For April vacation we decided to visit Baltimore — partly because we wanted to see the city, partly because we knew a couple of people there, and partly because it was an excuse to ride on the high-speed Acela Express. We splurged on first class, which provided us a helpful attendant dedicated to our car, food and drink service at our seats, and (most important) wider seats with extra legroom. The food was merely adequate, and first class was occasionally bumpy (just like regular “business” class, surprise, surprise), and we didn’t really take advantage of the unlimited beverages (a glass or two of wine doesn’t compete with the four Bloody Marys consumed by each of the guys in front of us), but I suppose the more comfortable seating made it worth paying the extra fee. In any case, the Acela was mostly a very enjoyable experience — certainly much better than flying, and not just because I like trains. Avoiding all the security hassles at an airport is the #1 advantage, but there are many others; in general, going by train is just the civilized way to travel, and it’s a real pity that it’s dying out in North America. My only complaint is that the free WiFi service was pretty lame, being slow at the best of times and cutting out altogether at others.
Speaking of splurging, we decided to stay at the Hilton in the Inner Harbor neighborhood, mostly because we already have a relationship with them as we always stay at the Hilton Garden Inn when we go to Elmira. This particular Hilton provided several advantages but also many disadvantages. The biggest plus was the view from our 18th-floor room (of course they called it the 19th, since they skipped floor 13):
I suppose we would have appreciated this view even more if we had been sports fans. (The tourist info person at the city’s Visitor Center told us that Baltimoreans always appreciate visitors from Boston. “We like to take their money,” she explained, “since they always spend a lot when they come here to watch the Red Sox beat the Orioles.”) Anyway, the room was comfortable, the quality of the furniture matched the view, and the location couldn’t be beat.
Those are the advantages. The disadvantages all sound petty, but they added up when compared to the much less expensive Hilton Garden Inn: this regular (“full-price”) Hilton charges for WiFi, serves disappointing breakfasts, provides no fridge or microwave, has a sink that’s set back six inches and can be used easily only if you’re tall and skinny (neither of which we are), and features a shower head that’s too high for me to reach (and much too high for Barbara, who’s 4′9″). All of this for a single room that costs a lot more per night than our suite in Elmira. Now of course this is partly (largely?) because of the economic differences between Elmira and Baltimore, but it would be interesting to see what the Garden Inn costs in Baltimore (yes, there is one, in an almost-as-convenient location).
After walking around the Inner Harbor area, we stopped at the aforementioned Visitor Center, from which we took a 100-minute guided tour of the city on one of those fake trolleys. Despite the many errors made by our guide, a retired podiatrist, I’m really glad we took the tour and always recommend these things to newcomers to any city. They’re the best way to get an overview of the city and an orientation to what’s where. Then you know what to do for the rest of your visit.
I mentioned that our guide made many errors. Here are five of them:
- He claimed that the First Unitarian Church of Baltimore is the oldest Unitarian church in the United States. It was established in 1817. Dorchester’s First Parish Church was established in 1630. Not much of a contest there.
- Speaking of churches, he identified one as a “Lithuanian mosque”… and then compounded his mistake by observing that it’s a “Lithuanian Catholic mosque.”
- Another religious one: when we passed the Holocaust memorial, the guide referred to the “one million Jews killed by Hitler.” It’s not that I want to play a numbers game here, but one million is far from six million.
- On a non-religious matter, he pointed out the house of Wallis Simpson, who married “King Henry VIII.” Edward, Schmedward, let’s call him Henry.
- Finally, when we passed the building where Homicide: Life on the Street was filmed (see picture below), the guide observed that this wonderful TV series was directed by John Waters. Not even close!
The guide was also rather clueless about the response of one tourist while driving through the nearby German and Polish neighborhoods. “The Polish immigrants were unwilling to live next to the Germans,” he remarked.
The woman in the back of the bus said, “Gee, I wonder why.”
“It’s because the Germans invaded Poland before World War II…” the guide started to explain.
“She was being sarcastic!” interrupted another tourist.
After the “trolley” tour, we mostly got around on foot, especially when exploring the fascinating Mt. Vernon and Fells Point neighborhoods. We had to try out the light rail at least once, and we often took advantage of the wonderful new Charm City Circulator, which provides free and frequent bus service in a loop throughout the downtown area. With two routes still to go, the first route has been open for only three months and is already a tremendous success. At one point we needed to take a regular city bus, as we were going to the Baltimore Museum of Art (see next paragraph), which is outside of the downtown area. Not being completely sure of where the nearest bus stop might be, I whipped out my iPhone and checked the Maps app, which not only located the nearest stop for the #3 bus but even told us that the next bus would be coming along in four minutes! (I know, I sound like an Apple ad, but it was incredibly convenient.)
