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Jerry White 1914 - retired 1995  photo by Dan Henon, 1985 (Texas)
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Model Railroader
- scratchbuilt his first model in 1931, a Boston
& Maine gas-electric.
- wood roof & floor, cardboard ends and sides.
- rivets punched one at a time on a piece of hard
wood.
- ran on O gauge track.
- led to 1st order, $35 to custom build one for
a B&M engineer
- Charter Member of the New England Association
of Model Railroaders.
- Personally models, HO & O Scale.
- O Scale layout / test track sold to Rod Miller
with business.
- Resold a few years later, buyer unnamed.
- 2002 has a few O Scale models, display only.
- HO continues. Some club & personal references
in new millennium, very limited in later years.
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NMRA
- Technical Chairman for four years
- served on the NMRA Standards Committee for many
years
- Clinics, over the years too numerous to count
on:
- model building
- drive systems
- gearing
- Awarded the NMRA President's
Award
- NMRA Master Model Railroader #139
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Manufacturer, prewar (Jerry White)
- 2-8-0 locomotive kit O gauge; CVRR w/57"
drivers and a 4-6-0 locomotive kit O gauge
- based on Central Vermont prototype
- powered by Kendrick &
Davis #1 motors, mounted vertically in the cab with the gear on the rear driver axle.
- offered as machined kits and
built-up.
- sand cast in bronze from original
patterns designed by Earl B. Allison of Claremont, New Hampshire
- the steam patterns were bought
from Mr. Allison before he moved to California in the 1930's and Jerry made only a few minor changes in them so
that the models could be noted as "improved."
- boilers and tenders were identical.
- only engine frames were different
- years later, with the help
of Dave Waddington, Jerry located a set, restored and upgraded their operation. These were pictured in OSN 124,
pp. 45-46.
- early 1939 kit price: $35
(2001 equivalent on the American Institute of Economic Research cost of living calculator = $445.94)
- also a Boston & Maine
gas-electric in kit form (O gauge).
- cast aluminum body and bronze
trucks.
- K&D motor mounted vertically
on the truck.
- metal ladder chain-powered
on the other side.
- VERY RARE, not many were made
or sold.
- All of these models and patterns
were sold to Howard T. Judd in Winchester, New Hampshire who produced them under the JUDD in late 1939.
- Comments from Jerry White
in OSN 82, 1985, "I sometimes wonder if Judd sold any at all. The detail of these early sand-cast models was
quite crude by today's standards but they ran a lot better than some of the brass imports which cost more than
a thousand dollars today."
- Jerry White then moved on to California to work
with Rollin
J. Lobaugh at LOBAUGH.
- created patterns for Lobaugh pre-WW II.
- 1941 Lobaugh catalog also noted that "I.E.
Lobaugh (Rollin's father) and Gerald White do the assembling…"
- This continued until he entered the U.S. Army
Air Corps in 1942.
- Returned to work for Rollin Lobaugh in 1946, but
only stayed about 9 months.
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Manufacturer, postwar (Superior Models, Kurtz Kraft Models)
- Additional information about these companies is
available upon request from the Walthers Collection
library of the National Model Railroad
Association (NMRA). E-mail them for more details.
- Superior Models (1946-1955, Redwood City, California)
- scratch built models of steam locomotives in TT,
HO, OO, S and O Scale
- 1954 Model Railroader
noted that Jerry White would make an Erie Triplex for $975
- another of his favorite locomotives in the Jerry
White Collection was a 17/64 scale SP MT-4 that he built in 1948.
- scratch built some diesel locomotives and many
passenger cars including complete train sets such as the Western Pacific's California Zephyr
and the
New
York Central's Mercury.
- Kurtz-Kraft Models Company, 1955-1957 (HO)
- injection molded PS-1 box car with separate free-standing
ladders, hand grabs, etc. The kits were available painted and lettered in several road names.
- had road names unavailable
elsewhere and a different door type
- first run sold 50,000 kits
per J. White (1994)
- flat-cavity molds, very well
detailed cars
- one problem was that the Kurtz-Kraft
cars sold for $0.89 to $1.19, less trucks and Athearn came out with a generic 40' boxcar for $0.89 with trucks.
Later models, after Jerry left the company, were not very prototypical and the later craftsman kits were not well
accepted.
- As the partnership was not
profitable in the extreme, Jerry left to take a job as a modelmaker at Ford Aerospace and set up shop in his home
working part-time as a custom builder..
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Custom Builder, Jerry White 1957-1995
- Initially custom-building in all scales, Jerry
told OSN that he slowly phased out the smaller scales.
