John Allen was also my inspiration for pursuing model trains. I grew up in Santa Cruz, CA and was fortunate to visit John Allen's G&D in the early 1970s, shortly before he passed away. I'll always be grateful to my dad, who had little interest in trains, for cold-calling John to see if our family could visit the layout. John invited us over to his home in Monterey; he was a gracious host and spent several hours with us in his amazing basement. Periodic readings of Linn Westcott's book bring me right back to that visit.
Regarding O scale G&D rolling stock, the only one I've seen is a G&D boxcar offered some years ago by Intermountain. Occasionally one shows up on eBay in the $20-$40 range.
