Cloud Atlas XIII
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Trains: David
They call David “The Conductor.”
He joined the Central Michigan Model Railroad Club at 16. A wunderkind who became the club’s treasurer.
He’s also a bit of a jokester.
“I still live in my childhood home,” David says. “I just kicked my parents out.”
David is the first one in on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday nights, and usually the last one to turn out the lights. The club meets in a second story loft in downtown Jackson, Mich. The hours come from the club’s old location at the local mall. It used to be they’d meet on Mondays and Fridays, but David says they started using Wednesday as a “work day.”
Though “work” is always code for “social.”
“It’s more social than anything. This is my social club,” David says.
Trains: Craig
Craig grew up across the street from the Pontiac rail yards. He’s been watching them for a lot of years.
When he was 18, he got into model trains, but never really had a place to run them. In 2002, he moved to Jackson, and found the Central Michigan Model Railroad Club.
“Then I had a place to play with them,” Craig says.
Before then, Craig studied geography in college. He also collected stamps and license plates. “It’s an OCD thing,” he says, with all the colors, symbols, and numbers. Organizing. Categorizing.
Craig works in the travel industry in Novi.
Trains: Blair
Both sides of Blair’s family has worked on the railroad. He has five family members riding the rails.
“I love seeing my brother drive by on the train,” he says.
Blair’s been collecting train memorabilia since he was young. He has an O-gauge train set at home, and the GTs are his favorites.
He’s grateful for the Central Michigan Model Railroad Club.
“I can’t personally work on the railroad because I’m deaf, so this is the next best thing.”
Trains: Art
Art has been collecting model trains all his life.
His mom and dad got him started as a kid, and he still has the original toy train. “It still runs,” he says.
After his children left the house, he converted their bedrooms into train rooms.
“It keeps me occupied,” Art says.
After 20 years in the club, with everyone placing trains on each other’s sets, how does he know which train is his?
“We just know.”
Trains: Blair
Both sides of Blair’s family have worked on the railroad. He has five family members riding the rails.
“I love seeing my brother drive by on the train,” he says.
Blair’s been collecting train memorabilia since he was young. He has an O-gauge train set at home, and the GTs are his favorites.
He’s grateful for the Central Michigan Model Railroad Club.
“I can’t personally work on the railroad because I’m deaf, so this is the next best thing.”
Trains: Gene
Gene is 85 years old. He’s been seriously collecting trains for more than 55 years. It all started with a $5 set during the Depression.
He served two tours of duty in World War II and in the Korean War.
“When I got home from the service, I started collecting more.”
Since then, he’s been a bit of everything: pest control, fencing (as in fences), antiques.
He’s been with the Central Michigan Model Railroad Club since the beginning, in the 1960s. It’s the tradition – the idea of keeping these old trains alive – that keeps him interested. He likes the G-gauge trains: “The big ones.”
His set is full of moving parts, like a talking car wash, and a tornado that spins around on an old record player.
Gene also collects barbed wire.
Abandoned Irish Hills
Used to be that the Irish Hills, a section of US-12 between Detroit and Chicago, was quite the tourist attraction.
As a kid, my family often went to Stagecoach Stop and Prehistoric Forest, and played putt-putt and drove go karts at the little amusement parks. Even back then there was a level of hokeyness – but it didn’t matter. Those places were tons of fun.
But now, it’s all shutting down. There are a few attractions that are still humming along. The majority, though, lie in disrepair (or worse).
In high school, my dad and step mom were married at Stagecoach Stop’s little chapel, and their reception was held in the old timey tavern.
Stagecoach was a bustling place back in the day. You could watch a gun fight in the town square, grab some ice cream, pet a goat in the petting zoo, and even stay overnight in the motel. There was a working lumber mill, and horse rides, and a drive-through haunted Halloween tour.
Now those places are overgrown and fading away.
Driving down US-12 now, and passing through the Irish Hills, it feels like a ghost town. It’s almost like a run-down part of town, with all the windows broken out and no one left to protect it. Eventually, I’m sure, these roadside attractions will be mowed down completely.
Maybe the dinosaurs at Prehistoric Forest will survive. But more and more each year that place gets eaten by vegetation.
So last fall I took a drive out there, seemingly back in time, to capture some of those attractions I remembered from childhood. Before they disappeared.
At Stagecoach, I ran into a couple that was hosting a garage sale of sorts on the property. Most of the area was closed off, but I asked if I could walk around to grab some photos, and they said “yes.”
The Irish Hills Fun Center, a general amusement park with putt-putt and go karts, was completely abandoned. The kart track was still in decent shape, but the rest of the property was fading fast.
