Tony Dyer

[Brian Kirby]

It is my sad duty to report the passing of Tony Dyer, at the age of 83, after a short illness, a well known pioneer of etched loco and coach kits, under the Kemilway banner. Tony was my boss, when we both worked at Model Railway Manufacturing Co.Ltd. in the 1970s and 80s, better known to most by the unofficial title of "King's Cross Models". This was the day job for Tony, evenings and weekends were often devoted to development and production of the famous range of Kemilway loco chassis kits, coach kits and the one complete loco kit, in partnership with top draughtsman and designer George Pring, who sadly took his own life some years back. 

   After national service, Tony became a full-time electrician, working in various estabilishments, including a hospital, where he recalled recently, that he spent most time on standby in case of failures, which allowed him many hours to catch up on his modelling, whilst being paid. His interest in model railways led to an involvement with the Mopok and George Alan ranges, the latter being the springboard leading to the formation of Kemilway. Somehow he also found time for his passion for shipping, playing drums in a concert band, and a keen interest in all things military?

  Tony met, and later married Judy, and together they raised a family in West Drayton, from where he would eventually regularly commute to King's Cross. The York Way shop closed in 1988, and with the children now grown up, Tony and Judy decided to relocate to the beauty of the Lake District, where they could indulge their passion for fell walking and the great outdoors. It was also a complete break from model railways for him, he had become dis-enchanted with the politics of the hobby, he removed himself from involvement in Kemilway, George went on to produce his equally famous 7mm Gresley coach kits with a different partner, eventually all was sold to new owners.

  I learnt a lot from Tony, not just anecdotally, he helped me with modelling projects and gave practical demonstrations (all on MRM time!), hopefully some of it has rubbed off on me. Tony enjoyed his retirement in Cumbria, though sadly Judy passed away before her time, he kept himself busy with his nautical interests, playing golf and enjoying cruise holidays. His daughter Susan, and sons Michael and Peter were with him at the end.

                                                    Thanks for everything Tony, we'll miss you.

 

                                                                         Brian Kirby.

[Miss Prism]

Well said, Brian. Tony was one of the great pioneers.

[glo41f]

It was always a pleasure to go to KX models and once Tony knew that you were a "proper" modeller he was very helpful and co-operative. A sad loss to the hobby and the world.

 

Martin Long

[Simon Lee]

First met him when calling into Kings Cross models, few years later when I was leading trips abroad for ship spotting and photography our paths crossed again, depending on the intensity of the trip Judy would be there as well.

 

I always found him to be a polite, kind and cheerful man, one day on a ferry coming back to Dover after a week away he appeared by my side handed me a pint with the words "thanks for a dam good week". 

 

RIP Tony

[PMP]

Can't add much more to Brian's words. A nice bloke, and good manager, with an excellent professional, courteous and helpful attitude to the shop customers and those of Kemilway.

 

RIP and condolences to the family and fellow friends and colleagues.

[coachmann]

Thank you Brian for the PM. I had a trade account at Kings X and in those days I could pick up the phone and place an order knowing Tony would ensure it would be on my doormat the very next morning. Alan "Bracks" had gone self-employed before me and worked from home, but we both continued to paint models (including buses in those days) for the shop. Long after his retirement Tony continued to send along occasional models he had prepared for friends. He was an early proponent of etched brass for models, in fact so early that his initial LNER coaches were not half-etched but were modelmakers aids for all that. After all those years of voices over the phone, we finally met a few years ago when he visited us during a golfing session at Abergele. He was as he sounded, a kindly gentle man. 

 

As we age, our Christmas card list of old friends gets shorter. 

My sincere condolences to Tony's family,

 

Larry Goddard

[Not Jeremy]

What a lovely and informative valedictory, thank you very much writing it and posting it here.

 

I didn't ever knowingly meet Tony, but visited the Kings Cross shop and had certainly heard of him through his involvement with Kemilway.

 

RIP to another gentleman of this wonderful hobby of ours.

 

Simon Castens

[hmrspaul]

That is terribly upsetting. I first met Tony when we were both founding members of (Egham) Staines Model Railway Society. I was only a young teenager. He built a BR Midland Railway model railway which I shared the operation of at SMRS exhibition - I still have the remains of the rake of Airfix Presflo I built and weathered for that outing. Tony was pleased with the quite complex timetable I put together for that outing.

 

Yes, I remember how pleased he was when he could be overnight electrician at the hospital, the only fixed work was to change all of the light bulbs in the theatres on a Thursday night. Apart from that he could usually get on with a lot of modelling and later packing and preparation work for Mopok, a company he jointly formed with John Senior (another SMRS member). Later, I saw him irregularly at KX models on odd occasions when I was up to London for meetings - he was really pleased when he started seeing my involvement with the Datafile articles in MRC. More recently he generously gave me all of his slide collection - his shipping interests had become substantial and I understand he did a lot of scanning and preparation of photos for a major ship related website. A really good friend, I only wish I had connected up with him more often.

