capistrano.

Not Glen Landin, who recently graduated from El Modena High School. He just goes home.

Landin, 18, is president and curator of the Glen Landin Railroad Museum, which houses more than 15 scale-model railroads. Located in a room off his house in Orange Park Acres, the museum is open to the public daily by appointment (except Christmas and Memorial Day).

“I got a model train as a present for Christmas,” Landin remembered, “but it didn’t work, so I went to a hobby shop and got one that did.

“My neighbor, Jake Johnson, helped me get started,” Landin said. “He is involved with model railroading and helped me build all the layouts,” which Landin refers to as his “railroad empires.”

“In 1984, I began building the main empire, which is modeled after (the mining towns of) Deadwood and Lead in South Dakota,” said Landin, who said he visited that area during a family vacation.

The two train empires, which sit on table tops, are made of a variety of materials, including wood, paper bags, wire, plaster and foam. Landin carved the plaster into granite mountains, then added green foam, sand, miniature trees and buildings, as well as the railroad tracks, to complete the scenes.

“The way I build and paint the layouts adds a lot to the authenticity and realism of the empires,” he said.

“I make some of the buildings from scratch, but most come in kits. They’re white plastic, so I have to paint them so they look weathered and old.”

To do this, Landin has to select the correct color, paint the piece, then put it through a process called dirt-dripping, which gives it an antique look.

The empires also have populations of people, some as small as an inch tall, that also need to be painted. “I use a very small brush,” he added.

Landin learned most of the processes involved in building his model-train empires through hobby magazines, books, tapes and videotapes, as well as his family trips.

The sizes of the model trains are in proportion to full-sized ones. The largest scale, called LGB, is 0.25 inches per foot--making each car about a foot long--while N scale is 0.075 inches per foot. The HO and HOe sizes fall between the N and the LGB scales. The smallest is Z scale, which is only half the size of N-scale. Landin hopes to add Z-scale models soon.

Landin’s museum also houses an award-winning diorama of the Golden Spike ceremony that took place at Promontory, Utah, on May 10, 1869, marking the completion of the first transcontinental railroad.

Landin entered the diorama, which took him seven months to complete, at last year’s Orange County Fair. Along with receiving a blue ribbon and first-place trophy, Landin was told by the judges that his entry was the finest of its kind they had seen in 15 years.

He plans to enter the fair competition again this summer with an LGB-scale model of the Silverton Railroad Depot in Silverton, Colo.

Landin’s ideas for his empires come from the various trips he takes--”by train, of course,” he said. He and his family have traveled extensively throughout the West, taking pictures and planning his new projects while he vacations.

This summer, he is traveling to Albuquerque, Denver and Chicago by train with his mother and one of her friends. “My mom really supports me. She helps me with different things,” Landin said.

“I hope to come back with some new ideas for model empires.”

Even so, it might be a while before he can begin building them, as model railroading can be an expensive hobby.

“It may cost only $5 for a boxcar, because they are usually plastic or metal, but the engines run from $20 to $200, sometimes more,” Landin said of the HO-scale models.

Pointing to his LGB models on the Silverton tracks, he said, “The engine for this one was about $1,000.”

Even the smaller models can be costly, depending upon the difficulty in scaling them and the metals used. Landin owns a brass HOe engine that cost him $95. He estimates that he has spent more than $7,000 on his museum.

The first place Landin goes when his family stops at any train station is the gift and hobby shops in search of additional model trains.

“I have in mind what I want to get, and my trips are focused on finding them (the trains).

“I usually get new additions--like a car, engine or building for the set--about once a month,” he said. Landin mows his neighbors’ lawns and washes cars to earn the money, and also receives pieces as presents from friends and relatives.

While the museum is a way of educating people about the past, it is entirely nonprofit and admission is free. Landin does, however, have a donation box, but he said he doesn’t receive enough money to support his hobby.

But he is not deterred, and even has plans for expansion. He has already added an LGB-scale garden railway that runs outdoors near the museum and hopes one day to purchase an old caboose--real-life sized, which would cost about $8,000--to add to the tour.

“I would leave it just as it is,” he said, “to add to the agedness of it. I also want to buy a live-steam train for the back yard.”

A live-steam train is 1 1/2-inch scale, meaning it stands about knee-high.

Landin said most of the visitors to his museum are friends, neighbors, church groups and Boy Scout groups. He estimates that about 30 people stop by each month. Every December, he holds an open house, which attracted 300 museum-goers last year.

Carol Thompson, one of Landin’s teachers at El Modena, attended the last open house with her husband.

“It was great,” Thompson said. “It must have taken a lot of work to finish it. Glen was a student of mine for three years, and I knew he was interested in trains. But I hadn’t seen the museum until this (school) year.

“Everyone who was there seemed to be really interested,” she said. “Glen was dressed in a conductor’s uniform and looked quite professional.”

Greg Bowden, the band director at El Modena, said he too has visited the clarinet student’s showplace.

“Glen’s done a really good job of collecting it all,” Bowden said. “I’m not as avid a collector as he is, but I visited Promontory Point and I’m interested in model railroading. He’s done well at showing the historical aspect of railroading.”

As for his future, Landin plans to attend Rancho Santiago College and then hopes to work for Amtrak. His ultimate goal is to be a train conductor and work in Colorado.

“I never dreamed (my hobby) would go this far,” Landin said. “I just thought I’d have a small layout in the corner, but I kept going. Railroading has become more than a hobby--it’s my life.

“I wanted people to know about trains and their importance,” he added. “We have to keep the past alive so that our culture and history won’t die.”