David Hannah III

by Daris A Nevil from phone interviews, October 2015

David Hannah III is a long-time live steam modeler. He built the famous Browning Railroad in Chappell Hill, Texas. He was a long-time friend of Jim Jackson.

David entered the Live Steam hobby in 1985. He purchased a Railroad Supply Corporation Mikado steam locomotive kit in 1986. Over the next 9 months David received 17 sections of pre-machined parts. The day finally came that the chassis was complete and running on air. David opened up the garage and attempted to set the values. But David suffered from hearing loss, and could not make out the bark from the stack.

Ted York was in the neighborhood visiting his daughter. While passing David's house Ted noticed the beautiful Mikado in the driveway. He walked up to David and said, "I will set the valves." David stood back and let Ted have a go at it. David walked into the house and said to his wife, "I don't know who that is." His wife replied, pointed to a recent issue of Live Steam, "He is the man here is this magazine!"

After an hour and a half of work Ted completed the task, and the chassis ran smoothly on air. He pointed out to David that the equalizers would need to be adjusted once the 350 pound boiler was mounted.

Jim Jackson assisted David with the construction of 2 miles of track at Chappell Hill, Texas, known as the Browning Railroad.

When it came time to sell the Browning Plantation, Jim Jackson approached The Harris County Park Board in order to secure Zube Park as a new location for the track. All the track and buildings of the Browning Railroad were moved to there to become the Cypress Creek & Southern Railroad. Jim also had a track at his house. Most of his track was relocated to the station area of Zube park.

Isomville
In 1990 David Hannah III attended a meet at Train Mountain. It was here that David met Don Isom who was building miniature buildings for Train Mountain. The two were riding on a train headed by a GP-50 Diesel, with Don Isom driving, and David noticed something wrong; the miniature buildings looked small compared to the 1.5 inch scale trains. David suggested that Don build the miniatures to 2 inch scale. This would produce an effect known as "forced perspective". David commissioned Don to build the village of Isomville on the Browning Railroad. David planned to run narrow gauge equipment on his railroad, so 2 inch scale would fit right in.

David purchased $10K worth of buildings. Don made two trips to Texas to deliver the buildings. While unloading the truck David's father-in-law asked Don if the buildings would hold up under the tough Texas weather. Don's reply was to jump on top of a building and said "I drove here from the Northwest at 80MPH on the highway. If the buildings can withstand 80MPH winds they will hold together in Texas." Don used real shingles on his buildings, and sure to his word, not a shingle was missing upon delivery.

Building Bridges


David learned not to underbuild bridges. He rebuilt the bridge for strength and safety, using three 2x4s on edge laminated. Kids rocked caboose off the bridge, so Hannah made the bridges wide enough to stand on. Made the bridges strong enough to hold a Ford tractor.

While rebuilding the North spillway dam bridge, Jack Lucks fell off the side where the planks had not yet been fastened. He was putting down 2x4 flats on I-beams, which were 30 feet long, 60 foot long bridge. Jack stepped on a 2x4 not attached, fell off the side, cracked his arm, had to have a cast. So Hannah named it Lucks Bridge.

On top of the dam had 500 feet of track, two tracks, total 1000 feet of track. Bridge on SE end of Lake, off dam.

David never graduated from college, but became a self made engineer, always over-built everything.