It’s Monday, Oct. 19, 1953, in Ann Arbor, Mich. New York Central eastbound mail and express train X342 has just set out the express car the REA truck is unloading. Its 8:40 a.m. station stop completed, the 5400-series Hudson-powered train will pass under the Broadway Street bridge, resuming its Chicago-to-Detroit run.
My wife, Brook, and I used Sanborn fire insurance maps, track maps, and period photos to create this scene on our HO scale Michigan Lines. Our prototype-based layout models the major rail lines radiating from Detroit to 20 Michigan cities that have a special meaning for us. Ann Arbor is one of them. It was my hometown, and Brook and I met there while attending the University of Michigan.
The prototype photo came from the New York Central System Historical…