 

Brian, that was a lovely tribute you posted. I'd be grateful for a pm giving me an address or email for Peter or Susan if you have one. bartlett.paul@tiscali.co.uk

 

Paul Bartlett

 

PS I should have added I have some photos taken when, with his brother, we went out to get details of MIdland Railway buildings in the outer London area - some here http://paulbartlett.zenfolio.com/radlettmrstation and others http://paulbartlett.zenfolio.com/stalbansrailway including Tony striding away in the distance http://PaulBartlett.zenfolio.com/stalbansrailway/e1d09eab0 . The two of them blagged our way around several sites - down to claiming we were there to size up the bridge at the North end of Radlett for demolition.

[dibber25]

I have only just received this sad news. I knew Tony from his earliest days at Egham & Staines MRS and was invited to his home at West Drayton very soon afterwards. He lived close to where the Staines branch passes under the main line and I recall he kept some observations of the oil train which came from Thames Haven to Staines West. It was Tony who told me that he had on just one occasion each, seen a Warship, a Western and a D200 take the tanks down the branch. 

He and John Senior had a passion for parcels trains and on one Saturday they went shopping for parts to build some parcels vans. Despite visiting several shops they came back with nothing. At that time K's oval buffers were made by the Anglo-Swiss Screw Company in West Drayton. Tony paid them a visit but was told he'd have to buy 10,000. That was the start of Mopok (Modern Prototype Kits in OO). The next stage was to convince pattern-maker and caster, Adrian Swain, to quit his design job in the aviation industry and go full-time in model railway manufacturing. Mopok's/Adrian's Gresley bogies were a work of art at the time. It was Tony who suggested that I make patterns for some of the station fittings that I needed and so my range of name boards and other bits and pieces came into being, marketed by Mopok. Tony went on to join with George Pring and Kemilway was born, introducing etched brass kits (a Midland Railway lattice footbridge was the first) and cyano-acrylate glue ('Superglue') to the modeling world.

It was the piracy of their work by the less scrupulous in the hobby that led Tony to be disillusioned with the hobby and I always found that desperately sad. However, I can quite understand that it can be a costly business to pursue such actions through the legal system, particularly when the margins on your products are tight and the sales in only modest numbers.

All of us at ESMRS owed Tony a great deal as he was one of the few who involved himself actively in the building of the clubhouse at Egham, at a time when lots of building work and  no modeling had divided the club. If I recall correctly, Tony was Secretary of the club for a while. They were good times. Busy times. Innovative times, as Tony brought his skills with the soldering iron, model design and sales and marketing together with John's experience in print and plate-making (the same process used for etching). We were all friends as well as club colleagues and members of what was to become the 'cottage industry' which provided such a boost to model-making. Tony was at the forefront of that. (CJL)

[hmrspaul]

I have had an email and phone exchange with Adrian Swain of ABS. As many know he is not able to post on here.

 

Adrian has expressed his sorrow at learning of Tony's death.

 

In many ways we owe the existence of ABS models to Tony and MOPOK. It was their orders for whitemetal castings and the vacuum formed base of their coaches, both supplied by Adrian, that encouraged Adrian to leave his job and go full time as a cottage industry. Unfortunately the failure of the MOPOK, Kemilway/George Allan companies during the Ted Heath invoked crisis led to Adrian being left with large quantities of homeless castings. He set up to sell these direct, did some of his own coach kits and also started to produce the wagon kits he became so well known for. Kings Cross models, where Tony went to work after failure of their company, was an early retail outlet - ordering in good numbers once they realised how accurate and well received the new range was.

 

Adrian added he always got on well with Tony. He was always very cheerful when I knew him and I think the Kings Cross shop was fortunate to have him on the staff.

 

Paul

[Clive Mark]

I remember Tony at Kings Cross. Nice chap. Very helpful and very sincere.

 

More sad news.

[roythebus]

I knew Tony in those early days of Adrian Swain casting things for people. Adrian cast my first bus kit in about 1969, the London Transport LT class Scooter. Soon after that I was introduced to Tony, who was by then developing the Mopok range of parcel van kits. Mopok took quite large quantities of my bus kits and he would often visit me at my place in Northampton to collect the latest batch of bus kits.

 

I kept in contact with Tony through the model shop at Kings Cross where I worked for a while in 1968. He played in a band called Farandahl during the 1980's doing society weddings.

 

Tony is one of the pioneers of modern railway modelling. My condolences to his family.