Early Spring President's Message 2021

March 30, 2021

Hello Model Railroaders,

With the Winter of 2021 officially behind us, it appears as though warmer weather has finally started to reach all of us, here in Northern New England. I hope that this has been a productive winter for each of you, as you work on various layout or modeling projects. My helix is actually starting to take shape as I begin to lay roadbed and track on the approach from the lower level of my layout into the helix. If you have a specific project that you have been working on, I would like to ask each of you to consider sharing a few pictures along with some words with us, on our Division web site, regarding your efforts.

It is certainly great news that the Covid19 vaccination efforts have swung into high gear. By now, I am thinking that most of you have been fully vaccinated or have secured appointments to have that done. If you haven`t done so, I would highly encourage you to get vaccinated.

Board of Directors Meeting

On April 6, 2021, the Seacoast Division Board of Directors will hold our next virtual meeting. As a reminder, Seacoast Division Board of Directors meetings are open to all Seacoast Division members. If you have an issue or item where you feel the need to address the Board of Directors, or if you just want to listen in to one of the BOD meetings, please contact me and I will send you the meeting information.

One of the items the Board will be discussing is when we can safely return to holding "in-person" Quarterly Events. If you have any thoughts or opinions about this subject, please contact me prior to the BOD meetings and I will be happy to share your opinions with the Board members.

NERx Convention

As most of you are aware by now, the NER will be hosting another NERx Virtual Convention. The convention will take place on April 10 & 11, 2021, from 2 to 6 pm and 7 to 11 pm eastern time on both days. There are some great clinics and layout tours that you can experience. The schedule of events is posted on our Division web site or you can go this direct link [http://www.nerx.org/index.html#events] to get the information. Please consider attending the NERx convention.

Seacoast Division Virtual Spring Event

The Seacoast Division Virtual Spring Event will take place on Saturday, April 17, 2021. Similar to our past virtual events, we will start at 10:00 am and hopefully finish by 12:00 pm. We have 2 great clinics to present to you, one from Joe Linquata on "Creating Rigid Foam Scenery", and the other from Dave Emery on "Designing and Laying Out Scratch Built Structures." There will also be a video tour of John Newick`s Central Maine and Aroostook N scale layout. Additionally, we will have a "What`s On Your Workbench" session where some of you will be showing us your recent modeling efforts.

I will send out the Zoom meeting information on the day before the Event. I will also plan a "practice" Zoom session meeting for either Wednesday or Thursday evening the week prior to the Event. These practice sessions are a great way to become familiar with the Zoom log-in procedures and also are a chance to see and catch up on the latest goings-on with your train buddies that you haven`t seen for a while. We have a lot of fun at these practice sessions! Please think about joining us!

Request

I sent this out to you in my previous President`s Message and I wanted to give this one more chance before I pull it. I received this email from a fellow model railroader:

I found your email address on the Seacoast Division NMRA website. I am based in Bedford, NH and have a large collection of model train magazines. It contains a few decades of Model Railroader and others. Do you know of anyone who might be interested in such a collection? Thank you.

If there is anyone interested in this gentleman`s magazine collection, please let me know and I will provide his email address to you. Thanks for your consideration.

Division Staff Openings

Our Division Webmaster would like to step down from his duties. If you are the type of person that is very tech savvy and would be interested in running and maintaining our Division website, if you have those skills, please contact me. Thank you!

I am very happy to report that Seacoast Division member Ken Moller has volunteered to join the Faulter Fund Committee. Thank you, Ken!

That`s all I have for you at this time. Please consider writing an article for our "Switch Tower" newsletter. All of our members would love to hear from any of you regarding your model railroading efforts or adventures. Please join us at the upcoming NERx Virtual Convention and our Spring Seacoast Division Zoom Event.

Best regards,

Tage Erickson, Seacoast Division President