2024 Board of Directors
David Crumpton, Chief Executive Officer
I joined the TWMRC in August 2018. Since that date, I have met some terrific people and learned a lot about our current layout and the history of the club. Since my entry into the club, I have been deeply involved in helping build the switch control panels around the layout. My main interest is to see our TWMRC layout continue to become more complete. Also, I enjoy seeing new members come on board and add energy and enthusiasm to our club. I am very honored to serve as the CEO of the club and look forward to growth in membership, development of our layout, and a lot of fun along the way.
My love of railroading began during the summer of ’69 and ’70, between college sessions. I worked on a track gang for the MKT Railroad out of Hillsboro, Texas. The work was hard and we spent most of the time replacing ties and rail between Hillsboro and Ft. Worth and Hillsboro and Waxahachie. I developed a love of trains, the smell of creosote, and the rumble of F7s and GPs as they shook the ground.
I have been married for 48 years to the love of my life, Margreat. We have one son, Matt, and three terrific grandchildren. We love being grandparents to three terrific children. After graduating from the University of Texas in Austin in 1973, with a degree in Education, I spent five years as a football coach and science teacher in the Grand Prairie and Ft. Worth public schools. I decided to change careers in 1978 and went to work in the welding supply and gas industry. I worked full-time for Airgas until the end of December 2020, when I retired after 42 years of service with them!
Darrell Cowles, Chief Operating Officer
Like many of you, I had a toy train from about the age of 3. Actually, I think it was really my dad’s toy train, but he claimed it was for me. On my 10th Christmas, Santa brought me the Lionel Texas Special, which now resides on a shelf in my office. We (Dad) built a 4×8’ plywood layout, and he helped me form a mountain on one corner, and we added a couple of switches for the siding. However, when I
was 12, we moved to Weatherford to start a peach orchard, and the train layout didn’t make the trip; plus, there was very little free time with a new orchard.
Fast forward to building model airplanes, model cars, slot car racing, R/C
airplanes, and the discovery of females. About 1990, my 11-year-old daughter
and I attended the Fort Worth model train show. Bitten. Again. Started building
a layout in my backyard shop, but found a club to join and learned a lot. In 1997,
a group of members from this club formed a new club: The Texas Western Model
Railroad Club and we started building a permanent layout in the Joe Williams
Compressor Service warehouse. About 2014, we moved to our current location
in Forest Hill. I was President and guided us to becoming a non-profit 501(c)3,
and served in many other offices along the way, plus designed the current layout
for our club. I like the small details that bring scenes to life, so getting into 3D
printing was pre-destined. I look forward to the day when the entire layout is built
and we can show it off to the model railroad community!
Jay Waters, Chief Administrative Officer
Howdy!! I have been a member of the Texas Western Model Railroad Club since 2011 and have served on the Board many of those years. I am widowed and have one son, Jeremy. My grandson, Jace, is my train buddy, we play and ride trains together every chance we get. I am an Aggie, class of ‘86’. I developed my love of trains from my Grandpa’s 8’x12’ Lionel layout.
My favorite railroad is the Santa Fe– a holdover from the Lionel set. I began collecting HO scale in my teens. Shortly before I joined the Club, I started the construction of my own personal layout and realized very quickly that I needed to learn from the experts how to do it the right way. Fortunately, I discovered the TWMRC and have found that there’s no better place to sit at the feet of the Masters to “learn the ropes” of model railroading. This Club is full of knowledge and camaraderie; we’re a model railroading family.
Chris Mahan, Chief Development Officer
My history started as most guys do; in my case, it was a Marx 0-6-0 engine and five cars on Christmas morning when I was eight years old. The train was never run under the Christmas tree because my mother never wanted to have the train running under the tree, so I had to set it up in the corner of the family room. By the time I was eleven, I wanted to do more than watch the train go around in a circle. My Dad took me to the Toy Department of the May Co., the largest department store in town, and there I saw my first HO-scale trains. You might guess what was on the top of my Christmas list. Santa heard me, and on Christmas morning, I had a rubber band-driven switcher and six cars, some track, and two turnouts. I quickly discovered that HO trains don’t run well on carpet. It was off to the lumber yard for a 4 x 8 sheet of plywood and some 1 x 4 for supports and legs. I started to build my HO empire in the garage. That lasted for two years until my Dad wanted his garage back. He helped me finish a shed, behind the garage, which was 14 by 25, and I built to my heart’s content. I had a nice layout, or at least I thought so. My model railroading stopped when Uncle Sam came calling. During that time my parents sold the house and moved into a condo. They had to box everything up as best they could. I moved those boxes with me for the next fifteen years when an ex-wife wanted me to get rid of them. She had a Brother-in-Law with two sons who had just started to build a layout. I sent them the boxes to build their Empire.
Fast Forward to 2021 and the lockdown and Covid. I started talking about building models and my wife Brenda said why not get back into HO Trains. I joined the Texas Western in 2021 and the rest is History!
Robert Rathgeber, Chief Financial Officer
My love of trains all started one day at about the age of 5. My father knew an engineer for the Jersey Central passenger pool. A trip was arranged to ride with him in the GP40 locomotive, and cab car. I still have memories from that day sitting on my father’s lap in the conductor’s seat. From that day forward, I glanced down every track I crossed in anticipation something might be coming. I have never lost that feeling!
I have a wonderful wife, Christine who, like myself, is a native of the NYC metro area. We recently celebrated our 10-year anniversary. We have a 9-year-old son named Gavin who keeps us busy with hockey and soccer. We have lived in Keller for 3 years. I also have two children, Robbie Jr, 23, and Samantha, 18, from a previous marriage.