I’ll give a hint:
I am guessing your kitty cat has rises that Rainbow Bridge, sorry for the loss. They become family as much as any one.
It’s amazing how attached we become to our pets. Penny and I had two Persian cats Ginger and Rocky. As we are both retired we spent a lot of time at home with our cats. In fall of 2016 Ginger was attacked by a dog and had to be put to sleep 2 weeks later because she grew weak and finally stopped eating. She had been part of our family for 18 years.
The following year Rocky also passed away in the late fall at 18 years of age. At that time Penny did want another cat because it was too hard to bear when they passed. But the house felt to so empty and quiet she began looking for another cat. Last spring we welcomed Max into our home.
I give up.
Max the kitten at 10 months old.
Ahh… the cat is incidental. The friend was a train guy.
I’ll wait a bit… gel cells and a big custom diesel are hints…
Greg
OK, I didn’t know Dirk had a cat…
I miss him too.
Figured you would know as soon as you see it. I used to talk to him quite often on my 1-1/2 hour commute.
What a nice guy, creative, fun.
Looks like there’s still structure out there, just looked on google maps that have a 2019 date (but maybe that is a copyright date.
Sadly, the group of us that was in constant email contact with him on a daily basis didn’t get a chance to explain to his son some of the things Dirk was trying to do.
A while back, we think, some of his stuff ended up on EBay.
I think I still have his number saved in my phone. He emailed a group of 3 of us sometimes up to 20 or 30 times a day!
Greg Elmassian said:
Looks like there’s still structure out there, just looked on google maps that have a 2019 date (but maybe that is a copyright date.
I wouldn’t be surprised if his earth works still stand, he built steady and sure, never cutting corners. I suspect the pipe will decay in place.
I know that Mark Johnson wound up buying some of the estate, I bought about 40 decoders from him and he indicated they were from Dirk’s estate.
Greg
I never asked what was in the container box, but he never seemed concerned by the size of his dream…
The yellow loop across the track from Dragoon Summit was his Narrow gauge track and the wye under that arrow and the leg extended to the driveway was about 5’ high and nicely detailed.
I miss Dirk or SD too and think of him often, most recently the UP, BNSF rail running adjacent to my new property in the evening sunset made me fondly recall the sunsets Dirk shared and the UP rail running by his place. Dirk and I were working on and sharing interest in scale length heavyweights and SP tunnel motor projects, alas the projects were lost after Dirk suddenly passed leaving me with various components of said projects. I made a few trips through the country and stopped by to see Dirk’s Empire in Dragoon Valley, AZ twice, Dirk reciprocated and visited me in Elverta, CA too. Dirk had a way about him, kinda sucked you in! It was all good.
The container on the slope had his railroad treasures within while the latest container acquisition was for his end of the “skunkworks”.
Our email group was pretty active as Craig suggested. Once I got hammered with a 100 plus emails from Dirk and Eric, As I recall they were trying to BLOW me up, good memories for sure. We still trade banter and current events/projects but the man behind the daily drive is rolling on accurate/detailed smooth rail in dismal heaven.
Michael
Michael Glavin said:
I miss Dirk or SD too and think of him often, most recently the UP, BNSF rail running adjacent to my new property in the evening sunset made me fondly recall the sunsets Dirk shared and the UP rail running by his place. Dirk and I were working on and sharing interest in scale length heavyweights and SP tunnel motor projects, alas the projects were lost after Dirk suddenly passed leaving me with various components of said projects. I made a few trips through the country and stopped by to see Dirk’s Empire in Dragoon Valley, AZ twice, Dirk reciprocated and visited me in Elverta, CA too. Dirk had a way about him, kinda sucked you in! It was all good.
The container on the slope had his railroad treasures within while the latest container acquisition was for his end of the “skunkworks”.
