2016 Mini-Meet Report From Our Hosts and Guests

The Central Savannah River Division was pleased to host its second mini-meet in Aiken, SC  September 23-24, 2016.
 
On behalf of our hosts, Steve Prevette:

Thanks to local members and assistance from the Region, the event was a great success.  A mini-meet is a one or two day event hosted by a Division, on a smaller scale than the annual convention, but with attendance open to the Region. For the Aiken mini-meet, we offered two operating sessions on Friday and a no-host dinner.  For Saturday, we rented a classroom (divided into two halves) at University of South Carolina Aiken for the Region Board Meeting in the morning, and clinics all day.

The Region funds mini-meets in order to support smaller divisions and allow them to be able host a Region get-together.  Our division members appreciated being able to show off local layouts, the Aiken train station dioramas and provide clinics of what we've learned in the hobby.  Attendees arrived from all over the Region. We did set a record for the number of people at a Burnt Hills and Big Flats operating session, nineteen folks. The level of knowledge in the Region on operations is encouraging, we ran the trains very close to the intended schedule with an overcrowded room and many new operators.  We had a similar success on Don Barnes' Baltimore and Ohio, with more than twenty present.

For the Saturday clinics, we focused on hands-on sessions, including Peter Youngblood, MMR's powder pastel weathering session.  Other clinics covered benchwork, backdrops, tracklaying, Fastrak turnouts, and scenery. Rather than a "death by power point" on operations, we did a round-table Q&A and had a good match up of new persons to operations and experience operators.  The discussion provided a few ideas for future operations columns in the SouthErneR.

All in all, a good time was had and we look forward to attending and hosting meets in the future.

On behalf of guests, Peter Youngblood, MMR:

The Aiken, SC SER Mini-meet Sept. 23-24 hosted by the  Central Savannah Division 9 crew was attended by 35 NMRA members all of whom had a great time. 

Friday afternoon early arrivals had a chance to operate Steve Prevette's N scale "Burnt Hills & Hickory Flats" railroad. After dinner at Mi Rancho, the group moved on to Don Barnes' HO scale "Baltimore & Ohio" layout, a massive project located upstairs in a private residence custom built to accommodate the layout. Although still under construction, visitors quickly accepted an invitation to participate in an operating session.

Presiding at Saturday's SER BoD meeting, newly elected President Alan Mole shared his thoughts about wanting to expand SER events with joint division participation. A committee will be created to research and develop opportunities.  Concurrent with the morning BoD meeting was the first of numerous clinics which concluded late afternoon at the close of the event. Thanks to SER Registrar, Steve Prevette, for spearheading a fun and educational Aiken Mini-meet for the second time.