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INVENTORY CLEARANCE SALE
33% OFF TICHY STRUCTURE & CAR
KITS
BETHLEHEM PASSENGER CAR KITS
CENTRAL VALLEY SWITCH KITS
MAY 2011 PROJECT PAGE UPDATES due to extensive reruns: BRILL 55 HO KIT "now in second run" click here NEW IN THE MRRW PRODUCT FAMILY Working on RR
 “GRAND
RIVER CAR SHOPSprofessionally built up Cannonball kits”  LIMITED EDITION GRAND RIVER BUILTUPS  ----------------------------------------------     MRRW IS ALIVE, WELL, & STAYING RIGHT HERE OUR CURRENT PRODUCT LINES ARE TOO ( BUT RED BALL (HERITAGE) IS MOVING ) [As Mark Twain kinda said-our obituary on the internet is quite premature] RED BALL IS GETTING READY TO MOVE (old headline)
Announcement for release
8/29/09
M. Dale
Newton founded the Red Ball kit firm in 1939 and operated it from
his printing business in Los Angeles, Ca. He moved to Medford,
Oregon, during World War 2 and continued operations there. John
Anderson, later a leading fotce at Kemtron then founder of Cal
Scale, milled hundreds of the crisply detailed solid metal Red Ball
molds during the post war years. Red Ball was briefly located in
Elkhart, Indiana, but returned to Medford prior to its purchase in
1955 by Howell Day. Mr. Day was a pioneer model rail shop proprietor
in Dunellen/Piscataway, New Jersey, He had manufactured O scale kits
and had introduced an HO PRR K4 kit prior to World War 2 under the
“H Owen” brand.. The Red Ball line was expanded to include dozens of
unique prototype kits, well over 200 billboard refrigerator cars and
over a hundred wood style boxcars during the New Jersey era.
Red Ball was also an early importer of Japanese made brass motive
power and specialty cars. Upon his retirement in 1975 the parts and
kit line was acquired by Wabash Valley Lines, Inc. and has been
operated by Merle Rice’s Model Railroad Warehouse for the past 34
years. Rice added dozens
of additional prototype specific kits and engineered the use of most
Red Ball molds to produce injection molded styrene parts and kits.
During this era, the wood and metal Red Ball line was
differentiated from the styrene kits by introduction of the
“Cannonball Car Shop”
brand for styrene kits and parts. Red Ball, at seventy years old, is
one of the handful of remaining pioneer kit makers and has been
particularly notable for introducing a wide variety of detailed
unique prototype cars and carsides to the hobby. As Red Ball enter
its seventy -first year of kitmaking it will be conducted by LaBelle
Woodworking Company’s Rick Steele.
Metal and
plastic molding machinery, hundreds of solid metal molds and many
tens of thousands of parts are being packed at the Model Railroad
Warehouse for this undertaking. LaBelle Woodworking Company, the
future caretaker/ proprietors of this historic line of unique model
railroad kits, have set an ambitious goal to release their first Red
Ball kits by December 2010. Please patiently watch for their kit
announcements later in 2010.
Next month,
Model Railroad Warehouse will announce special limited edition 70th
Anniversary Red Ball kits of the Pile Driver and open platform
passenger cars for release the winter of 2009-2010.
These will be upgraded revisions of previous Red Ball kits
based on styrene bodies with and metal castings. These anniversary
kits will be “the last MRRW Red Ball” offerings. The Signature
Series and LTD Series kits will continue as kit offerings by Model
Railroad Warehouse under the LTD and Signature Series brands.
FACTORY CLEARANCE--CLICK YARDSALE . NEW IN THE MRRW Prototype Product family. Click here S Scale? --
see special announcement-click here
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New LOGO to look for on all pages when
updated. Click on the logo to go directly to the latest on that page.
Signature
Series
(cheese)
when he read this comment "Your
web page is a wonderful aid
He sits around and wonders if
people scroll down this far when