We visited three museums during our brief visit, and can highly recommend all of them:
- The Walters Art Museum has an extraordinary eclectic collection. We focused on the Egyptian artifacts, the Islamic manuscripts, and the special exhibit of Japanese cloisonné.
- The B&O Railroad Museum is perhaps of more specialized interest, but it has a fine collection of vintage locomotives and railway cars that visitors can explore (many cars are restored to their original condition), as well as a couple of well-done model railroad layouts.
- The 600-pound gorilla is the astonishing Baltimore Museum of Art, which has to be one of the top art museums in the country. Most fascinating was their temporary exhibit about Cezanne and his influence on American modernism, which I found both enjoyable and informative. The Antioch mosaics, the European art in general, and especially the Cone Collection all deserved more time than we had. If you’re ever in Baltimore, don’t miss this museum!
Finally, we can’t go anywhere without mentioning restaurants. All in all, we were a little bit disappointed in the food we had in Baltimore, and I’m sure we could have done better. Although we were told that it was silly for us as Bostonians to go out for seafood, it seemed sillier not to. Why go somewhere and avoid their specialty? So we mostly — but not exclusively — ate seafood. One dinner we ate at Phillips Seafood, which started with two strikes against it because of being both touristy and a chain, but it turned out to be perfectly adequate. We also ate at the famous Bertha’s Mussels, still touristy but at least local; it was good, but definitely not gourmet. On the gourmet side we did have an excellent meal at the Marie Louise Bistro, but we concluded with an overpriced and unimpressive experience at the LDS restaurant our last night. We went there because it was raining and we were exhausted from all our walking, so we found the closest restaurant to our hotel. At first we thought that the sign meant that it was a Mormon restaurant, but it turned out to stand for “Luna del Sea.” This hybrid of English and fake Italian turned out to represent the cuisine all too well, and neither the service nor the ambiance made me comfortable. Don’t bother going there the next time you’re in Baltimore.
Oh — two more things. First, it’s worth noting that there are many instances of public art in the downtown area. Here are a couple of examples:
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| Finally, on the right we have what purports to be the narrowest house in Baltimore: the visitors’ info claims that it’s only nine feet wide, and it certainly looks to be no more than that. If you look carefully, you’ll see from the brick that there are different row houses almost immediately to the left and right of the doorway. |
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I am sure that we are going to return.
After spending a totally absorbing 90 minutes at Harry Potter: The Exhibition, I still don’t know why it’s at the Museum of Science of all places — what’s the connection with science? — but I highly recommend it nonetheless. The exhibition consists mainly of actual props, sets, and costumes from the filming of the Harry Potter movies, supported by small amounts of textual commentary and other related material. By far the most striking aspect of the show is the exquisite attention to detail; every tiny bit of the handmade costumes and other props has been carefully crafted and expertly weathered so has not to look new. The verisimilitude has been enhanced by the context in which the materials are set — sometimes actual scenes but more often just sets that are suggestive of the scenes used in the movies. Even the usual store that you are forced to walk through when leaving the exhibit is entrancing, as it is made up to look like various shops from the movies. The exhibition will be there until February 21; don’t miss it!
Incidentally, it struck me as I was walking through the exhibits that there is a deep connection with model railroading here. I was asking myself why I would be interested in costume design, a subject that actually doesn’t interest me at all. And yet the costumes were among the most fascinating artifacts on display. Halfway through it hit me: even though everything was 1:1 scale, it’s a lot like a model railroad! The attention to detail created a miniature world that selectively reflects the real world but veers off into fantasy in various ways. I once again thought of imaginary gardens with real toads in them. See a post I wrote four and half years ago, which was actually about math but could equally as well have been about model railroading; it’s just that everything is intertwingled.
Just went to the Hub Model Train Expo in Marlborough. It was surprisingly popular — I had to park a quarter mile away — but somewhat disappointing. There were lots of vendors, mostly selling similar items, and only a few scenicked layouts. I did, however, find one scene that I admired and will take as an inspiration:
What an astonishing museum! “An undiscovered gem” was how the docent at the desk described it on our way out, and she is right. Barbara and I visited the Wenham Museum yesterday — our first time in Wenham for either of us, despite the fact that Barbara has lived in the Boston area for 28 years and I’ve lived here for 44!
So why hadn’t we known about this wonderful historical museum, especially given my interest in model railroads? I guess it’s because it is indeed an undiscovered gem. Anyway, along with temporary exhibits, there are only three types of permanent ones here, two of which very much interested me, and the third of which might well interest you (depending on who you are):
- First and foremost (in my unbiased opinion) is a collection of model railroad layouts, including several well-done ones of various scales on permanent exhibit. When we went, there were also several extra ones being shown for the past three months, including a stunning one built entirely out of Legos! You can see images at the New England Lego Users Group gallery. Observe that everything in this huge layout was made from Lego pieces, including not only scenery and buildings but also the fully functioning trains and amusement park rides. The other layouts were all conventional ones, including a lot in N scale and even some in Z. But the majority were in HO, one of which contained truly excellent structures and scenery, especially the lovingly crafted hills and rocks.