Prehistoric Forest, the true goal of my trip last fall, has been known as a target for vandalism. With motion sensors and cameras guarding the place, it was risky to try to grab photos of the place. When I drove past, there was a utility truck and a man taking measurements, so I played it safe and drove on.
Word is that the place has been sold. Who knows what will happen to it.
It was weird to see a place that was so bustling turn into such a dead spot. I may take another drive out there this fall to see what’s changed – if anything.
(See the rest of the set on Flickr)
8/24/13 – Action Super Heroes
Saturday was the last big sale day for my favorite local comic shop. Leonard, the owner, is retiring as of Labor Day.
The good news, however, is that he may have found a buyer for the place. They have to get things worked out with the bank, but otherwise it’s a go.
That’s my friend Jon Hart in the background, there, digging through the alternative titles. I’m mainly a Spidey and X-Men guy, myself.
8/14/13 – Concord Auto Body
I have this list of things I want to stop and photograph on my way into work. Concord, Mich. has quite a few little things like this sign that are on my list.
This month-long project is the perfect excuse to pull over, grab the camera, and check one off the list.
I’ve watched these weeds envelop this sign all summer long. Now I got it.
8/13/13 – Treat Yourself to Cancer
A brick wall I pass every day on my commute to and from work, in Concord, Mich.
Love that, even after it’s been hacked, it hasn’t been fixed.
8/12/13 – Sweet Corn
This time of year is both happy and sad. Happy because, hey, it’s still technically summer.
But it’s sad because it’s the Sunday of summer – the last little bit before fall starts creeping in. Nothing says this more than harvest time, especially this cool summer in Michigan that feels like half-fall anyway.
Fall is a lot of people’s favorite season, but not mine. The crops, though. Man, I’ll take those all autumn long.
Michigan is known mainly for its cherries, apples, and blueberries, but we’re lucky in that a lot of crops grow well here. Peaches, melons, corn.
“You can tell it’s a Michigan [insert crop here],” my family used to say. “They don’t grow these like they do in Michigan.”
I’m not positive that’s true. But I do know that everything tastes pretty darned good this time of year.
8/11/13 – Slow Strangle
Never realized this rope was tied around my dying apple tree in the backyard. Hm.
Also, this one was edited in Aperture for old time’s sake. Do most of my editing/culling in Lightroom, and export to Aperture for management.
8/9/13 – Antenna To Nothing
Lots of abandoned goodness in Albion, Mich. Took a little drive Friday afternoon during lunch and spotted a row of buildings that looked like they used to be thriving businesses.
But no longer.
8/7/13 – Hosed-Down Horse
It’s county fair time here in Jackson County.
Despite some thunderstorms, the fair went on – muggy, sticky, and steamy.
For a horse, that means bath time, obviously.
8/6/13 – Nest
This is the stuff nightmares are made of.
Bald-faced hornet nest. Huge. Hanging.
To keep a safe distance, I stuck with the EF 85mm f/1.8 for this one.
8/5/13 – Majestic
Found in a random spot in the outside wall of an abandoned church in Albion, Mich.
8/4/13 – Red to Black
Early- to mid-June is raspberry season in Michigan. Everyone knows that.
But I didn’t know that blackberries ripen in late July. And there they were. Smaller than the kind you usually buy in the store, and not quite as sweet. Finding a bush full of free ones, though, was all right.
My grandmother’s house growing up had one of every kind of berry: red, white, and black raspberries, blackberries, blueberries, and grapes. Diving into the pricker bushes was so worth it, just to get at those suckers.
8/3/13 – First Big Crop
It took a while, but this year’s garden crop is finally starting to produce.
The plentiful rain, the sunshine – a totally different than the hot and dry weather we had last year here in Michigan.
Tomatoes, squash, green beans, zucchini. All the usuals. This year’s new edition is cucumbers. I’m not a huge fan, but it’s fun to grow something new.
Nice to see my vegetable budget pretty much disappear during these months, too.
8/2/13 – Waiting for Action
I pass almost nothing but farmland on the way into work. Vast soybean and corn fields.
Not sure exactly what this machine does, but it looks like it’s waiting for something.
Really, I liked the colors of this scene on my way into work Friday morning. Stop in the middle of the road, check behind me for approaching cars, snap the photo, and drive on.
Bingo.
8/1/13 – Driveway Grass
Today’s photo was a quick one – I hadn’t pulled out of the driveway for my morning commute when I saw the sun reflecting (as it so often does) on my front lawn grass.
There are lots of pretty views on my way into work each morning. Usually the sun is rising over some mist-covered field, or the sky is painted with dawn colors. It’s one of my favorite parts of the day, my morning drive.
It’s getting to that time of year where the sun wakes up a little later each day, so by September the mornings will be perfect. Just perfect.