Welcome to the Drummer Creek Line of the Great Northern Railroad. Nestled in a small town in Central Illinois the DCRR has grown from modest beginnings. As the case with many other garden railroaders I too began as a young boy modeling HO and N scale trains.

My first model train was an HO Scale Tyco© “The Rock” starter set that was purchased by my grandfather when I was 3 years old. He and my Great Grandfather built me a 6’ by 4’ train table, which folded into the wall for easy storage. It wasn’t until grade school that I was introduced to G scale (Large Scale Trains).

In the mid 1980’s my Grandfather, Dale Lilly, who had purchased my first HO scale train, purchased his first LGB© starter set.I can vividly

remember the first time I set eyes on the layout setup on my grandparent’s living room floor. From that point on we both had “the bug”.As my grandfather’s rail empire grew the floor space in the living room began to shrink and we were soon forced to find an alternative location for the train. That summer we spent a week constructing a 50 ’ by 10 ’ train table in one of the old barns. Many summers were spent in the barn building miles of trains and transporting thousands of passengers. Then came high school, college, and the girl, not leaving much time for railroading.

Several years passed without model railroading until the Christmas of 2001 when my grandfather passed along his first starter set. That summer my wife and I had purchased our first house and I finally had a place to put a garden train.

Since that time I have expanded quite extensively on that first starter set that my grandfather gave me. Every once in a while, is still run that LGB© locomotive around the loop to keep it limber, but for the most part it sits on the shelf awaiting the next young family garden railroader to come along.

Today the Drummer Creek Line is modeled in the 1960’s to early 1980’s Great Northern Railroad as it might have appeared had the GN dipped this far south into Central Illinois.

The pages of this website were constructed to tell you the story of the DCRR. I hope you enjoy your visit and possibly even catch “the bug” while you are here.