- Second is the Claflin-Richards House (not actually in the museum, but physically attached to it), a 1690 house with various rooms restored to different periods of its history from then to now. If you are interested in local history, social customs, architecture, etc., you should definitely see this fascinating house.
- Finally, the museum houses a huge collection of dolls (over 5000, of which only 1200 or so can be displayed at a time) from many countries and over several centuries. These included the Ralph Waldo Emerson family dolls, adding a sense of local history. Not my cup of tea, but impressive and clearly worth seeing by anyone interested in dolls and what they represent.
One of my students asked me why I haven’t yet posted any photos of the model railroad I’m building. One answer is that it’s still in such an early stage that I don’t have much to show yet. Another answer is that I’m intimidated by videos like the stunning Route 6 HO Scale Model K-Car Trip around Philadelphia, which is so much like the urban, transit-oriented layout I am trying to accomplish (except for being Philadelphia rather than Boston) and yet so far from what I am really going to achieve.
But I’ll bite the bullet soon and will show some of my progress.
Take a close look at the yellow bars in this bar chart:
Much to my surprise, it turns out that subway fares in Boston have remained nearly unchanged for 110 years when adjusted for inflation, especially when you ignore the short-lived drop to ten cents in 1950. This chart comes from a fascinating document entitled “Report on the Proposed 2007 MBTA Fare Restructuring and Fare Increase,” published by the MBTA in July of 2006.
Why am I so unusually interested in this geeky document? Perhaps it’s because I’m a math teacher — or maybe it’s because I’m building a model railroad based loosely on the T, though I think there’s a lurking variable there that explains both phenomena. In any case, the general public should also become aware of it, especially with all the recent complaints against the MBTA. Many, perhaps even most, of those complaints are certainly justified, but isn’t it interesting that the fare hasn’t actually risen significantly in real dollars in over a century? Using my trusty TI–83 Plus calculator, I computed a linear regression for the data, with years since 1900 as the input values and the fares in 2005 dollars as the output values, excluding the anomalous dip in 1950. The slope indeed turned out to be indistinguishable from zero — actually 0.0013 to two sig figs. Even when I included the 1950 fare it was still only barely higher, being 0.0017. The correlation coefficient wasn’t good, but it’s still quite compelling that the best-fit line should be nearly flat.
Just got back from the Boston Trolley Meet (actually held in Somerville, not Boston). This event, sponsored by the Boston Chapter of the National Railway Historical Society, offered a combination of layouts, dealer tables, and field trips. The actual exhibit provided a good balance between “real” trolleys (mostly historical material on the prototype) and model trolleys (mostly layouts and rolling stock). Unfortunately the layouts focused almost entirely on the trolleys themselves, with very little in the way of scenery or structures, and the rolling stock was almost all very expensive, so I didn’t buy any. (I’m not in the market for a $300 trolley car.) It will still useful — and fun — to look through the various books, posters, maps, and DVDs, and to see how the various layouts presented working models of trolleys in tight spaces.
I guess Kalmbach didn’t have 100 fingers:
Actually, I never knew you, sad to say. For 15 years now I have been intending to meet George Sanborn and talk with him about the MBTA (since my model railroad layout is based loosely on the MBTA of 1969). But I kept putting it off, and now it’s too late. Adam Gaffin’s remembrance, titled “Remembering Boston’s train man,” links to Dirty Water and to Commute-a-holic. Read the comments to Gaffin’s post, and the various links in the original post and within the comments. As SwirlyGrrl says in her title to her otherwise blank post, “He will ride forever ’neath the streets of Boston.” Why did I keep thinking that I could always talk with him next year?
P.S.: I have just been told about the Globe’s article on George Sanborn. Read that too.
This morning I went to the Spring Open House of the South Shore Model Railroad Club in Hingham, MA. Despite the excessive number of young children present, it was an excellent layout, with a reasonable but small quantity of vendors as well. The layout was well worth seeing, especially the structures and scenery. I especially liked the urban scenes, including a semi-covered track entering a city. The nearby harbor was less than completely effective, but water is especially difficult to model convincingly. I’m certainly not going to try to become a member, as their requirements include attending 18 meetings within a period of nine months! So I suppose it fits into the category of “a nice place to visit, but I wouldn’t want to live there.” I do, however, plan to return for a longer visit for their next open house in the fall.
OK, so why on earth should you care about a review of a model railroad show? More generally, most of my readers aren’t the least bit interested in model railroading, so why should they bother reading this post? The answer is that any performance — whether it be a play, a concert, a translation, or a model railroad — requires a passing grade on the creation of a willing suspension of disbelief, and this weekend’s exhibit by the Northeast NTRAK Modular Railroad Club at the National Heritage Museum in Lexington, MA, did poorly on the test.