Our email group was pretty active as Craig suggested. Once I got hammered with a 100 plus emails from Dirk and Eric, As I recall they were trying to BLOW me up, good memories for sure. We still trade banter and current events/projects but the man behind the daily drive is rolling on accurate/detailed smooth rail in dismal heaven.
Michael
Michael,
One of the last email correspondence I had with SD (Dirk) was when he told me that you and him were planning to come down here to visit me at Los Angeles Live Steamers. I was really looking forward to that visit. Sadly his emails abruptly stopped. Then only a few months later, we got the word of his passing. He was a fantastic “dreamer” and every time he posted his photos of his empire, I felt happy seeing his vision come to life. I also felt extremely “exhausted” seeing all that work and the shear size of his railroad. What a great friend and I still miss him :(.
Never met the man but really enjoyed the few pictures I was able to see of his railroad. The shear audacity and scope of his project was amazing.
Greg, thanks very much for remembering Dirk. I first “met” him in 2011 when he chimed in on a turnout thread I started. You posted his pics for him, and he explained his 6-foot long #14 turnout he made from scratch:
We interacted a lot since then, up until his passing. He was always enthusiastic and encouraging, and I miss the reports on how his dream layout was progressing.
Cliff
Dirk was one of the reasons I experimented with Proto29 track. The emails back and forth about it droe me to experiment with it. Sadly, I’ve come to the conclusion that its not worth the hassle.
Dirk also was encouraging me to build my #9 turnouts as well. The new layout will likely have something close (#8 or #10) unless I can CAD up a #9 frog.
Gary
Yeap, that was our plan to visit you and the Live Steamer group as well Travel Town for me to document/dimension SP’s #3025 Atlantic 4-4-2 for my Sacramento Daylight A-6 #3000 formerly A-3 #3058 project. Your thoughts and description are spot on IMO. I became concerned when the last email from Dirk was less than typical with typo’s and such. Dirk literally was consumed overnight, like a switch had been thrown. No response to mine and others email after the aforementioned email concerned others and I. A little detective work by Eric lead to contact with his son Nathan, it was sad times thereafter. We were advised that Dirk collapsed and was airlifted to the hospital with a non operable brain tumor. Several days later Dirk succumbed and passed peacefully. Dirk had a grand plan, lots of space to make it happen and the drive to get it er done. Dirks influence is sorely missed here.
I have to travel to Arizona in the near future to pickup load of equipment I purchased from Dennis of the Palo Verde & Southwestern Railroad. I’ll attempt to schedule time to work out the plan Dirk and I had to visit ya’ll.
Michael
Thank you Greg for stating this thread.
Oh how I miss my friend Dirk. The daily emails and text messages, the occasional phone call. Sharing of photos of trains we’d see throughout the day. He taught me a lot in the few years I knew him. Really sparked that kitbashing/scratch building bug in me again. Like HO scale used to be 20+ years ago. We would (Dirk mostly) challenge each other to build our models as prototypical as we could.
I’m grateful that he started the email groups. It allowed me the opportunity to get to know modelers. Thankfully I still email with Michael and Craig. Dirk and I often talked about meeting each other. The summer before he passed he was planning a trip to Michigan. He was planning on swinging through Minnesota. Sadly that never happened. I really wanted to go to Arizona to see his property. I may have to reach out to Nathan and see if we can still do that.
Michael mentioned the email BOMB. HAHAHAHA, Dirk and I were like two little kids in a candy store.
I also have to mention the upside down photos. Among the email group we’d all take pictures on our phones and send the pictures out. Some how Dirk’s beautiful sunrise/sunset photos more often than not ended up upside down. We used to tell him that but they kept coming in upside down.
Hah! I do remember the upside down pictures, we struggled mightily with them, another fond memory.
Thanks Eric!
How much of the google drawn image was actual track and how much was left to finish? I go by that area a lot, sad to see something that grand pulled up and gone, mich like Dennis‘ Paulo Verde and Southwestern. Is there still stuff being sold on e bay ?