 I'm Brad. I'm Connor. I'm Tyler. And I'm Katie. And the August What's Neat starts right now. The What's Neat Show is sponsored by Caboose, sharing our passion for trains since 1938. This is What's Neat for August 2019. I'm your host Ken Patterson and this month we've got an absolutely fantastic show. First of all we look at graffiti artist and stencil artist Pete Wallager. He shares his work with us in a video called Eyes on Trains. It's a real treat to see that this month on What's Neat. We also visit the Magic House in Kirkwood, Missouri, where James Regear shares with us a beautiful layout that he takes care of out there. It's behind glass. It's double deck and it's a real treat to see this month. On the road with Michelle Kempema, we visit Train World where she interviews Ken Bianco Jr. It's absolutely amazing to see this train store that is in its third generation of operation. Campbell Rice shares with us Joe Atkinson's Iowa Interstate Railroad. It's an HO scale. It's a very prototype railroad. You guys are going to love the detail on this layout this month. And with that that's the lineup for August 2019 What's Neat. I do want to say that if you're in the Lakewood, Colorado area, please be sure to visit Caboose. It's got to be one of the biggest and most well stocked train stores that I have ever seen. That's Caboose in Lakewood, Colorado, or you can order your supplies online at MyCaboose.com. And so with that, let's get on the rest with this August 2019 What's Neat. My name is Pete Iswallager. I'm an internationally known stencil artist. I am known for my signature eye. I put it out on the streets to wake up the world. The reason I'm doing Eyes on Trains, about a year and a half ago, a scrapper was following me on Instagram and he said, Pete, would you like to come to my scrap yard? I'm scrapping full-size locomotives. And to a graffiti artist to paint a full-size locomotive is everyone's dream. So I, of course, and it spawned this entire series of going to the scrap yard week after week after week after week and painting trains and then essentially picking them and using them as my canvas for my exhibition. Most of these trains are being scrapped, they're being melted down, they've traveled millions of miles across America and ultimately are worth more as scrap metal than as a train on the tracks. And part of me doing the show is to save those trains and to also kind of be the mortician, you know, the mortician to the trains before they die, to really just give them a face and identity, just to kind of, you know, give them their final farewell. And in a way I kind of feel like I'm saving their lives in some sense because I'm reclaiming a lot of the parts off of these. The show is going to be at Hoffman the Chance Gallery in Maplewood. Like I said, it's been a year and a half in the making. It's been just a lot of just figuring out how to get from A to Z. I mean, we moved a train into the gallery and you know, I don't know what it takes to get that but luckily I have a good friend by the name of Eddie Bauer who knows how to do that. He went and picked up a train from the scrap yard, brought it to my studio and then really brought that train from my studio into the gallery which was quite an undertaking. So about six months ago I was asked to do a massive mural in Indianapolis. The only stipulation is like, we want a mural with positive messages. So I get to this wall and I'm looking at it and it's this really, it's really wide and short and there's 40 of them all separated and I'm like, man those sure look like box cars. Each logo on the train which I have carried over now to my show has positive messages like instead of the Frisco logo it says forgive and it's the biggest mural now in Indianapolis. But if you want to see that, the hashtag is the Monon Love Train. These trains have traveled millions of miles and it's one of the most iconic images that we see there in everyone's life and they're kind of dying you know in a way and I want people to realize that this isn't just a piece of art, this is something that's traveled across America that now has been reclaimed and hopefully we'll sit in someone's house for the next and maybe a museum for the next 300 years you never know. I mean to see this train going to this door it was almost like that weight that I've had on me for the past year and a half knowing that oh my gosh eventually I got to get a train in the door and we did it. It was one of the best feelings of my life. It's finally like you have the idea, here it is and you know now it's in there. So you know I'm doing this train show and the first thing you think of when you think of trains are the mini trains. So this has been another part of the whole aspect. I mean I've always been into trains, I've painted a few trains in the past in my life but I never really got into the model world and one thing I wanted to kind of show is a miniature version of this scrapyard so I've been going to all these train shows, been meeting all the foamers which by the way is a name for the people who foam when they see these big trains and freak out but that's the name but I mean there could be a whole documentary just filmed on these folks who are die-hard trainers and it's mostly not the non-graffiti stuff they like it clean so I'm hoping