It didn’t help that the adults at the show were outnumbered by the 4- and 5-year-olds. I suppose it’s nice to see that there are still young kids who are interested in model railroads — maybe there’s a future to the hobby after all — but it made it hard to concentrate. Actually, however, made it did help in the suspension-of-disbelief department, since the young kids tended to ooh and aah loudly about the trains and the bridges, not the quality of the representations, thus encouraging belief in the reality of the model. Otherwise the issue was the constraints imposed on modules that can be interchangeably connected mean that the total layout looked like what it was: a sequence of unrelated modules. There was no overall theme, no sense that this could be a real layout. Sure, a canyon or a truss bridge or an industrial area might look authentic, but it’s not part of an authentic whole. It all reminds me of the typical Algebra II course, which consists of several vaguely related modules instead of a unifying theme — in other words, instead of a course. A model railroad should reflect some consistent big ideas; it shouldn’t just be independent modules that happen to meet at each end.
In my review of Transit Maps of the World a couple of days ago, I made the following observation:
I have to admit that it will appeal strongly only to readers who are fascinated both by cartography and by railroads, and mostly to those whose railroad interests are focused on urban transit. I am a member of that small band.
I’m delighted to learn that I was wrong about the narrowness of the audience. The author has written to me from across the Pond and has let me know that “it reached number 110 on the general Amazon Sales Ranking and as high as Number 1, 2 and 5 in categories like Mass Transit, Atlases and Travel books.” That’s wonderful!
OK, this is just one example. It’s purely anecdotal evidence, and therefore it doesn’t prove anything. But it’s still indicative of a problem with adult attitudes toward math. A bit of background first: if you don’t have the good fortune to be a model railroad enthusiast, you will need to know that “HO Scale” (not gauge) is 1/87 and that “N Scale” is 1/160. Now here’s the quick anecdote:
A participant in the HO Railroading Yahoo newsgroup asks the following:
Is there any known formula for converting a N-Scale track layout to a HO track layout?
Where do I begin in explaining why this question bothers me so much? The most obvious reason is the writer’s inability to deal with fractions, even when he has a computer and therefore a calculator; he clearly can’t figure out what operation to perform on 1/87 and 1/160. Some of my ninth-graders in Weston couldn’t do that either, so I suppose it should neither surprise me nor bother me. But the main reason the query upsets me is the opening five words. “Is there any known formula?” Most formulas are the wrong way to go, as they tend to replace thinking with algorithms. Sometimes we do need formulas, but why look for one here? Surely an experienced model railroader knows that multiplying N-scale lengths by 160 gives you real-life scale (prototype, as we call it). And then dividing the real-life lengths by 87 gives you HO scale. Who needs a formula?
This gorgeous book — I might even call it stunning — must have a rather limited audience. Although I’m tempted to add it to my list of favorite books (see my profile in this blog), I have to admit that it will appeal strongly only to readers who are fascinated both by cartography and by railroads, and mostly to those whose railroad interests are focused on urban transit. I am a member of that small band.
The full title of the book is Transit Maps of the World: The World’s First Collection of Every Urban Train Map on Earth. Wow! Author Mark Ovenden and editor Mike Ashworth have done an amazing job of compiling the comprehensive collection described in the subtitle. The frontispiece promises beautiful cartography within, and the book delivers on the promise. (But there is one small glitch. What the frontispiece shows is a stylized map that at first glance looks like the London Underground, but a second glance shows that the “stations” are really cities. These are all the cities represented by maps in the book, and they’re linked together by fanciful subway lines. The commentary says this:
This captivating diagrammatic view of the cities included in this book is in the style of Harry Beck’s classic London Underground diagram. It was conceived by the author and executed at LS London by Alan Foale, who is responsible for updating the London diagram. It is also available as a full-size wall poster from London’s Transport Museum shop or online.
But, alas, I searched through the London [no “’s”] Transport Museum site to no avail.)
Anyway, among the treats awaiting the specialized reader are beautiful contemporary maps from hundreds of cities, historical maps for many of them, great photographs of stations and transit vehicles, and crisp explanatory text. Among the most attractive maps are those of obvious cities (e.g. London, New York, Boston, San Francisco, Montreal), those of less obvious cities (e.g. Madrid, Budapest, Barcelona, Hamburg, Hong Kong, Osaka), and those of thoroughly unobvious cities (e.g. Bucharest, Kiev, Prague, Cairo, Stuttgart). The blurb from The Guardian points out that the explanatory text provides a lot of background on the history of mass transit and remarks that this book is “the ideal gift for the most challenging relative.” Well, I suppose…as long as your most challenging relative is an urban-transit-and-cartography enthusiast.
