Invasion 2006

The Ottawa Valley Garden Railroad Society hosts an annual event called the “American Invasion”. So named, because a bunch of us from South of the Border come up for an operating session and party. This year was my second, but it’s been going on for over 5 years.

It starts with a “free run” session on Friday on Fred Mills’ IPP&W. This is a chance to run your own train, but you’re on your own, as there is no dispatcher.


	Here, Ken Brunt from Pennsylvania prepares his live steam Ruby, while Doug Mattheson from Ottawa offers advice.


	They didn’t want us to go hungry, so they had an entire lamb and a hunk of beef prepared. It was roasted over an open barbeque for about six or seven hours. Mike Steele did the preparations.


	It smelled delicious, and tasted even better.


	I ran my 1:20 train across Doug’s new steel bridge.

Everyone enjoyed watching double headed live steam Shays pull 17 hoppers around the railroad.

Frequent stops for water are a necessity.


	Ric Golding (Carlyle, IL) owned one of the Shays; Doug the other.


	On Saturday, Doug provided an operations briefing and a dedication of the new Post Office at Craig Leigh.


	Visitors were presented a ceremonial envelope to mark the occasion.


	Jean was the engineer, and I was the conductor for train #451, a through freight out of Craig Leigh, bound for Fir Grove.