May 2024 Meeting

Last night was our May hybrid (in-person and online) meeting and was attend by about twenty plus folks. Many of us started off with a large group at Ricky-Jo’s sharing a meal a great stories. We whisked through the business portion of the meeting and got straight to the presentations. We had four digital shows and one slide show.

We were treated to an excellent show by Andy Panko highlighting the history of the of NS&T main line through Merritton including maps, diagrams and photos. He also covered the history of the Michigan Central line through St. David’s including the story of a cement plant built on the side of the escarpment, again with many photos. He also outlined an upcoming hike planned for mid-October featuring many historic rail sites in the Niagara Falls and St. David’s area.

We then had a wonderful presentation by Glenn Cherry of his recent trip into the US to see and photograph CPKC’s Hudson steam engine 2816 on its tour through western Canada and down into the US. This was followed up by Tammy’s super presentation which overlapped Glenn’s also covering 2816 with additional photos of American short lines. Then Ricahrd Guitar, one of our ZOOM attendees, shared some of his digitized slides of railway scenes from the 1970s.

Finally we had a slide show by Steve Armstrong which featured some very artistic shots of steam excursions from the 1970s. All in all they were all excellent presentations.

The Longest Day is coming up on Friday June 21st where, those that wish to, will gather on the Laking Garden bridge for breakfast and the morning rush of trains. Our BBQ is also planned for July and a GO trip is planned for August so it should be an enjoyable summer. Our next hybrid meeting is scheduled for Wednesday September 25th at the Lock 3 Museum and over ZOOM.

April Meeting

The monthly hybrid meeting was last night at The St. Catharines Museum at Lock 3 with good attendance in person and on line. Plans were discussed for The Longest Day which falls on the Summer Solstice; the CHRA Niagara annual BBQ which is set for July; a GO train trip planned for August and a fall hike set for October. There were great presentations by Glenn Cherry, Dean Brown and Andy Panko. All in all another successful meeting, looking forward to the next one on May 29th. See you then!

Niagara Train Show Report

The Niagara Train Show, hosted admirably by the Niagara Railway Museum again was a great success with lots of railway aficionados as well as young families attending.

The CRHA Niagara booth at the Niagara Train Show was also a great success for us. We offered the following:

  • Our promotional boards as used at our plaque unveilings
  • A poster board about St.David’s and its railways by Andy Panko
  • A continually running Powerpoint presentation in three parts:
    • A few slides about Exporail (our parent organization)
    • Our best slides from our Longest Day excursions over the past few years
    • A slide show about our five current historic plaques
  • …. And of course, railway themed baked goods by famous chef Tammy Frakking which sold quite well.

How is success measured beside sales of stuff.  We got three new members signed up!!

Thanks to the leadership of Tammy and a handful of CRHA Niagara members who dropped by to help during the show.

We are looking forward to being there again for the next Niagara Train show in the fall!

2018 Calendars availability!

We have now sold out of our 2018 Calendars!

To see what is in the 2018 calendar, click here.

However, some may still be available at a number of hobby shops as follows:

Call the shops before you visit to make sure they still have copies!

 

 

 

CRHA Niagara has now installed 5 historic plaques!

The month of October 2017 saw CRHA Niagara Division unveil three more historic plaques in addition to the two we unveiled in prior years. To read about all of the unveilings and see the content of the plaques, click here!

Plaque #3: Welland Canal Construction Railway at Lock #1

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Plaque #4: NS&T Port Dalhousie Extension in Lakeside Park

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Plaque #5: Stop 13/Electric Park in Welland