Unfortunately a few of the maps did not scan well and are decidedly fuzzy. If they were printed in a larger size they might have been easier to read, but then I suppose the fuzziness would have been more obvious.
Finally, as I observed in a much earlier post (two and a half years ago in fact), my interests in cartography and model railroading share something with my interests in certain parts of mathematics: representation. Although Transit Maps of the World doesn’t deal with model railroading per se, the two topics are deeply intertwingled for those of us who model urban transit. And transit maps are especially interesting for math teachers and mathematicians, not because they are scale model of reality (similar, as we say in geometry) but precisely because they are not scale models. Riders almost always want a map to be topographically correct, but they don’t want it to be made to scale. Indeed a scale map of an urban transit system would be nearly impossible to use: either it would be much too tightly crammed together in the downtown area, or the entire map would need to be much too big. Applied geometry isn’t as simple as they taught you back in ninth grade (or tenth grade, if you’re above a certain age).
How tall is a tree? What color is a rock? These may sound like silly questions, but they have thrown themselves in my face as I build my model railroad. In the process, I’ve discovered a couple of facts that confirm what Chris Fehl taught me in a drawing workshop that I described ten months ago: when I think I can’t draw, the truth is that I’m not seeing. Here are the facts:
- Trees are tall. Yeah, I know, that’s obvious. But until I got out and really looked at trees that are next to houses, I never truly realized that most of them tower over the houses. Trees on model railroads don’t look right because they aren’t tall enough. (On the other hand, the viewer’s eye is at a different level when standing on a street compared to looking at a model railroad.)
- Rocks are some undescribable combo of gray and brown. I can’t yet figure out how to make them look realistic, but it quickly became clear that I needed to look closely at actual rocks.
My goal is to make rocks that look like this model. But before I build more terrain and scenery, I need to see the real world. The modeled must precede the model.
Is model railroading an art, or is it a craft? Or is it just a hobby, as most people believe? Surely some would admit that it’s not only a hobby but also a craft, and perhaps there’s someone somewhere who thinks it’s an art.
If it’s an art, you should see it in museums, right? Well, I almost saw it in a museum today — and if it weren’t for the storm, I would have. But there was no way I was going to drive to Lexington at midday today. Our excellent National Heritage Museum was sponsoring an unfortunately timed model railroad exhibit sponsored by the HUB Division of the National Model Railroad Association. But I missed it.
Of course I could console myself by assuming that it probably wasn’t very good anyway. There’s at least some evidence to support this sour-grapes theory: as I reported last year, I was disappointed by their 2006 show in Marlborough. But my complaint about that one was that it was too commercial, and it seemed likely that one at the National Heritage Museum wouldn’t be. Oh, well.
But I’ve been to three other model railroad shows this year that were (at least partially) successful from my point of view. One showed model railroading as a hobby, one as a craft, and one as an art. Let’s start with the hobby first. Greenberg’s Train and Toy Show is a 30-year-old tradition that ropes in the whole family by not limiting themselves to model railroads (as you can tell from the name). This was my first visit — on November 18 in Wilmington, MA — and I was pleasantly surprised. Although there was a lot of junk, and too many tables were selling the same merchandise, there were also several high-quality layouts and a few choice vendors. It was definitely worth going to, as long as I was willing to invest a few hours to sort the wheat from the chaff.
Next comes the craft. The New England Prototype Modelers Meet — on June 3 in Collinsville, CT — was very impressive, but unfortunately over my head. No problem with chaff here! Just the opposite: I was clearly an amateur among professionals. There was amazing attention to detail, as you can see from the photo gallery. I can hold out this level of craft as an ideal, but I’ll never come close to it.
Finally, model railroading as art. The DeCordova Museum in Lincoln is hosting an elaborate exhibit called Trainscape, in which 12 artists created original works of art, all interacting with and linked by a fully functioning model railroad that passes through them:
Trainscape addresses a vital issue in the art of the early twenty-first century. Currently, many artists are actively engaged in the creation of imaginary worlds, not only with sculpture and installations, but also with painting, drawing, and photography. This impulse reflects philosophical ruminations about alternate realities, escape from the current world situation, and the use of place as an emotionally expressive device. A major theme within this exploration of parallel universes is a wide expansion of the idea of landscape sculpture (as opposed to the far more familiar “landscape painting”). Trainscape presents many alternative worlds, united only by the physical — and often conceptual — presence of the trains that travel throughout the exhibition.
The use of a miniature railroad enables DeCordova Museum to effectively present twelve separate works of contemporary installation art in a limited space, and to allow these works to be considered both separately and in juxtaposition. The miniature is also the perceptual cousin to the colossal. Tiny objects and images demand close examination, so that they fill one’s optical field in much the same way as very large visual phenomena. This close looking at small things allows for deep mental immersion as well. Trainscape thus provides enveloping journeys to cities, mountains, deserts, technological landscapes, and places of pure imagination.
