{"id":46,"date":"2024-05-25T14:16:04","date_gmt":"2024-05-25T14:16:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/burystedmundsmrc.com\/bsemrc\/?page_id=46"},"modified":"2025-07-15T20:52:13","modified_gmt":"2025-07-15T20:52:13","slug":"club-history","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/burystedmundsmrc.com\/bsemrc\/club-history\/","title":{"rendered":"Our Club"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

When the land from our club house in Bury St. Edmunds was required for development in the 1970’s, a railway-minded farmer offered the use of a pig shed on his farm in Drinkstone for a nominal rent. The members turned the bare room into a functioning clubhouse, complete with lighting, tea-making facilities and, using parts of the original layout, built a new 30′ x 20′ one representing GER action in East Anglia during the 1960’s, and featuring two large termini, a through junction station and two smaller branch line stations. The layout was worked into a sequence, through a fog of cigarette smoke and the sequence would take many weeks to complete.<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Photographs of the layout appeared in the Railway Modeller in the late ’70’s and was used for some years in Peco’s advertising literature. Much of the building and club-owned stock were the work of the late Norman Willis, the club’s first treasurer in 1949. Norman was a Great Western man at heart, having been born in Swindon, but he also had a great love of the Great Eastern and the wonderful depiction of Bury St. Edmunds Station (our Abbotsford), with it’s imposing lift towers, was his work. <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Sadly, as there years passed, the membership numbers declined to the point that there were not enough people to run the sequence and it was decided that alterations be made to convert the layout into a folded figure-of-eight design, albeit retaining three of the termini, so that the dwindling membership could still run trains. By this time smoking had been banned and we joined the land fit and healthy. Over the past years, the club saw an influx of new members, (45 at the present time) to the extent that we ran out of space. <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Our Honarary President and landlady very graciously allowed us use of an adjoining barn, which has been converted, by the members themselves, into a wonderful new clubroom.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

We now have 3 rooms<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Room 1 – This has our N Gauge test track and a large OO track, which is currently being added to and re-worked<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Room 2 – Has a seating and kitchen area along with bookshelves and workbenches<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Room 3 – Houses our layouts; Sumware<\/a>, Cobbolds Wharf<\/a>, Beyton Bridge<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Compare with our header image some 30 years apart.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

History of the Bury St Edmunds Model Railway Club Matthew Porteous<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

1949: Club founded in Bury St Edmunds as the Bury Model Engineering Club<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

1951: As all the members were more interested in model railways than anything else club changes its name to Bury St Edmunds Model Railway Club.  The club rooms were in a building on some waste ground behind Maltings on the Mildenhall Rd<\/p>\n\n\n\n

1960:  1st club exhibition.  Held in St Georges\u2019 Hall in Bury St Edmunds.  Attended by Rev W Audrey (author of Thomas the Tank Engine) with his Ffarquhar layout.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

1961 First of many club Exhibitions held in The Atheneum<\/p>\n\n\n\n

1973 Club moves to current club rooms between Woolpit and Drinkstone.  Initially in a single converted chicken shed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

1978 club large permeant layout completed with trackwork that featured on the PECO catalogue cover for some years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

2000 Expansion into room 2 in one half of an old barn on the same site.  Room used for model making and socialising.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

2010 Old grain store in the back of the barn converted into room 3 for layout construction.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

2010 Annual exhibition revived in Risby Village Hall<\/p>\n\n\n\n

2017 Club trip to Dortmund model show<\/p>\n\n\n\n

2019 70th anniversary trip to North Norfolk Railway<\/p>\n\n\n\n

2022 Club takes its S7 Cobbold\u2019s Wharf layout to the Warley national model rail exhibition at the NEC.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

2023 Annual exhibition in The Guildhall Bury St Edmunds.\u00a0 Work starts on the new 00 Gauge layout of\u00a0Bury Station<\/p>\n\n\n\n

2024\u00a0Annual exhibition in The Guildhall Bury St Edmunds March 16th and\u00a0we celebrate our 75th\u00a0Anniversary with an Exhibition in Bury Cathedral.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

When the land from our club house in Bury St. Edmunds was required for development in the 1970’s, a railway-minded farmer offered the use of a pig shed on his farm in Drinkstone for a nominal rent. The members turned … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"sidebar-page.php","meta":{"_crdt_document":"","footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-46","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/burystedmundsmrc.com\/bsemrc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/46","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/burystedmundsmrc.com\/bsemrc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/burystedmundsmrc.com\/bsemrc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/burystedmundsmrc.com\/bsemrc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/burystedmundsmrc.com\/bsemrc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=46"}],"version-history":[{"count":14,"href":"https:\/\/burystedmundsmrc.com\/bsemrc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/46\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1848,"href":"https:\/\/burystedmundsmrc.com\/bsemrc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/46\/revisions\/1848"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/burystedmundsmrc.com\/bsemrc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=46"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}