Tuesday, November 27, 2012

Sketching Sunday at the RR Station

I was delighted to find "my" railway station had only been moved, not torn down.  It's restored as a museum, near the National Frontier Trails Museum in Independence now!

This is what it looked like when I was a kid...a bit over a half block from my house...

The station agent lived next door to me...he taught me Morse Code when I was just a kid.  This is his desk in the station...

Yep, we ALL had phones like this once upon a time...

And since it's a museum now, it was all decorated for Christmas...the baggage cart you can see in the old photo was all tarted up with greenery and big red bows and looked kind of ridiculous...I left it and the wreaths out of my sketch.  Not how it was when I was a kid...

And for a complete change of pace, we ran by Costco and I sketched in the parking lot with my vintage Sheaffer calligraphy pen.  That was fun, too...

10 comments:

  1. Beautiful sketches Kate. Really like the train station and the Morse code key. I've been a ham radio operator for 30 plus years and used a key like that when I started out. Glad your station is still there.

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  2. Thanks, Dave...lots of memories, eh? And I was delighted to learn it was, too! Don Gore told me, at one of our sketchcrawls, so of course I had to go find it in its new home.

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  3. What a wonderful experience Kate. I also love train stations so I really enjoyed seeing yours.

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  4. What a grand building! Your drawing (without the wreaths) gives it a sterling preciousness and dignity. The vignette of the key is choice. We live within hearing distance of some pretty active RR tracks (a freight line hauling coal and corn). I love hearing the trains. How loud it sounds tells us which direction the wind is blowing. I suspect that's the soundtrack from your youth, too.

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  5. Thanks so much, all! It is a wonderful old building, I just couldn't stop grinning the whole time I was sketching it. And Marcia, YES...and happily, part of my experience here, too. We hear trains several times a day, but sadly we lost our beautiful old depot years ago. I sketched and painted it many times.

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  6. Wonderful work! I am especially drawn to the Costco parking lot sketch... it amazes me how a sketch done sitting in a car can hold so much depth and meaning. But I suppose that's the mark of a quality artist :) I also love the station... a town near where I live has those old clocks, too, and I would have loved to see that incorporated into the drawing. Maybe I will go sketch one myself! Your work inspires me, thank you for always sharing it with the world. :)

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  7. An old friend rediscovered . . . Fabulous!

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  8. I'm glad you didn't have to say goodbye to that stately old building. Memories of crank phone and Morse Code? That's special. Is Morse Code still in your skill set ._.. - - - ._..? (I had to look that up, it's not my skill set). Your post ties the memories and old and new all together well. A shared moment.

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  9. Inspiring work (and nicely documented work, too).
    Keep up the good work :)

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