O Scale Hall of Fame 2011

Vendor at O Scale shows and also did custom painting of freight cars. John was one the really good guys in the 'O' Scale community and we always enjoyed visiting with him at the conventions.

Jim was the executive vice-president of Atlas O, LLC, Hillside, NJ and is recognized as the co-founder of that organization. He spent the last 15 years with Atlas, starting in August of 1996 and he worked until the week of his passing.

As anyone who met or communicated with Jim saw, it was readily apparent that his interest, knowledge and love of the model railroad hobby and industry was vast and encyclopedic. While Jim had been responsible for the production of all Atlas O products, perhaps his best known achievement, and the one that gave him greatest satisfaction, was the creation of the entire line of Atlas O’s 21 st Century Track.

Jim provided Atlas O with a great foundation to move into the future where the company he helped found will carry on his exemplary work.

Thomas W. Haedrich, CEO Atlas Model Railroad Co. Inc. Atlas O, LLC

Overland Models, Inc., located in Muncie, Indiana, was founded in 1976 by Thomas E. Marsh. Overland Models manufactures highly detailed, heavily researched models for collectors, and ready-to-run models for your layout.

Best known for his scratchbuilding with simple hand tools. Mel Thornburgh was a rather prolific locomotive scratchbuilder and used only the most basic of tools. Anybody who was around at the time will remember the series of MR articles "Thornburgh Builds A Wabash Mogul" (IIRC starting in 1959). The Mogul(s) in question were the two F-4 class Wabash Moguls that were the last Wabash steam locomotives in operation. They lasted longer than other Wabash steam as they were the only locomotives light enough to cross a bridge on a Wabash branch line. Andre Chapelon - Trains.com

In the 40 & 50s he was featured in MR often. Always with a series of articles about scratch building Brass Locos. Mel was an amazing man , his work was impeccable, he made pretty much EVERY part of the loco , except the wheels, gears & motors. He used no commercial details -- bells, compressors etc, instead hand fabricating them all. On top of that Mel owned NO power tools , not even an electric drill -- he turned any machined part with a hand driven "eggbeater" drill & a file!!! He also had no workshop, using his kitchen table to build on. The man & his work always amazed me -- a few years back I bought a collection of MR magazines that had the complete set of his build of a K4 Pacific that was featured starting in 1949 & going thru part of 1950.

Dave Harris - Zealot.com