Recently, the Olive Hill Historical Society has decided to take up the task of building an HO scale model of the Chesapeake & Ohio Lexington Subdivision. This is the railroad that once ran from Ashland to Lexington, Ky. It forever changed the future for the communities it touched when it was laid down and it forever altered the outlook of eastern Kentucky when it left in 1985.
Cory Claxon is spearheading the effort. It will be built in one of the former classrooms on the east addition of the historic Olive Hill High School. The room overlooks downtown and will provide a large space for the railroad to be built.
Preliminary work has begun to clean the room including the early stages of designing a track plan that will match, as close as we can get, the former railroad line. Large communities, including Olive Hill, will be featured on the layout and will help convey the history of the railroad and its effect on the region’s economy in the early to mid 1900s.
We are actively seeking volunteers and donations to aid in this effort. All modelers of all skill levels are invited to help us move this project forward.
Cory Claxon be contacted via email at it@ohcae.org or by phone at (606) 225-5912 (please leave a voicemail). Please check back for updates as we make progress on this initiative.
(Above photo: C&O GP9 #5911, GP39 #3919, and a GE unit approach grade crossing at Olive Hill, Ky. with eastbound switcher, west-facing view from freight station showing depot at right, August 1969. Eugene L. Huddleston photo. (C&OHS))
