NEB&W Guide to Grand Isle, VT

Last Update: 2009-10-15

Layout Photo Gallery Table of Contents

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• Overview.
  • [Topographic map c. 1956. (Note that South Hero and Grand Isle are both part of the same island.)]

• Lacking information at the time about the South Hero creamery, we chose to model the earlier Grand Isle one, which was destroyed by fire around 1929 and rebuilt in glazed tile. Prototype views from the collection of David Hoag. (See the Grand Isle section, below, for views of the rebuilt creamery.)
  • [Prototype view of the Grand Isle facility.]
  • [Other end.]
  • [Side away from the track.]
  • [Loading milk into a baggage car.]
  • [Model photo.]
  • [Model photo.]
  • [Model photo by Lou Sassi.]

• Early steam-era view of the depot, the stockpens and the creamery in the distance.
  • [Prototype view.]
• A Rutland train pulls up to the Grand Isle station c. 1952. Photo by Jim Shaughnessy.
  • [Prototype view.]

• Just beyond the depot was a large barn (which we need to model).
  • [Steam-era view.]
  • [Prototype view c. 1980 of the barn (actually a poor photocopy - will find the original print).]

• I believe this house was up behind the barn.
  • [Photo c. 1980.]
• There was a store or Post Office behind the depot.
  • [Steam-era view.]
  • [C. WWI photo with captions by David Hoag.]
  • [Wagon shed sketch by David Hoag.]
  • [Photo of the trackside of the store c. 1980.]
  • [Photo of the other side c. 1980.]
• The Martell Hotel was just across from the depot.
  • [Postcard c. WWI. (Is that a giant chicken house out back? Aww, the smell of fresh country air!)]

• Looking west on the layout. Left to right: ice house and creamery, Martell Hotel, cardboard mockup of the station.
  • [Layout view.]

• The creamery was rebuilt in 1929, but retained an older wood ice house at one end.
  • [Prototype view, c. 1930, courtesy of Bob Nimke's The Rutland, 60 Years of Trying, Vol. V, No. 1.]
  • [Prototype view, c. 1973.]
  • [Model view.]

• Near the Grand Isle station and hotel, neither visible.
  • [Model view.]

• An NEB&W train heads north past the station.
  • [Model view.]

• Another passing NEB&W train.
  • [Model view.]

• Here comes the local freight.
  • [Model view.]

• Views of Grand Isle not on our layout:
  • [Aerial view.]
  • [General Store.]
  • [Another general store, Breault's Beacon Store (although by the time of this photo, Beacon had been taken over by Esso).]
  • [House.]
  • [Ferry.]

See our Layout Guide for Grand Isle.

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