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The next Western Division Train Meet is March 30th, 2024

Our club holds 10 train meets every year. The next Western Division train meet is scheduled to take place on Saturday March 30th, 2024. This meet will be conducted at the Arcadia Community Center, 365 Campus Drive (at Huntington Drive & Holly Ave.). All TCA Members and their families are invited. Come welcome the new year with your train collecting family! The meet will include trading tables, a display theme and operating layouts. The doors open at 9 AM for setup and the meet starts at 10:00 AM. The meet typically ends around 2 PM. Parking is free. The meet also features a free repair clinic and an auction. TCA members are admitted free (please wear your current membership badge and show it at the door when you enter the hall). Non-members/train enthusiasts are welcome to attend 1 meet per year for free. There is no charge for use of trading tables for sellers but you must be a member in good standing of TCA in order to have a trading table. Email info@tcawestern.org to reserve a trading table.

For a detailed listing of all upcoming TCA Western Division train meets, click here.

For information on how to join TCA Western Division, click here.

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Beautiful examples of Jerry Brown trains on display at the 2021 TCA National Convention hosted by Western Division and conducted in Burbank, CA
Beautiful examples of Jerry Brown Standard Gauge Modern Era trains on display at the
2021 TCA National Convention hosted by Western Division and conducted in Burbank, CA

At the March 30th, 2024 Western Division train meet we will have a special presentation made by TCA member William Brown. Bill has graciously agreed to again provide the lecture and presentation on his Dad's (Jerry Brown) and his own lifetime experiences creating the beautiful and rare Modern Era Standard gauge trains that were built by them in the 1970's & 80's. This is the same highly informative and enjoyable 'Meet the Experts' session that Bill conducted at the TCA 2021 convention held in Burbank.

Many of you are probably aware of who Jerry Brown was, but if you need more information, please review the web page here: http://tcawestern.org/brown.htm. If you have the recently published book titled "Not Your Daddy's Standard Gauge" by Arno Baars and David Carse you can also read all about the beautiful trains the Brown family produced in that book.

Bill's presentation will include actual 8mm home movies of the backyard railroad that operated at their Southern California home in the 60's and 70's, and actual display of some of the forms and tooling utilized to manufacture the wide gauge 3-rail models of the UP M10000 City of Portland streamliner, the M-10005 City of Denver streamliner and the Illinois Central M-121 Green Diamond five car set. Bill also told me that he would most likely be bringing the Illinois Central M-121 Green Diamond set to run on the Division layout at the meet.

If you did not have the opportunity to see this great presentation first-hand at the 2021 Convention, the March Western Division meet is your golden opportunity!

What is TCA?

Some trains running at a TCA meetThe mission of the Train Collector’s Association (TCA) is to develop an appreciation of and to preserve an important segment of history - tinplate toy trains - through research, education, community outreach, fellowship, establishment of collecting standards and to promote the growth and enjoyment of the hobby of collecting and operating toy, model and scale trains. The By-laws of TCA Western Division are viewable by clicking here.

TCA Western Division carries out this mission by holding 10 monthly meets during the calendar year. At these meets, the trading and displaying of tinplate toy trains and toy train related items takes place. TCA Western is the only Southern California based toy train club that provides free use of tables for these purposes. We have plenty of them available, in a well lighted, spacious hall.

There are over 30,000 members in the TCA organization nationally. Western Division boasts a membership of over 300 train hobbyists.

Rare and unique items await your discovery at TCA meetsTCA and Western Division have been in existence since 1954. For a little bit of history about TCA Western Division click here.

Do you have a box of old tinplate trains that you have been storing in the attic all these years since your childhood? Are you anxious to break them out and run them again? Do you need help in getting your old trains to run again - perhaps they require some servicing? Have you been meaning to perhaps convert those old trains into some cash in your pocket? Then bring those trains to our next TCA Western Division toy train meet in Arcadia. Those dusty old electric trains could potentially be something rare and unusual. The club layout would be a great place to see those trains running again after all these years. Or, if you have intended to get rid of those trains, selling them at the TCA Western Division meet can yield cash for you and make a collector happy as well.

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To request more information about TCA contact any Western Division board member or send e-mail to: info@tcawestern.org