# Mulligan's Excavating



## DaveInTheHat (Nov 13, 2011)

Everybody knows the story of “Mike Mulligan and His Steam Shovel” and how Mary Anne got stuck in the cellar of the Popperville town hall. Not too many people know what happened 75 years later when the town of Popperville built a new town hall. The old building was scheduled for demolition and the town was going to sell Mary Anne for scrap. Hearing this Mike Mulligan’s grandson, Bill set out to rescue Mary Anne. After a long legal battle which included corrupt town officials, scandals, kickbacks, and numerous other things the court decided that the town had no legal rights to Mary Anne. Since Mike Mulligan was never paid for the work that he did in 1939 the judge ordered that Bill Mulligan was to be compensated for the work done with interest. So, with the Mulligan family having ownership of Mary Anne a salvage operation was started. With the help of Earl Schmutz and the guys from Davetown Salvage Mary Anne was finally removed form the cellar and seen in the daylight for the first time in 75 years. She was taken to a undisclosed location where the restoration was done by Ed Wertz and his team of mechanics from the Davetown Speed Shop. Mary Anne is now on display for everyone to see in front of Mulligan’s Excavating. The only time she works now is the occasional parade or steam show.
























































Pictures of the entire build are here: http://public.fotki.com/DaveInTheHat/davetown/mulligans-excavating-/

Slideshow: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VkqdLmYwlsA


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## MtRR75 (Nov 27, 2013)

Nice work, as always. I'm not sure which took more work -- constructing the scene or constructing the story about the scene.


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## Patrick1544 (Apr 27, 2013)

Great story and diorama!


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## microbuss (Mar 13, 2015)

OOOOO! I want Mary Ann! 
Thats my favorite book! 
I used to rent the book on record from the library as a kid 
I found the story on a CD-Rom game 
the game uses Win 3.1 95 & Macintosh hehe

btw 2 thumbs up on the video!:thumbsup::thumbsup:


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## CTValleyRR (Jul 26, 2014)

What a brilliant idea! Unfortunately, I can't see it at work! I can't wait to get home and check it out. That was absolutely one of my favorite stories when I was a youngster.


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## Cycleops (Dec 6, 2014)

Very nicely put together diorama. That story was never popular in the UK so I had to check it out. Here's the story on YouTube http://youtu.be/KZtXtbZn5f0


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## Fire21 (Mar 9, 2014)

I had never heard this story before. Thanks, Cycleops, for posting the link. 

That makes DaveInTheHat's diorama even more interesting. Well done, Dave, really well done!!


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## MacDaddy55 (Aug 19, 2008)

*Awesome!!*

Davein the Hat that is so awesome. My kids would not go to sleep at night if I didn't read Mike Mulligan to them...and in the Winter Katy & the Big Snow...great story line and great conversation piece on a Layout or Diorama!! "Mike always said that Mary Anne could dig more dirt in a day than 100 men could in a week...even though he wasn't quite sure that was true!!":thumbsup::appl:


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## DaveInTheHat (Nov 13, 2011)

Thanks for all the positive feedback.


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## jwbegor (Jul 11, 2015)

Was that steam shovel a kit? I want to put a construction crew on my layout now!


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## DaveInTheHat (Nov 13, 2011)

It's a kit. It's a really nice kit. Mine was an old one. It's been reissued by Jordan.


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