Sylt Island era 2 planning help needed by new guy!

Sylt Island era 2 planning help needed by new guy!
After looking for a subject to model for German era 2 railroading I stumbled across a picture of the Hindenburgdamm "one thing lead to another" and I was hooked, I have now decided to focus on re-doing my train room from NKP USA to German era 2 railroading with some great narrow gauge RR on Sylt. I've done some research on line and have ordered a book or two about the Sylt RR & Island but its yet to get here (NH USA) from Germany, my plans are to model loosely on the prototype during the war years I'd like a passenger station with interchange to Island this gives me a great opportunity to model a condensed version of the Hindenburgdamm and then allows me to do some cool narrow gauge in the island. I have a 17' by 13' space in my basement, I hope is enough (is there ever enough in this hobby LOL?) Railway info thou' hard to find is slowly coming but finding out about military operations during WW2 has been a lot harder I know they build lots of bunkers and used the island as an aircraft carrier to launch bombing raids against Britain. I hope this give you a idea where I'm going with this project and their might be anyone who might have some more info I could use on any of this from track laying and planning to history and scenery ideas I love to hear from you. Thanks for your time :D Gordon in NH

Railway on Sylt
Hello altogether, I do not know, if it is permitted to add to this discussion, but I will try to explain why it is to delicate to model scenes of WW 2 in Germany. After the war , during "re-education" British and Americans taught us , that every military tradition in Germany lead to the disaster in Europe. Most survivors of the war (released from KZ , bombed or driven out of their old home country) suffered of a deep trauma. In order to start into future many people tried to forget (more or less successfully). In the 60's a younger generation grew up and they were on the one hand fully influenced of an romantic socialism on the other hand they are the real children of reeduction- sometimes "militant pacifists". Everyone intrested in history( even in military history) , offended the rules of political correctness and was under the suspicion to be a Nazi admirer. To come back to your special question: -Yes Sylt was the base of a bomber squad ( it was named "Hindenburg"), but the squad was not involved in airraids against Britain. It was the only torpedo bomber squad of the Luftwaffe. the first wing allocated to Westerland/ Sylt flew with Heinkel He 111 standard bombers in sea warfare on North sea. - I presume there are some books about this topic existing in Germany. -Thre is another book, I think it had been published by Bernhadt+Gräfe or Köhler+Mittler about the German Naval fortifications. best regards and sorry to all, that I have used the forum for such an statement, but I wanted to explain some special German attitudes Wolfgang

Hi Wolfgang, Thank you for the sensative answer. My Interests are Epoch 2b (1928 - 1932) with no political comment at all. I am not saying it is wrong to model the war years (look at how many people build tanks and planes etc) just that it may be difficult to get information. John

Railway on Sylt
Hello John, I only wanted to show why it is difficult to get neutral statements without any political background( neither left wing nor right wing) about this era in Germany. Additionally, I can report an example of this "political correctness " attitude carried out in German railway papers . Some years the paper " Modelleisenbahner" published an article about german railway artillery in WW 2. A reader wrote a letter to the editor , that it was a digusting article ".... than You can even start to print the timetable of the trains heading for Auschwitz"( last statement of him). Another reader stated , that he is an explosive professional and he desperately needs any information about possible endangering of shells by these guns. In another paper a well known railway layout builder stated in his biography, that he dislikes layouts with themes in the years of 1933-1945. So no 03.10, no 05. no class 50 or a Fliegender Hamburger( set in regular service in March 1933). In my opinion this attitude is so intolerant and has nothing to do with our, generally, non political hobby. Help my orthography!!! I presume my English is so terrible, but I hope readers will know what I am aiming at. And I am very glad , that RoG is an tolerant international hobby community. Cheers to all Best regards Wolfgang

Hi Gordon, I would have a look at this site and join the Epoch II forum. http://www.hs-merseburg.de/~nosske/EpocheII/e2xd.html However as a german language forum, you may need to be carefull asking questions, as personally I don't know how "interested" the germans are in modelling Epoch II during WWII. John Hello John and Gordon It depends in what forum you are posting such a msg. In the yahoo group there will be no harm. Like myself ( I am German and member of the group ( more the reader than the poster)) building under topic of a "war" time there are in the group a lot of epoche IIc builder. Please look at the msg history of the group. If you would post such a msg in the DSO they probably start a witch hunt after you. There , some of the members are not very tolerant to "war" builders. Response in other forums showed me, there is a strong interest in that topic . The best experience about "war" model railway building was with the Austrian forums. They are very tolerant and polite. Ironically , it looks like we Germans like to trash about each other in forums :-) See the DSO forum flame wars at the moment. Must be some sort our behaviour. When we quarrel with ourselves we are busy and occupied and do not quarrel with other nations :-) So you have to be careful what forum you choose to place a topic like building the wartime. You can post your question in the yahoo group in English. there are a lot of members who answer than in your language. greetings Martin

Hi Martin, I must admit that two of my favourite items do not really fit my time period. The SVT 137 and the 6 axel heavy duty flat car (it was built to move tanks to the eastern front if my research is correct). Marklin released a DRG Class 50 last year, that was two modern for me (building of the locomotive did not start until 1939). Modelling can be a compromise between what we model, what we want, and what is available. I have found the Epoch II news group to be excellent in answering some of my left field questions. Regards John

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