# Railfan Specialties



## barnmichael (Jan 2, 2008)

Anyone familiar with this outfit? They apparently sell things like T-shirts and bumper stickers that say "I Grow Trains In My Garden". Their web page is in Chinese. www.railfanspecialties[/b].com . Their line of merchandise is called Garden Railway Gear. They sound legit in their emails to me, but Googling them comes up with some weird stuff. They are interested in our club being a local dealer for their T-shirts.

Thanks for any info.


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## Scottychaos (Jan 2, 2008)

hmmm..looks suspect to me.
I would guess that "railfanspecialities.com" was once a US-based legit railfan business..
I found them listed here:
http://www.fingerlakeslivesteamers.org/supply.htm

with this description:

Railfan Specialties - Garden Railroad equipment, locomotive, rolling stock, buildings, track; T-shirts, hats, etc. On-line ordering available soon.
P.O. Box 10245, Wilmington, NC 28404.
910-686-2820
E-mail: Paul Passante

Somehow I dont think Paul moved to China! 
my guess is the domain registration for the webpage lapsed, and its now owned by a Chinese company..
if you are getting emails from China, and not Paul, I would ignore it..

I tried google translation..didnt transplate very well from Chinese..
hold on..its actually Japanese:


http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=ja&tl=en&u=http://www.railfanspecialties.com/ 


nope, nothing in there about trains!  

unless you are sure you talking to Paul in North Carolina, I would ignore and delete emails..
might be worth calling Paul and asking if he is still in business..he might have a new webpage. 


Scot


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## GRRG (Oct 9, 2009)

Paul is legit. My store in Wichita is starting to carry his T-shirts (and possibly the signs and thermometers). He has sold to train museums and gift stores mainly before now. No web site, yet, that I know of. 

Claudia Rollstin 
Garden Railway Gizmos 
[email protected]


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## NTCGRR (Jan 2, 2008)

Hi Claudia 

welcome...


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## Greg Elmassian (Jan 3, 2008)

At first glance, Looks like someone bought the domain, but from looking at that site I would not conclude it was a US company, but a firm that has bought a bunch of domains to sell. By the way, the language is Japanese, not Chinese (you can tell by the Hirugana and Katakana characters).

Anyway, it is a blog by a person that talks about going to a gift store, and buying souvenirs.

This should take you to a translation of the page, maybe the guy has actually visited the store, although buying the domain name does not make much sense.

https://translate.google.com/translate?sl=ja&tl=en&js=y&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.railfanspecialties.com%2F&edit-text=

Greg 1,158


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## Totalwrecker (Feb 26, 2009)

Wow 6 years for the explanation, way to go Speedy!

Just curious why the old thread?

John


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## Greg Elmassian (Jan 3, 2008)

Whoops! Screwed up royally!

GRRG did a new post (SD 45 main board) and somehow I got to his other post (he's only posted twice)...

OK, I need to stop volunteering for sitting inside a "whack a mole" game...

DOH!

Greg


(funny, Japanese site still there)


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## R.W. Marty (Jan 2, 2008)

Now this whole thing is just funny on several levels


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## Greg Elmassian (Jan 3, 2008)




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