Walter Allen



William C. Fitt wrote the following about Walt in Modeltec Magazine, August 1986:


 * The late Walter H. Allen started the Pattern Pool many years ago. He collected patterns from the Live Steamers who had obtained the castings they needed and had no further use for them.  He warehoused, cataloged and loaned them to anyone with access to a foundry or, if casting service was unavailable, Walt took them to a local foundry for castings and shipped them to the hobbyist.

Rutland F-2j
Walter offered drawings in 1.5 inch scale for the Rutland F-2j 4-6-0. He placed advertisements in Live Steam Magazine in 1975.

Obituary
William Fitt wrote the following, which appeared in Live Steam Magazine, December 1979:


 * Walter H. Allen passed away on October 2nd, 1979 in Portsmouth, New Hampshire. Walt was born on December 31st, 1908, and he and his wife, Emilie, were married on December 27th, 1930, and shared over forty-eight years together.


 * In 1933, Walt went to work as a machinist at the Portsmouth Navy Yard but soon went into drafting and eventually became a Naval Architect. He retired in 1963 after thirty years of service.


 * Start in the 1940s, Walt was a lay-preacher in the Congregational Conference and, for thirty years, led worship in congregations in Maine and New Hampshire regularly.


 * Always anxious to help others, Walt taught Machine Shop classes in the vocational school for several years and was working on his second Live Steam locomotive at the time of his recent illness.


 * in 1961 he took on the voluntary chore of handling the Live Steam Pattern Pool and for ten years he collected patterns from Live Steamers who had completed their own projects, cataloged them and either arranged to loan them to other Live Steamers or even have castings made for those who did not have access to foundry services. Through his generous contribution of time, hundreds of Live Steam projects were made possible that otherwise would never have been built.  In 1973 he received the Live Steam Magazine Award for his service to The Hobby.


 * The Live Steam Hobby has lost a great benefactor in Walt's passing and a grateful band of hobbyists sends its condolences to his wife and their three sons.