BUILDING MOUNTAINS

A group of people in Paradise were busy making mountains last weekend, and even though they worked on them for almost a half a day, they won't be any taller than about 28 inches. 

Three men and two women spent six hours at the Paradise Center Saturday carving mountains from large chunks of Styrofoam for the center's railroad display. The mountains will be placed on the display in front of the mountain photomural that was attached to the wall in April. The foam-formed mountains will give the display background depth and will hide a portion of the train track, which was created to make a loop for the train. 

Dave Colyer and Karen Thorson, both members of the Paradise School Preservation Committee, started working on the mountains a week earlier, spending about five hours on it the previous Saturday. "Doing the detail on this can be time consuming because some of the detail work is really small," said Mac Hall, who is taking the lead on the mountain project because he has over 40 years experience working with Styrofoam as a carpenter with Sears department store. In addition, he constructed an entire room at his home with his own HO train exhibit and uses Styrofoam for some of his displays. Hall said they will probably put more than 200 hours into the 3D mountains before they're done. Colyer said they made good progress Saturday, when they added two more eight-foot pieces to the base of the mountain and believes they'll probably complete the Styrofoam mountains sometime in August. 

The volunteers used knives, saws, rasps and hot foam cutters of different sizes to shape the display mountains. "It just melts right through the foam and it's easier to sculpt with a hot knife," said Hall, who added that users have to make sure they don't burn their fingers. The Styrofoam mountains range from 22-28 inches in height and will go the entire 35 feet across the room. Hall gave the volunteers instruction on properly cutting Styrofoam about three weeks ago. Terry Christensen has also been working on Styrofoam mountains that will go behind the train roundhouse that he's been working on. 

The background mural photograph behind the new mountains was shot by Cheri Seli, who spent Saturday carving Styrofoam with her husband, Rob, along with Hall, Thorson, and Colyer. Colyer, the preservation center's vice president, is the primary coordinator of the overall railroad exhibit because of his knowledge of the old railroad tie plant and being a preservation committee board member. "I encourage others to take the lead when they have knowledge and experience I don't. I truly am not an experienced railroad modeler but enjoy doing it," said Colyer, who attended Paradise Elementary School from 1962 to 1970 and worked for the railroad in Paradise for eight years. 

Colyer took about 20 photographs of the mountains behind Paradise to use as a reference when making the Styrofoam mountains. He said that once the carved mountains are done, they'll paint them a natural brown with bits of reds, grays, and greens using brushes, sponges and rags and a mixture of acrylic or latex paint.

Hall is making 50 to 60 plaster molds that will range from about one to eight inches to simulate rocks and will be glued to the Styrofoam. Hall said they will also be using actual locomotive cinder that will be spread around on the mountains. They've gathered two bucket loads of cinder from the old Paradise railroad roundhouse site.  Hall is using mining sifters to make a fine cinder for the display.

Volunteers have been working on the railroad display for about two years, laying about 70 feet of track, making custom buildings of the depot, and the town of Paradise as it looked in the 1930s, and will include Northern Pacific Railroad HO trains. The railroad display shared the room on the second floor of the center with a historic Paradise School classroom, but plans are to move the classroom to another place in the building.