- 1960's concentrating on O Scale & On3
- Custom Building Philosophy & Methods of Jerry
White
- Scratchbuilt engines have brass boilers with as
large a lead weight as he could fit inside.
- Main frames and cylinder blocks milled from brass
bar stock.
- Tenders built with brass bar stock frames and
sheet brass bodies.
- All loco driver axles sprung with four springs
per axle.
- Made his own patterns for many detail parts (did
use some commercial parts when available). The cast lost wax parts were produced by an outside firm.
- including but not limited to:
- Lehigh Valley Pacific 928, first kitbash that
Jerry White ever did. The prototype for the engine is the LV 209X series Pacifics. The boiler and cab were scratchbuilt
from brass, and the tender is a die-cast All Nation tender with four-wheel trucks. The drivers are sprung and there
is a heavy separate lead weight in the boiler which is removed for shipping. This was available for sale in 2001
from Rod Miller.
- Lehigh Valley's The John Wilkes
custom built for Tony Ambrose. Featured a sheet brass boiler, milled brass frame and fully sprung drivers.
- Pennsylvania Railroad class M-1 4-8-2 scratchbuilt
for a customer in New Jersey.
- many Southern Pacific GS-4's
- California Zephyr 10-car train set built from Midland kits. Lighted with complete interior detailing including
people.
- Canadian National 4-8-4 scratchbuilt for the late
Max Lowrey.
- Scratchbuilt Erie Railroad Triplex, all 16 drivers
powered.
- Three completely scratchbuilt Union Pacific Big
9's.
- 1970-1995 (partial list by road, copyright 1994
Gate VI Publishing Inc.). Jerry had reported that during this period he had scratchbuilt 302 model steam and diesel
locomotives in addition to assembling several hundred kits and customizing hundreds of imported models.
- Two (2) Boston & Albany 4-6-6T
- Boston & Maine
- Two (2) 2-8-4's
- 2-10-2 Mudsucker
- 4-4-0 No. 934 (in his personal collection, a model
that was built using Locomotive Workshop parts and a lot of scratchbuilding. ingenuity. One that he had ridden
behind back East.)
- Baltimore & Ohio 2-10-2 — 17/64
- Chicago, Burlington & Quincy
- 0-8-0
- 2-10-4
- E5 A and B units with 9-car Zephyr set
- Canadian National 2-6-0
- Chesapeake & Ohio
- Chicago & Eastern Illinois 4-4-0
- Several Chicago & North Western 2-8-4's
- D&H Canal Co. Stourbridge Lion
- Erie 2-8-8-8-2 Triplex
- Lima 4-8-6 Special
- Louisville & Nashville 2-8-4
- Two (2) Missouri Pacific 4-8-4
- New Haven
- New York Central
- 2-8-2
- Rexall 4-6-4
- 4-8-2 L4
- 4-8-2 Commodore Vanderbilt
- 4-8-4
- E6 A and B
- Electric #125
- Norfolk & Western
- 0-8-0
- 2-6-6-4
- 4-8-4 Class 1
- Northern Pacific 4-6-0
- Pacific Coast 3-truck Shay
- Pennsylvania Railroad
- Three (3) 4-6-2 K-4
- 4-8-2 M-1
- Five (5) Q-2
- Pittsburgh & Lake Erie 2-8-4
- Rock Island E6 A and B
- Santa Fe
- Seaboard E6 A and B
- Southern Pacific
- 0-6-0
- Two (2) 4-10-2
- AC9
- Several AC4
- Several AC8
- Several AC12
- F3 A-B-B-A
- Several MT4
- Union Pacific
- 2-8-0 Harriman
- 4-6-2 Forty Niner
- Early 4-6-6-4
- Late 4-6-6-4
- 4-8-4 FEF-3
- Three (3) 4-12-2
- Three (3) Big Boys
- developed drive system
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Suggested Reading including articles by Jerry
White:
- "West Bay Club Layout" by Jerry White.
Run 59, June 1979. O Scale Railroading magazine, Vane A. Jones Publishing, Indianapolis, Indiana.
- "O Meet American Version" by Jerry White.
Run 60, August 1979. O Scale Railroading magazine, Vane A. Jones Publishing, Indianapolis, Indiana.
- "Memoirs of a Master Builder, Transition"
by Jerry White, MMR. OSN 125, December 1994. 48/ft., O Scale News Magazine, Gate VI Publishing Inc., Elmhurst,
Illinois.
- Jerry White's autobiography. Includes a list
of his models since 1970; photos of Jerry's favorite projects; and a discussion regarding his philosophy &
methods of custom building and detailing which covers some of the variations in his style over the years as well
as a few tips that may help you identify and care for an original Jerry White creation.
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