E. L. Moore's Clarabel Hotel: A tour de force of interior detailing

All model images courtesy James L. Dixon

July 19, 1972

Denis Dunning, Editor,

RAILROAD MODELER,

7950 Deering Avenue,

Canoga Park, California

Hi there . . . . 

I know your preference for trackside buildings and factories, but I thought I’d give you first crack at THE CLARABEL HOTEL. Makes the break at 2500 words. Of course the furnishings make the hotel come alive but only one paragraph is devoted to them, although a sheet of drawings presents designs for the ambitious. 8 photographs, some of which might be deleted. 3 sheets of elevation drawings.

When I’d finished it my wife reminded me “You’ve forgotten one important item that’s supposed to be in every hotel room.” So I placed a Gideon Bible on every dresser.

So let me know if you’d like to see the article, or no . . . . 

I thank you . . . . 

signed E. L. Moore

P.S. Uncle Peabody’s Machine Shop came out nicely. I’ll see if I canna come up with another trackside shop of sorts. Thought you said you had an article on privies coming out? No see um.

Dunning buys the article

That letter was E. L. Moore's pitch to Denis Dunning, editor of Railroad Modeler magazine, to sell an article about his latest project, The Clarabel Hotel. Dunning bought it, as the letter to the right attests, and it ran in the February 1974 issue.

It's an impressive project, although from the outside there doesn't appear to be much going on. As we'll see, looks are deceiving.

Ok, well, maybe I'm wrong. As I think about this some more the railing and staircase work is quite impressive. Overall, the facade is rather animated, what with the decorative trim, lights, and abundance of figures. Although, there was a sign hanging from the second floor that appears to be missing.

I think that wagon to the left is a hearse from ELM's W. E. Snatchem project.

Back in 2015 I wrote that I thought the shape of the roof gave away that the prototype for this model, at least for the exterior form, was ELM's Charlotte apartment building. This view makes that roof shape quite clear.

Notice that the back wall doesn't have a second floor exit. The only way to get out is from the door to the second floor porch out front. This would no doubt this would be a fire safety problem.

The model is something of a chocolate box design: the roof comes off and reveals two floors of interiors.

The top floor consists of 7 rooms, and a common washroom at the back of the building.

All the beds are neatly made.

The washroom is fully equipped, except maybe for towels.

This room must cost more as it has a radiator. It looks like not all of them do. Although, instead of a chair, this one comes with a lovely crate for seating.

I don't know what he's contemplating.

This room is across the hall from crate-man's room. It has also got a radiator, and chairs too!

The second floor lifts out to reveal the detail on the first. This photo shows the bottom side of the second floor, and how the lighting for the first is wired up.

The layout of the first floor is quite different. Over on the left we see what looks like the manager's room at the top, and a lobby at the bottom. On the right, is a kitchen at the top, and a bar / dining room at the bottom.

Another view of the first floor. The lobby and bar / dining room are positioned at the building's front.

Down in the lower left appears to be a baby carriage. 

The manager's suite looks properly appointed, but maybe could use a second guest chair :-)

A pink kitchen seems odd, but maybe all the white paint got used up on the second floor bathroom.

It's been good to be able to see this model in colour. Up until now all I've seen are black-and-white photos, which clearly have not done it justice.

Before we go, let's watch a movie.

Not coming to a theatre near you: Scenes from a Hotel

The more I studied these interiors, the more it struck me that if the photos were cropped and coloured in just the right way one might think they were mockups for scenes from a movie jointly made by Ingmar Bergman, Jean-Pierre Gorin, and Edward Hopper. The movie consists of a series of linked vignettes, one plays out in each room, where the only common thread is a strategically placed Gideon Bible. I bring you, storyboards from the the non-existent 1973 arthouse classic, Scenes from a Hotel.

fin

E. L. Moore’s residence and The Clarabel Hotel

[E. L. Moore's residence in Charlotte, North Carolina via Google Streetviews]

"Build me a hotel for my very own," said my wife in one of her more demanding moods. This being one of the less expensive ways of appeasing her (much less than the price of a dress or shoes!) I decided to humor her. Leafing through a stack of prototype snapshots, I asked, "How about this'n?" It was a three-gable front with lots of fancy railing that I'd been intending to build for some time, and now that Grandt Line railing was available the time was ripe ... and she fell for it as I figured she might. However, when it came to building it I cheated a bit, making a two-gable front hotel.

That was E. L. Moore’s explanation for why he built The Clarabel Hotel, and what he based it on, that appeared in the February 1974 issue of Railroader Modeler. However, let me suggest an alternative for the prototype source material: he used his own residence and 19^th century-ized it to get the hotel.

[The glamour shot for The Clarabel Hotel build that appeared in the Feb '74 issue of Railroad Modeler]

Awhile back I posted that E. L. Moore lived on Pine street in Charlotte, North Carolina, but nothing remained today except a parking lot and a dumpster. Recently Vince informed me of another address that an ex-RMC editor told him the magazine had on file back-in-the-day to get in contact with Mr. Moore,

525 Oakland Ave., Apt. 3

Charlotte, North Carolina, 28204

From examining the ‘evidence’ again it’s looking like E. L. Moore lived at the Pine street address until the late ‘50s or early ‘60s, and then moved to the Oakland address and lived there throughout the ‘60s and into the ‘70s.

 [E. L. Moore's place on Oakland Avenue.]

His Oakland apartment building subconsciously  reminded me of The Clarabel Hotel project – strangely, I woke up in the middle of the night with the connection.

[The side windows are visible in this Google Streetviews shot]

The residence and model share several major features: twin gables on the façade, upper and lower balconies, overall size and proportions are roughly similar, central entrance to a central hallway and staircase, similar side window organization. The Clarabel Hotel is his own residence in a 19^th century disguise. – well, at least, as Yogi Berra might have said, the similarities are rather similar :-)