Certainly their words, not mine, and surely not the way most of us think of model railroading, but it dramatically emphasizes the idea of miniature worlds and alternative representations. It’s there only through January 18, so be sure to go soon!
According to the New York Times and NPR, wealthy online gamers are outsourcing the playing of games to Chinese workers! At first glance this sounds ridiculous: surely people who play online games enjoy playing them, so it makes no sense to outsource that activity. It still sounds somewhat ridiculous, but it turns out that there’s a method to this madness. From the NYT article:
…affluent online gamers who lack the time and patience to work their way up to the higher levels of gamedom are willing to pay the young Chinese here to play the early rounds for them.
“For 12 hours a day, 7 days a week, my colleagues and I are killing monsters,” said a 23-year-old gamer who works here in this makeshift factory and goes by the online code name Wandering. “I make about $250 a month, which is pretty good compared with the other jobs I’ve had. And I can play games all day.”
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As they grind through the games, they accumulate virtual currency that is valuable to game players around the world. The games allow players to trade currency to other players, who can then use it to buy better armor, amulets, magic spells and other accoutrements to climb to higher levels or create more powerful characters.
I guess if you can hire someone to build your model railroad layout for you, you can also hire someone to play games for you. That’s logical, isn’t it?
What is model railroading? Sure, it’s a hobby, but all sorts of disparate activities are admitted into the big hobby tent; some are sports, some are arts, some are crafts. All of them are leisure activities that one does for fun rather than for profit. So cooking, for example, is a hobby for some, a job for others, a profession for a few. Model railroading, as I said, is a hobby — very, very few make a living from it! — and it encompasses a remarkable number of crafts and technologies.
Some model railroaders are really toy train enthusiasts; they “play with trains” as adults, having enough of a layout to be able to enjoy operating their not-particularly-realistic trains without worrying about scale realism or scenery. At the other extreme are the true railroad modelers, who can be fanatical about scale accuracy, faithfulness to the prototype, and detailed scenery and structures. There’s a whole huge range in between. But almost everybody finds himself (or occasionally herself) spending time on a wide variety of crafts, some of which may be more enjoyable than others, and all of which can turn out to have the side benefit of being educational and absorbing. There’s construction of benchwork, buildings, roads, terrain, and scenery; there’s the sometimes complex task of wiring an entire layout; there’s the artistry involved in creating backdrops and scenic details, as well as the routine painting of almost everything; there’s laying and ballasting track; there’s controlling the trains, with or without the aid of a computer. And there’s a large side of the hobby that I have very little to do with: realistic operation of a railroad, completing with timetables, picking up cargo, switching, and delivering the cargo. Quite an amazing variety of crafts for one hobby!
“Model railroading today is a great exercise in systems integration,” says joe.daddyo in the Layout Construction Yahoo newsgroup.
In HO scale model railroading, tracks always used to have rails that are 0.100 inches high, even though that’s not strictly to scale. Many model railroaders — mostly those who interpret the word “model” strictly — favor the newer versions, called Code 83 and Code 70 because they’re 0.083″ and 0.070″ respectively, which are more prototypically accurate than 0.0100″. On several of the model railroading newsgroups a fierce discussion breaks out periodically on this subject, usually about Code 100 vs. Code 83. Here are some of the remarks:
I can think of almost no good reason whatsoever to continue to buy, or plan to use code 100 in HO, save for compelling economic reasons, or for trackage that is not modeled and is out of view.
The way I look at it is that code 100 is more then 20% larger then code 83. If I had a boxcar or building that was 20% larger then it should be, it would be out of scale and not look right on my layout. I’m not a perfectionist when it comes to these things, but buying code 83 was a no-brainer for me.
Sure [code 100 track] is more durable, if you like to run your trains on 'I' beams...
Code 100 looks really weird after working with code 83/70/55. You can spot it a mile away in photo of models. No matter the cost or minor (theoretical) structural benefits, don't use code 100. Just my humble opinion.
A common reaction among civilians is to wonder why these enthusiasts care so much, but that’s not really a fair question: after all, I don’t ask why Red Sox and Patriots fans care so much, even though I don’t understand it. My question is to ask whether it’s this difference of 0.017" (about one sixtieth of an inch!) is really so visible to the naked eye. I have trouble believing that it is. On the other hand, code 100 is 20% larger than code 83, so maybe the difference can actually be perceived.
Over the weekend I squeezed in two more model railroad shows. The Marlborough one was OK, but disappointing. The Roslindale one was definitely worth while. Both will repeat in future years, so if you’re interested in model railroads I recommend the latter but not the former.