somehow I can break into that world you know like be the next Thomas the train but for 2015 you know. So the key people for this show have really just been kind of the drive and the motivation for it are about five people one being Nick Pistone who owns the scrapyard my homegirl Irene she has been completely all a part of this from the beginning I think she was even like friends with this guy on Instagram and was like we need to go out there and was really kind of the drive to getting this whole train things going and she's a bencher she hangs out in the train so she's really kind of helped me the third being Eddie Bauer who I've known my entire life this is the guy who moved the train from here to here to here and then I have an assistant by the name of Cam just a neighborhood cat who's been there a lot and then Will Rimmel who's a very great artist and and you know has been helping me get from A to B you know so right is E. Trains are the beginning of the industrial revolution I mean they are you know we got a super train coming up next I mean it's the next generations of trains happening I mean the trains especially that I'm covering are the ones that I saw growing up I didn't see the steam engines and that's what you see the train shows you know and I like the the old rusty big Union Pacific orange train so it's been it's been an amazing opportunity I don't think I'd ever have something like this fall in my lap again you never know but it's just like one of these scenarios that like all right I gotta see this through and I'm about that close so so after st. Louis I'd love to travel this technically on a train to different cities to Miami New York I have a couple galleries that I've been talking to nothing set in stone so if you know anybody who wants to take a train to their city this could be a pretty impressive show but yeah I want to travel this let the world see a little bit of st. Louis and a little bit of our history take these trains back to the cities they've already traveled to and you know it could be pretty awesome hold me do one more eyes on trains yo peace on this segment of what's neat I'm with Joe Atkinson in his beautiful HO scale Iowa interstate railroad Joe I appreciate you showing us your your layout system here with the what's neat show tell me just a little bit right quick how did you get involved in the hobby I started out when I was a kid I had a newspaper route that took me past a railroad yard and and just just the the interest in in the locomotives and and just watching this this equipment operate right in front of me that just really had me hooked from from the age of about about 10 I think awesome do you remember your first train uh first first model model first model train I do not I I think I started out in in n scale if I remember correctly okay and so so some of the early work was with that but I know I had like some well I had some taiko stuff before that time and and the typical I think I had like a sheet of plywood on our pool table or something so I was like me I used to get the sears christmas catalog and I used to couldn't wait to go through and pick out what's train I wanted oh yeah you know back back in the good old days there why did you decide to model the Iowa interstate well it started off I was interested in in the union pacific for for probably a decade or more I was I was planning to model that I kind of started down that path but after a while I just sort of got bored with with with modeling so many examples of the same equipment I I love st 40 dash twos but after after a dozen or so it just got a little bit tedious and and I just happened to to kind of stumble upon the Iowa interstate at one point in June of 2000 and just started thinking about the possibility of modeling that just because in part because they were running regular up detours in a few years just a few years prior to that and I thought I could sort of have the best of both worlds and have a bit more variety right have a have a nice mix of older power and and so that's that's really what it how it started out the fact that the Iowa interstate has just a ton of super friendly employees that there's a lot of great information available that that certainly helped to encourage me in that direction as well sure and then you picked h.o. scale and I noticed that it looked like you you hand laying most of your track did you hand lay all the track probably about I'd say maybe 85 90 percent the the only exceptions really were areas where I couldn't where the track was deeper in a scene so I I really wasn't in a position to to lean in far enough to get to be able to eyeball it to to hand lay but the majority is is hand laid now your yard here I guess it depicts what is in council bluffs which is the west end of terminus of the Iowa interstate here and then you your model kind of goes to the east is that that is that what you have kind of modeled here that's correct yeah the the the Iowa interstate just once the trains reach council bluffs then then they would be broken down and and they would serve the the local customers and then make the interchange moves with the up and bnsf and and then turn around and build the the outbound eastbound train that evening okay very good I really like the detail that you have on your your engine house