Welcome to Oak Valley!
FINALLY…I found the right bits and pieces to create a well proportioned water feature in the center of town! The pool is the plastic end cap of a mailing tube. The Realistic Water took a few thin applications to get the realistic effect. I am really pleased! I am always looking for features that will work in a 1912 town, and “used and cheap” are my favorite things!
I don’t know how this did not get posted, but it adds some interest after the holidays. In the 30+ years I have collected Preiser HO scale figures for Oak Valley, I never had seen this group of bridesmaids and groomsmen. I purchased them online (used) right before Christmas 2017. Since all are dressed in formal clothing, I just added a little glam to the women’s evening dresses. The minister was moved to the Protestant church.
I love finding previously owned figures at bargain prices. I had to do a little construction, and painted the cab dark “Thicket” green with antique gold seat and wheel spokes. What would have cost $35+ new, I got for $14.00!
This is why I save jar lids and bottle tops! It’s not perfect, but I enjoyed using cheap horses which had been in a drawer for years, and combining them with odds and ends to make a new feature for the town. It appears rather large, but it is because the original buildings are smaller than HO Scale. I think I’ll bring the carousel out now and then.
Our New England ancestors arrived in Naperville (a small town near Chicago) in 1833. At that time, it was a farming community, but the evangelical college had just relocated to Naperville. It was at the college where our great-grandparents, Guy and Nannie, met and fell in love. I have great fondness for several small towns of my ancestral towns, but for Oak Valley, I needed a flat terrain with snow.
Naperville has a river, and Oak Valley only has a stream. In his diary, our great-grandfather, Guy, mentions taking Nannie for a buggy ride to see a hill, because she was so homesick for the hills and mountains of East Tennessee.
Oak Valley is an imaginary small town in northeast Illinois in 1912, and I like to believe that in 1912 there was a small, but growing, black middle class in Oak Valley. All manufactures of HO scale figures include black and Asian figures. Early 1900s figures are becoming scarce, and there are NO black figures in this era. I have “converted” several individual figures over the years, but always longed for a middle class African American family for Oak Valley. I need a little more practice with color, but hope to have more AA residents in the future. I took this photo in the middle of town, so it is fairly dark. Here’s an image of the daughter, Emeline. 
Oak Valley, a Miniature Town in 1912 