The Baltimore Society of Model Engineers is a model railroad club located in Baltimore Maryland, formed in March 1932. We are the oldest organization dedicated exclusively to model railroading in the United States and the third oldest modeling society in the world!

The BSME layouts and offices are now located on the third floor of 3500 Parkdale Ave, Baltimore, Maryland in the historic Woodberry neighborhood. We are short walk from the Woodberry light rail stop.


The society is always interested in welcoming new members, regardless of modeling skills. Part of the club's activities help beginning members to become skilled in all aspects of the hobby. We also have plenty to keep the experienced hobbyist interested and challenged. If you are interested in joining our historic organization check out the membership page for all the details


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News - 12/27/22

Just one weekend left to visit our O-gauge 3-rail display we built for the H.P. Rawlings Conservatory's Holiday Poinsettia show and sale. The show is open 10 am - 4 pm Wednesday through Sunday. Travel from the magic of Hogwarts castle to the wild jungles of Jurassic park with Baltimore City Hall in between.

Baltimore Society of Model Engineers

As we are a 501(c)(3) organization, donations are tax deductible despite our .com domain

You can donate via the PayPal link on this page (the DONATE button) or through our Facebook page. Facebook does not take any credit card processing fees so we get 100% of your donation. PayPal credit card donations have fees of $0.30/transaction plus 2.2% of the transaction amount.​ If you have a facebook account you can use this link to access our page and donate there: https://www.facebook.com/baltotrains/

From our humble beginnings as a simple advertisement in the back of the January 1932 issue of “The Modelmaker” magazine, seeking modelers in the Baltimore region, the Baltimore Society of Model Engineers has persevered through economic upturns and downturns, wars, five different locations, and now a pandemic. We can’t help but wonder if the individuals who met in a NE Baltimore home on March 4th, 1932 ever imagined that the organization that they began would remain one of the oldest, if not the oldest, model railroad societies.


We celebrated our 89th birthday on March 4th, as an organization of members with a common interest in building and operating scale models of real railroads and trolleys (light rail) transportation systems.


Give us a shout if you would like to join us in developing skills, sharing knowledge, and planning the future of our organization. We meet every Friday night via Google Meet to share our projects, get advice, and watch videos from our very own curated lists, contact us at: bsme1932@yahoo.com