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Richard Hayes, pictured with his wife Rebecca, has donated his model train collection to the Central Carolina Community College Foundation for the establishment of the Richard and Rebecca Hayes Endowed Lecture Fund for Environmental Policy and Stewardship.

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Richard Hayes began serious train collecting in 1991 when his family moved back to Sanford after 30 years of his work career having taken him all over the country.

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Richard Hayes' train layout took two years to build on weekends as he traveled during the week. 'My train layout ... I fashioned after both the downtown Sanford train station and Hayes Coal Company and train yard environs, to an imagined rural country side and farm scenes traversed by the trains, turning into a mountain section with tunnels and bridges for the trains to negotiate,' said Hayes.