here I see that it it actually looks like the real thing now it's very very neatly done thank you and everything seems to be you know pretty much patterned after the the way it looks it I think that's been one of my favorite things about modeling a nearby prototype is the the ability to get a lot of photos and measurements and that type of thing and and again the employees of the Iowa interstate had had been extremely helpful in and in those days when when I was building scenes like that so tell me about your bridge I know that's been a kind of a a long endeavor painstaking but it turned out very well oh thank you I that's it's a good example of of those situations where the things we fear the most you know the answer is just to push through them and and just take one step at a time and and bridge building was was a part of the hobby that really really scared me for for a number of years that the idea of of cutting my my main line and and just everything that was involved with that in order to to build a bridge I just that had always brought up a bit of anxiety for me but I just sort of worked my way around the room started with the the most simple example examples of bridges on the on the prototype and and then worked my way up to to this one this is one of the last ones that I built for the layout and it honestly it took me a long time but it just it's just one of those things where no one step was particularly complicated it was just a matter of of stringing all those steps together and and and and pushing through so very nice job and and I tell you I have seen this bridge many times and in fact I'm I'm gonna roll some b-roll footage here of the actual bridge and you we actually cannot tell that it's actually curved and I really didn't know it was curved until you happened to mention it one day on an article and and then I got to looking at Google Maps and noticed that it was actually curved so it's a it's a very slight curve to it but it was enough that I felt like this I could sort of justify the placement where I wanted to locate it here on the layout and and it it's somewhat hopefully fit in with the scene and and the curve certainly you know didn't didn't didn't hurt in that in that effort not at all and this was a all original Rock Island track is that correct this portion of of the Iowa Interstate and and before that the Rock Island was actually originally part of the Chicago Great Western this this was built as a Chicago Great Western bridge and in 1953 when the Rock Island constructed the Atlantic Cut-Off that was meant to shorten and straighten their route between Atlantic and Council Bluffs part of that work involved connecting with the existing Chicago Great Western line into Council Bluffs and so between Peter and rig there there was this this portion where the Rock Island ran over that eventually when the Chicago and Northwestern bought the CGW and the the Rock Island became the sole operator on that line and and then when when the Iowa Interstate took over then then that was the case for them as well so Joe tell me where we sat here on the Iowa Interstate and a little bit what's what's going on in this area with your grain facility and everything this is Hancock Iowa this is the prototype is 32 miles east of Council Bluffs the elevator itself is located on what was once Rock Island branch line that the ran perpendicular to the Atlantic Cut-Off after that was built and after the the Cut-Off was completed then over time the the branch line sort of compressed on both ends and and what was left in Iowa Interstate Times was just this little segment that that dropped down from the main line and and and and served the elevator there's a little segment of the Oakland branch that runs under the the main line runs onto the south and that is just used for car storage during during my the time frame I model okay Joe so you're using the proto throttle here tell me I understand you are kind of like one of the early on-setters with that what so what do you think about it yeah you're right I the good folks that Iowa Scaled Engineering were kind enough to allow me to beta test the proto throttle and I had just I have just had a blast with it honestly it is I would say it is right up there with the introduction of sound itself oh really yeah the the impact it has had on on my enjoyment of hobby of layout operations and and just the the hobby in general I think it is has has really been a complete game changer for me it's hard to imagine what it would be like to operate without it now I oh wow I think the very first time I picked it up I was operating with it for about 20 minutes and I went back and did something with my my old mob throttle and it just felt so wrong it just felt so it was just it was that much of a of a shift in in my mindset in such a short time and this has just been it's honestly it's been I expected big things of the proto throttle and it's it's it's delivered that and much more for me it would be nice to see them make a steam version but I have no clue how they would ever do that but boy it yeah it's it's just totally changed the realism I guess of the way you operate the train that it's it's more actual prototype based yeah I I operated with really high momentum and braking and things like that before the proto throttle