In Marlborough I attended the National Model Railroad Association HUB Division, New England Model Train Expo, which had a couple of good layouts and a lot of commercial vendors. Mostly it was the same set of products over and over again, from table to table. There was almost nothing that I hadn’t seen elsewhere. There were too many commercial vendors and not enough artistry. Most disappointing was the lack of realistic detail in the layouts: while I don’t expect strict adherence to prototype (a.k.a. “rivet-counting”) in a show like this, I do think that scenery and structures should at least show a little attention to realism. We need the willing suspension of disbelief, as they say in the English classroom. And did I mention that there were too many commercial vendors?
Roslindale was a different story altogether. The Bay State Model Railroad Museum, a merger of the Massachusetts Model Railroad Society and the Bay State Society of Model Engineers, holds an open house several times a year. Packing four layouts into a small space, they are almost the opposite of what I saw in Marlborough, showing attention to detail at every level. The terrain, the scratchbuilt urban structures, the trolleys, and the weathering of all structures and railroad cars were particularly impressive. But so was everything else, really. Check out the links at the right edge of their webpage under Scale Layouts. And go visit them at the next open house, on March 3 and 4.
Barbara and I spent an enjoyable couple of hours yesterday visiting the MIT Museum and the Tech Model Railroad Club (TMRC). Go see both of them!
MIT’s small museum is currently showing five exhibitions:
- a fascinating collection of holograms — always amazing to look at, and claiming to be the world’s largest such collection
- an informative multimedia show about robotics and AI, complete with actual models, videos, and info about the real people behind the development of the robots (no, it’s not science fiction)
- a well-done exhibition about Harold “Doc” Edgerton, the renowned inventor of the strobe, including a large blow-up of his famous milk drop photo — worth seeing if it isn’t old hat to you
- a captivating and truly amusing set of kinetic sculptures by Arthur Ganson (are they art? are they engineering?)
- a wonderful history of MIT called Mind and Hand, of interest not only to MIT folk but also to anyone whose life includes education or technology
Actually, there were six exhibitions. Somehow we missed Tech’ing it to the Next Level. Obviously I’ll have to go back to see it if it’s still there (I don’t know how we could have failed to notice it), since it’s all about educational innovation using technology.
Now, onto the model railroad layout. TMRC is well-known in certain circles as being the originator of the term hacker —not in the current sense to which the media have perverted the term (for which cracker is the approved term), but in the sense of “a person who enjoys exploring the details of programmable systems and how to stretch their capabilities, one who programs enthusiastically (even obsessively) or who enjoys programming rather than just theorizing about programming, one who enjoys the intellectual challenge of creatively overcoming or circumventing limitations.” It’s no coincidence that these meanings arose out of TMRC, whose exhibit suggests “MIT” as much as it suggests “model railroading.” In contrast to the majority of the highly detailed layouts that one is likely to see elsewhere, this one emphasizes the technology more than the illusion of reality. Exposed wiring is a virtue, not a defect. Seeing the scaffolding is fine. Roads don’t need drains, mailboxes, or fire hydrants. But there are many cool high-rise buildings, including one that lets the viewer can play Tetris on it (the controls turn the lights in the building’s rooms off and on appropriately, producing a Tetris game through the windows). There are excellent demonstrations of how to handle tracks and roads on multiple elevations. And don’t forget the ads for the breakfast food for which MIT has been famous for decades: Apple Gunkies, “rhomboidal pellets of true fruit goodness.”
Two upcoming model railroad shows:
- Tech Model Railroad Club, Saturday, November 18, at the MIT Museum, 265
Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge MA, Room N52–118, 2–5 and 7–10. Free!
- National Model Railroad Association HUB Division, New England Model Train Expo, Saturday-Sunday, December 2–3, 10–4 at Best Western Royal Plaza Trade Center, Marlborough MA. Not free (but not expensive, especially for kids).
I will be at both, and I hope to see some people I know. Brief reports will follow.
It takes a certain kind of person to be interested in the sociology of model railroading…
One of my students was surprised — not to mention perplexed and amused — to hear that one of my hobbies was model railroading.
“Why are you surprised?” asked one of his classmates. “He’s a math and computer science teacher — of course he’s into model railroading!”
Statistically speaking, the second student is surely wrong, since not very many math teachers are also model railroaders; but in principle he’s right on target. Indeed it’s not surprising if somebody interested in math is also interested in model railroading. Model railroading is all about scale, it’s all about representation of the real world, in short it’s all about models — and to a large extent that’s what math is all about.
Check out the great photos at <legnangel.livejournal.com/564026.html>. I wish I could read the Russian text, but maybe Boris can help.
