The short-lived, but equally curious and interesting Tower 55 series from
Overland Models should include a brief understanding of Overland Models and the Marsh family of Indiana.
If you live in Indiana, you might be in a town or city with a Marsh Supermarket. Started in
1931 in Munice, Marsh Supermarkets is now headquartered in Indianapolis, Indiana in the midwestern section of the United States.
The chain includes nearly a hundred locations today (www.marsh.net).
What do groceries have to do with brass model trains? Tom Marsh, co-founder of Overland Models,
worked in his family's stores for almost three decades before joining the model railroading hobby as a businessman.
Overland Models began in the late 1970s. The company was started by Tom Marsh and Anton Wenzel.
Anyone familiar with Overland's output and the name itself will quickly realize the Union Pacific interest. Mr. Marsh
was the UP follower and Mr. Wenzel enjoyed Great Northern. The first Overland Models releases in 1979 were caboose models
in HO-scale made of imported brass construction of UP and GN prototype.
A few years into Overland's history, Mr. Wenzel leaves and starts Oriental Limited. Oriental
Limited imported brass model trains, similar to Overland Models. Oriental's name was taken from Great Northern's Chicago
to Seattle passenger service that operated from 1905 to 1931 and would lay the foundation for GN's Western Star and most famous
train Empire Builder.
Though plastic models are the majority of releases in the hobby, Overland Models made a name for itself
with not only quality but its ability to be first with a new model of a contemporary prototype. An early Overland Models
release example would be its GP40X or GP50 diesels that were available to modelers about the same time railroads were considering
adding them. Plastic models for these two EMD prototypes would not see hobby store shelves for years.
Today's Overland Models is operated by Brian and Missy Marsh. Brian is Tom Marsh's son.
The Tower 55 line appeared to be ready to mimic this practice with its announcement of GE's GEVO ES44DC
and EMD's SD70ACe, well ahead of the rest of the hobby manufacturing crowd.
Though many would point to Tower 55 as Overland's one release of plastic models, this is not the case.
In the 1990s, Overland Models had some Sn3 (S-scale narrow guage) kits made by Grandt Line that were plastic construction.