but this has just made it that much more enjoyable the the the shift to thinking in actual notches just like the prototype engineers right it's been surprising to me just how much of a how much that has has helped to sort of draw me into the prototype world and in my thinking as I operate in and just just really been a a pleasure all the way around okay Joe I see all these little locks here on this on your I guess these are switches is that is that what you got going on here right yeah the the just recently I decided to finally jump in and and add locks to all of my mainline turnouts as the prototype does and I'd been seeing people for many years Lance Meinheim and James McNabb and others who had been using switch locks and had kind of hesitated just because I thought the work of actually unlocking the the turnout would would be kind of cumbersome when I'm operating alone but once I actually dove in and and and tried it I thought that much like the proto throttle I thought that the use of the locks actually added a lot to operations really brought my thinking into the into the prototype world so what you have here is your unlocking tool with the key on it right yeah the the these are just micromark uncoupling picks that I've been using for years and in order to kind of simplify the the use of the turnout the switch locks I just drilled them out and added a key ring to the end for for the the key for for those locks so pretty neat pretty neat Joe I really appreciate you showing your layout with everybody here on what's neat and isn't this just the greatest hobby in the world it certainly is it's it's just been a blast I appreciate uh appreciate you stopping by it's been uh been great to speak with you again and and uh has it always a pleasure to come see your layout I always enjoy looking at it well you're always welcome well thank you so much thank you Joe thank you for this segment of what's neat I'm standing here with James for a gear in the magic house in beautiful downtown Kirkwood Missouri and James I'm standing amidst this beautiful train layout that you all have on display and you are the curator for this tell us about this layout James well this was a home layout built for Bill Kensfield uh in his basement and he donated it to the magic house in whole and it's uh it's a beautiful two-level layout that represents Colorado in the 1950s yes yeah of course it has the Kirkwood station down here some buildings labeled to match uh St. Louis area sites um I saw the Kirkwood station there now how many feet of track have you got on this layout how big is it it's about uh 16 by 20 I'd like to say with probably a main line of about a hundred linear feet wow double deck too is that right that's right there's a balloon on the bottom balloon on the top and single track going up and down now what do you power this layout with James nce that's a good system it works good for you it's it's working very well and this runs seven days a week is that right it runs seven days a week and it runs about six hours a day so these locomotives get put through the paces in fact I say that when I've brought equipment onto this layout that isn't up to stuff doesn't quite meet NRA couple height standards it will wreck them so it it is a good test of quality I found that I found that we've been we've been running a lot of great stuff from athern I've really appreciated their locomotives their reliability long term so that's awesome man double deck layout it's all yours to be had this is like a real job how great is this when you go to work it's uh it's a really uh it's a fun job you know I stumbled into this job in fact one day when I was here at the magic house with my daughter and I'd seen signs around town at hobby shops looking for volunteers for this layout and I said well I'm gonna stay at home dad mostly so I don't know exactly how much time I'll be able to volunteer unless I can get child care and I said you know what we've given up on following finding volunteers at this point we are looking to hire somebody and so that's awesome I know you got a babysitter for the next two more hours you told me today oh yeah we're we're taken care of we have we have good child care this is a beautiful layout now is there a website for the magic house or how can people find this to come visit um just google magic house st louis children's museum um I think it's magic house dot org okay but I could be wrong about that so yet yet any rate google st louis magic house st louis children's museum that's awesome so when you come on out here tell everybody that you've heard about it on what's neat and come and meet james regear one of the members of the what's neat this week podcast so thank you very much james for sharing this beautiful layout with us on what's neat all right thank you this is michelle kempama with what's neat and I am on the road in long island and I'm here in lenbrook at train land with kin bianco junior and I love the star it's amazing tell us a little history of your star thank you well um my grandfather started a long time ago um he was actually a beautician and cut people's hairs and went on these award shows and um one year he got a train set for his kids and the train set actually became worth more than what he paid for so he took the train set away from them