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May 20, 2005

Chugging and puffing in the backyard

In my latest "backyard epic," I tell the story of a Laurel Oak Ranch couple who loves trains. No, I mean these folks REALLY LOVE trains. They've built a large model track that takes up most of their backyard.

I get the most joy, personally, out of telling stories about real people doing unusual/extraordinary things. I hope you enjoy these tales as well.

And once again...if you know of someone in the Jamestown/north High Point/northeast Davidson County area who ought to be the subject of a backyard epic, please let me know. Just send me an e-mail or give me a call at 883-4422, Ext. 238.

Their way's the railway

5-20-05

By Justin Cord Hayes Staff Writer
News & Record

HIGH POINT

Christian Skidmore's arms are being nibbled by goldfish as he towers, Godzilla-like, over the railroad bridge in his back yard.

The pump in the pond underneath the bridge isn't working. "It's hard to do this when they're nibbling on you," Skidmore says, though he does get the pump working.

Did Casey Jones have to put up with this? Probably not.

But then history books don't indicate Jones had a G-scale model train with 400 feet of track in his back yard, like Skidmore and his wife, Rivka, do.

Their home in northeast Davidson County's Laurel Oak Ranch is a monument to trains. Their living room is painted green and yellow, the color scheme for Southern Railway.

"We're train geeks. It's a healthy little obsession," says Christian Skidmore, who estimates the "little obsession" has cost about $10,000.

As children, Christian and Rivka found the size and power of locomotives thrilling. Their parents took them to train yards and introduced them to "railfanning."

If you've ever driven past railroad tracks--especially in picturesque areas--and seen folks standing nearby, armed with video and still cameras, being blown like daisies by the stiff breezes of passing locomotives, you've seen railfans.

When the two "train geeks" met at High Point University, they had no idea they'd grown up with the same love of steam engines. Their mutual obsession has blossomed since their marriage in 1996. They volunteer together twice a month at Spencer's railroad-rich N.C. Transportation Museum. Rivka Skidmore's most recent Mother's Day gift was a six-compact disc set of locomotives doing their thing. The two are planning a cross-country train trip next year.

The hobby brings the couple together, but they joke that it also splits them from time to time.

"We never fight about anything," Christian Skidmore says.

"But we'll argue heatedly over every part of this track," Rivka Skidmore says.

Christian Skidmore switches on a five-car passenger train decorated to resemble the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad -- familiar to Monopoly players as the B & O. Rivka Skidmore grew up near Baltimore.

The passenger train's companions, two engines bearing coal cars, boxcars and a caboose, contain mostly Southern Railway models because Skidmore's Southern roots make him a Southern Railway fan.

The backyard layout contains 11 tons of pebbles -- for the railroad bed -- hauled up to the train site wheelbarrow by wheelbarrow; at least 300 clamps with eye-straining screws to hold the tracks together; and of course, that goldfish pond, dug out of rocky ground and filled with multiplying fish.

The Skidmores get ready to plant shrubs and flowers among the tracks, as their 6-year-old daughter, Stephanie, walks up.

"What's the first rule of trains?" Rivka Skidmore asks her daughter.

"Don't stick any part of your body outside of the train," Stephanie says.

She thinks her parents' train set is "neat" and likes it because "real trains are too loud."

Then, Stephanie begins to pester her mom for a piggy-back ride.

No, Rivka Skidmore says.

Please?

No.

Aw, come on.

"How about a trainback ride?," Stephanie asks.

That does the trick. The daughter gets on her mother's back, and the two walk in circles, Stephanie imitating the chugging of a locomotive.

Contact Justin Cord Hayes at 883-4422, Ext. 238, or jhayes@news-record.com

Posted by at May 20, 2005 9:12 AM