Model Railroad Nostalgia: Classic Articles from Model Railroader

[Kalmbach Publishing] Classic Articles from Model Railroader. (1980) Begins with A. C. Kalmbach’s 1936 story about his own layout, and ends with a 1964 review of “OOO scale”, which soon after became N scale. In between we get Frank Ellison’s story about operating on his Delta Lines, John Allen on weathering, Linn Westcott on eliminating derailments, Jack work on building an HOn3 caboose, etc. The selections amount to a history of model railroading, including its increasing contrast with railroad modelling. A salutary reminder of the difficulties of working with paints that might dissolve each other, the lack of detail parts, the need to kluge scenery from plaster, dry colour, weeds, varnish etc. And a nostalgia kick for anyone who was around in those days, for whom Ellison and Armstrong’s emphasis on layouts designed for operation was a revelation. Worth picking up if you find a copy. ****

Mitchell's Layouts: mentored by Ellson and Armstrong

     Don Mitchell. Walkaround Model Railroad Track Plans (1991) Don Mitchell’s track plans showed up not only in Model Railroader but also in the NMRA Bulletin and other magazines. He emulated both John Armstrong and Frank Ellison, and occasionally mentions them as mentors. He begins with ergonomic constraints, such as typical reach, and discusses principles of layout design entailed by giving his clients what they wanted. Thus a few of these layouts are for the train watcher, but most are for operators, or those who just want to watch trains occasionally when operation doesn’t appeal.
     All the layouts were designed for specific spaces, so they also show what can be done when nooks and crannies and stairs and furnaces and other obstacles force compromises. The smallest, the Oakville Central, is 37" x 70", to fit under a bed. It’s an oval with a short runaround track, a small yard, and a bunch of industrial spurs. It does nicely as inspiration for an N scale layout-on-a-door (a once popular style), which would allow a couple of passing sidings, and additional yard track or two, more spurs, and (most desirable) a more expansive scenic effect
     The largest design is for the San Diego Model Railroad Museum. It’s more of a guideline,  

showing a carefully arranged mainline depicting Tehachapi Pass, with both operator and public viewing spaces on three levels. The yards, industrial switching areas, etc, are left up to future development. The design supposes phased construction, so that something worth displaying can be created quickly, and the extensions into the rest of the display space can wait for revived enthusiasm and renewed funding. The Wiki article about the Museum doesn’t mention Mitchell, and the existence of several other layouts suggests that only phase one of his design (the pass itself) was built.
     Most of Mitchell’s designs are for fairly large spaces, half a basement or garage. He prefers lobes accessible from both sides, but accepts the occasional need for pop-up or rear access. He likes eye-level or higher backdrops to help focus attention, and mentions the need for adequate ventilation. In discussing operating scenarios, he had to consider the limitations of DC control systems; many of his designs would be a joy to run with DCC. His style is less personal than Armstrong’s and Ellison’s, but he does allow himself an occasional pun. A book worth studying. ***

A Matter of WHO: hunt for disease carrier (Movie)

A Matter of Who (1961) [D: Don Chaffey. Terry-Thomas, Sonja Ziemann, Alex Nicol] A case of small-pox arriving in London on an international flight triggers an international hunt for the source. Terry-Thomas plays the Health Department investigator working on behalf of the WHO, which makes the title an overly cute pun.

     The hunt forms the spine of the plot. Crooked oil-deal shenanigans, politics, love, etc complicate the story and add the thrills the audience expects. There’s even a helicopter. Fun and games, and a satisfying ending. Terry Thomas for once tones down his mad-cap eccentric character, the rest of the cast play their stereotypes well, the photography and music are unintrusive so we can focus on the story, such as it is.
     Later treatments of the dangerous disease theme focus on the work of containing it, etc. Here, the most interesting bits for me were the ones that showed how the disease-containment work was being done. 1961 was still culturally the 1950s, and the movie-makers of the time didn’t trust the audience to accept a quasi-documentary film, so they added the spice of intrigue and crime. An OK hour and a half of entertainment, with subtexts relevant for our covid-19 times. **

Photography's history in pictures

Julia van Haaffen. From Talbot to Stieglitz (1982) A survey of the photography collection held by the New York Public Library. I skimmed and sampled the text, which appears to be a thorough if brief history of photography’s first century or so. The well-printed plates will give the casual reader a good overview of how photographers learned to exploit the medium. As the technology improved, so did the range. Photography has I think become the dominant medium. No matter what the medium used, the maker now must take into account what photographers have done with similar contents, compositions, or intentions.
     Photography reduced the price of pictures, which in turn changed the way we use them. The first major use was recording and documenting, which enabled the spread of at least visual knowledge of the world beyond the viewer’s immediate surroundings. This continues in, for example, our reliance on video and still imagery to bring us the daily and hourly news, which in turn affects our political and economic decisions in ways we are hardly aware of.
     Recording the family was once the preserve of those rich enough to pay a painter to paint their portraits. By the nineteenth century’s third quarter, most people could afford to have their pictures taken at least once in their lifetimes. This aspect, too, continues, multiplied a billionfold by posting our “status updates” on the social media.
     It took a little while longer for photographers to understand the artistic possibilities of the medium. From the beginning, photographers cannibalised the other mediums and genres, and in return showed how content and composition of the images could be manipulated in new ways, which other artists adapted to other media.
     Photography’s improving technology eventually reduced the skilled craft component of image making, and so shifted attention to the content and composition of the images. We now expect all art to be first and foremost an image, and only secondarily an example of craft skill. Or rather, we now expect the image maker’s skill to show in the composition and content of the image, not in the manipulation of the materials that go into its making. We also expect the image to somehow express its maker’s personal point of view, which may even be more significant than any depicted content. Or perhaps better, which may give significance to content that would otherwise be ignored, overlooked, or misunderstood.
     All this and more will I think occur to anyone who looks at the pictures in this book. ***

The Martians are Coming, the Martians are Coming!