Anyway, the question for me is why this collection resonates for me at several different levels. For one, the miniature figures look like — and might in fact be — model-railroad figures that have been repurposed. The use of food items, actual-size rather than scaled down, sets up a feel of Gulliver’s Travels, a feeling that’s very different from the miniature world of model railroading where absolutely everything is perfectly to scale. This tension is amusing, attention-getting, and fascinating.
There’s also an interesting connection with mathematics, where we are often concerned with models and representation. What happens when there’s a clash between two representations of different scales? Does this incongruity create delight and humor?
I’ll resist saying that it’s food for thought.
Just got back from the Amherst Railway Society’s annual model railroad show, which is held in…no, not Amherst…Springfield, MA. Barbara wasn’t interested in going, so Meredith accompanied me. Although she isn’t a model railroader, her interests in crafts and technology combine to make model railroading relevant to her.
When we arrived, the first person we ran into was Colby Cousens, Weston High School’s tech support person. (And what’s the probability of that? I doubt that there’s any way to calculate it.) Literally tens of thousands of other fans were attending this huge show, which sprawls over three buildings of the Eastern States Exposition Fairgrounds, generally known as the Big E. The organizers describe the show this way:
…The event features real life railroads and scale model railroads, historical societies, travel agencies, art shows, flea market dealers, importers, manufacturers and photographers. Modelers’ exhibits will display outstanding handiwork on layouts ranging from the tiny Z scale which fits on a coffee table to a monster 80 foot N-Trak system. The Amherst Belt Lines, an HO scale model railroad empire, has become a show highlight. As of the 2005 show layout, It has grown to 15.8 scale miles of mainline (960 linear feet) on 78 modules and has the capacity of multiple train operation. The Southern New England O Scalers will show its huge O gauge railroad with 100 car freight trains and 7 unit diesels.
…
There are 3 buildings with over 4 acres of railroading of all kinds.
We spent three and a half hours at the show. That still wasn’t enough time to see everything, but I think we saw all the exhibits that I needed to see. Anyway, after all that time we were exhausted, so we couldn’t have stayed longer even if it weren’t 5:00 by that point.
Stay tuned to see the effects of what I learned and bought, including a working (animated) model of the famous Citgo sign in Kenmore Square, which was built in 1965 and is therefore perfect for my 1969 Boston layout.
Currently I’m halfway through reading Playing with Trains: A Passion Beyond Scale, a memoir by Sam Posey. There’s a certain irony to the title. The word “passion” is accurate, for this book is truly about Posey’s deep enthusiasm and passion for building a model railroad layout. He spent 6000 hours on it, so it had better be a labor of enthusiasm and passion! But the word “playing” is largely ironic: the 16 years during which he devoted intense work to building his layout were anything but play.
Playing with Trains is not only about Posey’s passion for layout design and construction, but also about his family; many passages in this book are about model railroading as a family endeavor. Posey also writes about other aspects of his life, including his career as an architect and builder and his simultaneous career as a race car driver and ABC sportscaster.
The most poignant parts of what I’ve read so far concern his battles with Parkinson’s disease, which destroyed his ABC job and deeply affected his attitude toward model railroading. There’s a subtle and unnamed connection between Parkinson’s Disease and Parkinson’s Law in the chapter I just finished reading. (These are two different Parkinsons: James and Northcote.) Knowing that his degenerative disease would probably cut his life short and would almost certainly end his ability to build a model railroad long before he died, Posey vowed to prolong the projected completion date of the layout. But what if he wanted to spend four years and there was only one year’s worth of work? He realizes that the amount of work would expand to fill the time available for its completion, so there was nothing to worry about.
The real question is whether you have to be a model railroader to enjoy this well-written book. I think not. It’s perfectly possibly to become engaged in reading any work that portrays its author’s knowledge and passion, even about a subject in which the reader has no particular interest. This often happens in fiction — the works of Dick Francis come to mind, which captivate all readers, including those of us with absolutely no interest in horse-racing — and it can sometimes happen in non-fiction as well. It does here.
Dennis and I were talking about multiple representations. Multiple representations are one of the Big Ideas that wend their way through all our math courses. A table and a graph and a function machine and a mapping diagram are all multiple representations of the same thing.
But what’s that thing?
A function per se is an abstraction, a possibly infinite set of ordered pairs. The graph doesn’t represent the table; both of them represent something else.
It reminded me of a conversation with a Lincoln-Sudbury parent back in the mid-’70s. He had noticed a disparate array of interests of mine that showed up in the two courses in which I taught his son. These interests ranged from aspects of mathematics to linguistics to cryptography to cartography to musical notation and even to model railroading. “What did all these have in common?” he asked himself — and me.
“I don’t know,” I replied. “What do they all have in common? I’ve never thought about it.”
“Well,” he said, “after pondering it for quite awhile, I realized that they all have something to do with representations. What you’re really interested in is the different ways that abstractions can be represented.”
So a parent of a student helped me understand myself better. Maybe he’s right.
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