Our most esteemed member Barry Norman joined the club in 1976 and a year later was exhibiting his first layout Wyndlesham Cove at the 1977 Bury show held at the West Suffolk College.

It then appeared in two 1981 issues of the Railway Modeller which lead to him unexpectedly awarded the ‘Railway Modeller Cup’ for that year. Well done!

This was followed by Petherick which then led to his first book ‘Landscape Modelling’ which was a best seller published by Wild Swan and more than 60 articles have appeared in Model Railway Journal. Some of these articles covered layout design and led to his second book ‘Layout Design’.

Images off Barry’s layout Petherick

He was one of the main instigators in the club branching into 0 gauge with the building of an exhibition layout, Cobbold’s Wharf which is an S7 scale layout (7mm to the foot) and is based on a part of Ipswich docks as it would have appeared in the 1950’s. Locomotives include both steam and diesel and the rolling stock is mostly goods wagons which reflect the docks industrial feel. The buildings are, in general, models of real structures that once existed on the docks.

It was exhibited at the 2022 Warley Show in Birmingham. The layout was well received by all who viewed it and has been invited to many other exhibitions across the country as well as being invited to appear in several model railway publication.

A little bird has mentioned that he’s latest project is what was the small branch terminal station in Eye, Suffolk!