sold it got them another train set same thing happened so he was saying you know what I could probably make some money off of this so uh after that started um he started accepting uh you know giving out free haircuts for trains so bring in your old trains and we'll give a free haircut so um it just started from that and it started from his basement and then he opened up a shop uh avenue m and uh we have train world over in ditmus and uh now train land uh retail store so um yeah it was a long journey and now we're up to our third generation yeah which is you yep me my uh my cousin anthony uh cousin phil poli so a lot of family involved and uh it's it's still good yeah family and trains are good yep your retail store is full of amazing products and but I think your online business is even bigger than your retail right oh oh yeah mail order has taken over and I think with any business now mail order is such a big important aspect and um we've kind of been able to kind of shift over and uh when it was the second generation my father's generation it was bone mail order and now the third generation is internet orders and uh my uncle tony and uh the brooklyn store is uh a workaholic and just keeps on shipping out orders and so it's nice I I work with my father and my cousin anthony works with his father so it's a great dynamic so you get a little old school and a little new school and uh you know my cousin myself bring in the new newer aspect with the online mail order uh internet and uh our fathers have the more old world uh charm with the internet magazines stuff like that so I love your layouts that you have in the store so people can try things I was surprised I was looking at a train here and all of a sudden it starts honking and talking to me and doing all this and there's a guy way over there with the cell phone controlling it that was really fun you you absolutely let the public touch and play and I do you find that just really drives imagination with kids you know what for retail store the best success is when the families kids are interactive so they come into the shop and the kids want to I mean they're seeing trains they want to grab it they want to touch it so we we let them use the remote controls we have iPads they could run in with their their phones now so the technology has gotten so advanced and developed and um so it's I think Lionel has done a great job and other manufacturers as well trying to get kids into that this hobby so it's great it's seeing a kid with uh you know running the train back and forth is priceless I agree and uh I don't think there's a shortage of kids that love this at all not at all the people that say oh the hobby is there's nobody at all they're so wrong in fact today you had tons of kids around here this morning they were all playing with the train we had to wait to do the interview because there were so many kids over here so um I'm glad you kicked them out right I kind of had to kick your kids out because we can't film with the kids here but he does have them in here but the the kids are great and um yeah it was nice to see them coming early this morning and great to see you see a retail store have the kids yes um your retail store just it just gives me that feeling of nostalgia and fun and like that whole I'm getting a train today kind of feeling it's just nice to have a retail friend yeah you cover every product here what's your largest uh selection to me it looks like maybe Lionel so for the general public when people come in and want a starter set Lionel by far is the name they know um the first thing they say oh my father had it when he was a kid or my mother and so that's like the biggest um recognition that we have and by far general public coming in is Lionel is king but you also cover everything the prototype modeler would want here so with the hardcore hobbyist we have HO, N scale, G scale we have all the train scenery with land scenic so um HO is actually very popular and um so we we do it all yeah I everything I could think of buying they have in the store it's already here so well thanks for letting me come out and talk to you today thank you so much Michelle I really appreciate it yeah and I'm glad you were able to get a little taste of train land train world in New York and anytime you want to come back we're more than happy to have you that's awesome oh and I should say it was easy to get here I came from Times Square this morning got on a subway got on the Long Island Railroad which was a fun experience I got to ride a train to a train start and even on the little short walk here there was a Dunkin Donuts so I got breakfast too there you go what's better than that so if you want to visit this store if you're anywhere near New York this is an easy place to get to and of course there's online ordering too what are your store hours here so uh summer hours are different than winter hours so winter hours we're going to be open more summer hours um shorter hours but generally Monday through Friday 10 to 6 and Saturday like 10 to 5 okay yep that's awesome well thank you I hope you all come and check out train land and train world thanks all of the model railroad products seen in this episode of What's Neat are available through caboose in Lakewood, Colorado or order online at mycaboose.com