Ever notice how, during one weekend in late January, the Valley finds itself unusually free of middle-age hobbyists with their unshaven faces, sweat pants and obsessive interest in all things locomotive? That's because we've all gone to the Amherst Railway Society's Railroad Hobby Show down at the Big E in West Springfield. What used to be a one-night-a-year shindig in a room somewhere on the UMass campus in the late 1960s has grown into a two-day event in four conference exhibition halls, the most recent incarnation occurring last weekend. On display were dozens of scale model railroads from railfan clubs across New England, as well as booths for historical societies, travel agencies, and antique dealers offering all kinds of items to make a trainspotter drool.
