Pahrump Valley & Armargosa RR Back to layouts
Owner: Lou and Joan Banning

Scale: G and 1 1/2"

Description and Narative:
Once upon a time, a long time ago, I saw this LGB drover's caboose and just had to have it. It did not matter that I did not have any other "G" gauge equipment, because I wanted to put it up on the fire place mantle. After that , each time we would take a trip, I would buy another car to go with that caboose and pretty soon I had a train without an engine. Well , we had to have an engine, so I bought a Lionel Atlantic which came on sale. The train looked really great on the mantel, but then I decided that we would have to have some track and so the story continues. In the meantime I had retired and we moved from Henderson Nevada to this little town of Pahrump.

The PV&A , Pahrump Valley & Armargosa , was began sometime in 1993 when my wife told me that the tracks I had running all over the house on the floor , had to go, so we started with a small 100 ft. loop out in the back yard. My wife's cousin had come down from Seattle for a visit and was helping me. We soon decided that it just was not enough and added a tunnel and a longer main line. We had the track down and we figured that we should have a building, so we scratch built the Leghorn Saloon. Our wives complained that we could not have a saloon without a school and a church, so they were next on the list of things to do.

The wife's cousins, Bob & Violet Peterson, stayed with us until spring when they had to go home, but from then on each year they would return and Bob and I would add onto the railroad, building the buildings and laying more track. This continued for several years and the railroad has grown to about 1300' of track and about 25 turnouts and have scratch built many buildings. It is not of any particular era, so we run just about anything with wheels.

Although we have really enjoyed the "G" scale railroad over the years, our interest has grown a bit. About five years ago I got interested in the 1-1/2" scale ride on size trains. At first I just wanted a train to take to the bigger clubs that have that size trains, but the wife said that we should have a track around the 2-1/2 acres so that the Grandkids could enjoy the ride on as well. So November of 2003 I let it out that I was going to lay some track. I thought that this would be a long project, but to my surprise, people came from nowhere to help with the railroad. Friends and neighbors all came to help with the building. We have built all of the riding cars, assembled all 3500' of the track and scratch built 28 turnouts to date. Each time I call for a "work party", there are 8-12 guys show up and we all have a great time working on the railroad. The model rail road hobby is full of great people. I have tried just about everything in my time, but I have always come back to railroading.