The Tech Model Railroad Club (2014)

backchannel.com

19 pointsgonehome3 comments

I miss Eli's salvage shop. I seem to recall that it closed shortly after I graduated and was a treasure trove of random electronic and mechanical crap. I suspect the land underneath it quickly became far more valuable the stuff inside it.

I just found another branch of Eli's business that's still open. I may have to check it out and see if they're anything like what I remember.

I recently started driving down Hampshire street on a regular basis and saw the old store front is now a fitness studio, but Eli's changed its business model in the 80's and still exists next door selling second-hand equipment. Just no more digging through the junk for half-used reels of components.

Now do you remember going down to Camp Myles Standish in Taunton for the old military surplus electronics. That was always the real treat.

I found the chapters about the MIT hacker culture in Levy's book (from which the article is an excerpt) very inspiring and fascinating. Every programmer should read them.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com