Frederik Pohl. The Day the Martians Came (1988) So the first fully staffed expedition to Mars accidentally discovers Martians, who live underground in tunnels that their ancestors must have built. That’s the first chapter in a series of tales that show how humans, well, Americans mostly, react to the news. Everyone is out for a buck or some other advantage. The Martians look somewhat like seals with more leg-like flippers. They like to huddle together and enjoy each other’s company. Apart from eating, that's all they do, really.
     Excerpts from magazines, scientific papers, Congressional records, media interviews, etc punctuate the narrative and display the official reactions. All the narrative threads come together in the final chapter, in which Pohl dispenses some poetic justice, just so’s we won’t totally depressed by his satiric insights into our weaknesses and vices.
     A nicely done satire. Pohl has a good eye and ear for the self-delusions that underpin most of the damage we inflict on ourselves and each other. ***

Holmes in London (photo album)

    Regent Street

Charles Viney. Sherlock Holmes in London (1989/1995) Viney links Holmesian locations to photos of late 19th and early 20th century London. A feast both for the nostalgia buff, and for Holmes fans. The photos are generally good, and all are as well reproduced as half-tone letterpress permits.
     Besides the excerpts from the stories with at least  one photo for each, what attracted me was the record of a London long since gone. And yet it lives on. Many of the elegant new buildings still stand. The great hotels were established then, and many still exist (some have been rebuilt). Advertisements fastened or painted on walls and windows and busses fascinate. The habit of “stocktaking”sales was already well-established. London was a commercial city, rapidly expanding and creating what we now often deplore as car-focussed suburbs, but their wide streets were built to attract people who could afford to own or hire carriages.
     An enjoyable book, well worth the $2 I paid for it at the local food-bank yard sale. ***

Memory: Lapham's Quarterly XIII-1

 Lapham’s Quarterly XIII-1: Memory (2020) Another wonderfully wide-ranging collection of snippets, pictures, and essays. Most of it is memoir and reminiscence, usually accompanied by musings on the nature and power of memory. The common-sense but mistaken concept of memory as some kind of record that can be played back dominates these musings. We now know that remembering reconstructs the memory, often so vividly that only careful recording of different instances of the same memory will convince one that they were mistaken.
     A secondary thread is strung on the assumption that a good memory betokens intelligence and wisdom. That makes about as much sense as assuming that good spelling betokens writing talent.
     So what charmed me most were the memoirs, and the attempts by the writers to make sense of their lives by telling their stories. ****

Michel Lambeth, Canadian Photographer

Maia-Mari Sutnik. Michel Lambeth Photographer (1999) Lambeth (1923-1977) was a Canadian photographer with strong socio-political convictions, which at times interfered with his willingness to take on bread-and-butter assignments. His work as sampled here shows not only technical skill and a sensitivity to the human narratives surrounding his pictures, but also an aesthetic based on understanding the possibilities of black-and-white photography. He did work in colour too, mostly on assignment for Star Weekly, a newsprint magazine distributed with the Toronto Star and available separately as well.
     Sutnik clearly believes that Lambeth is a neglected figure in the history of Canadian photography. I think she’s right. He was one of many 1960s Canadian artists who objected to colonial reverence for British (and European) art, and neo-colonial diffidence vis-a-vis American art. Was he a great photographer? No, but he was a pretty good one, as the cover photo shows. He understood the power of black and white, and preferred prints with a short mid-range. He also had the gift of attracting his subjects’ trust, so that they did not feel the need to mask themselves in conventional poses.
     A worthwhile monograph. Sutnik wrote it accompany an exhibition of Lambeth’s work at the AGO. She asked some of his friends to write reminiscences. An online search will yield many images of his photos. **½

Ivan Eyre, not your Group of Seven acolyte

Don Bain. Ivan Eyre Pavilion Gallery. (1999) Eyre was Born in Saskatchewan in 1935, but spent most of his life in Winnipeg, where he taught art at the University of Manitoba from 1959 to 1992. He’s best known for his landscapes, and his blending of surrealism and abstraction in his figurative paintings. I find his work very interesting, but oddly unmoving. Perhaps there’s something in them that’s alien to me, and which I therefore cannot see. That would be Eyre’s take on my response, since he claims that we see only something of ourselves in any painting, and can’t see whatever else is in it. His figurative paintings (whose figures are often himself and his family members) seem to me to be coded expressions of his hidden self. That’s what makes their content interesting. I kept thinking “Freud”, which isn’t a compliment.
     The pictures are often striking in their collage-like layering of imagery and deliberately off-kilter composition. Their enigmatic signs and symbols make them suitable for the kind of public art that proclaims corporate support for culture. They don’t threaten easy social or political readings.
     His landscapes are, he claims, wholly imaginary; at any rate, he doesn’t paint from photos or plein air sketches. Several times on his travels he has discovered a landscape that looks like one of his paintings. He attaches a mystical significance to these coincidences. He’s also made a number of sculptures, which like his figurative paintings combine surrealism and abstraction.

     He’s definitely not a Group-of-Sevenish artist.
     We bought this book on a trip West, when we spent a day at Assiniboine Park and the Pavilion Gallery. Look up Eyre online, the available images cover a much wider range than in this book. It’s a well done summary of his life and work. **½