Back to the future

Last Sunday we left a sunny fresh spring afternoon to duck into a cavernous university field house -- dim, slightly musty and very noisy. Inside were a few women and hundreds of boys, but the boys were trapped inside bodies sporting beer bellies, beards, and balding heads.

It was a model train show.

It was all there -- from postage stamp N-gauge to garden trains big enough for cats to ride, from antique Lionel to bullet trains, brand new to more than “gently” used. Freight and passenger. Historic and imaginative. Short routes and international lines. Maps and dining-car china and whistles and warning lights and pictures and videos and miniature trees and books. I would tell you I think I even saw a full-scale cannon, but I don’t believe it either.

At one end, full layouts were displayed with great pride, representing thousands of hours of artfully designing landscapes, tunnels, mountains, and whole cities. As astounding as they were, I found the fact that they could be transported to a temporary site for a two-day show equally impressive.

Most of the men fell into two camps: those on a mission to either buy or sell, and those who were simply stupefied. The latter were the greatest pleasure to watch, wandering from table to table, picking up small coal cars or flatbeds, affectionately stroking gleaming locomotives, carefully sifting through trays of plastic boxes. I felt as if I could see their memories projected on the back of their wide eyes: a close moment with their dad, a happy time with a brother, enjoying a collection that had now been lost, or perhaps a summer day spent along a track near home, watching trains go by and dreaming of far-off places.

The passion is not all reverie, however. The knowledge of many these men about railroading, the history of trains here and abroad, the mechanics of engines and drive wheels, or the inside track of freight management is impressive.

The women? They wandered behind an oblivious spouse, congregated near the coffee and hotdogs to chat, or assisted with sales and food. A few were walking small dogs dressed in costumes. I didn’t want to know.

I saw fewer than ten children at the whole event – most with men I’d presumed to be their grandfathers, and most impatient to go home.

It’s likely in quarter-century that this wonderful little piece of Americana will be gone. Almost everyone in that field house had been knocking around this planet for 50 years or more, the younger folks enticed away by glitzier recreation.

That’s sad, because trains not only occupy an important place in our past, but an extremely important place in our future. They have the potential, properly managed (please note this caveat), to be an exceedingly safe, efficient, and economical means of moving freight and people. Most other developed nations have recognized the power of trains for mass transit within and between cities, but it’s far underdeveloped in the United States.

There was a ray of hope. At one small table in the middle of everything, a young man, a representative of a state train passenger association, was handing out literature and advocating a propagation of new lines. Perhaps, in 2050 there may be model trains shows after all, and, more importantly, the real thing saving us time, money, fuel, congestion, frayed tempers and death by auto.

Perhaps, I must confess, I often find myself a child living in a little house next to the tracks, counting cars, inhaling soot, catching tableware rattling off the edge, and listening to the whistle and clatter Doppler their way through our days and nights.

Copyright 2008, Pat Grauer