All-Star Electric Trains ships to the printer!

This year's Classic Toy Trains Special Interest Publication, All-Star Electric Trains, celebrates 30 years of Classic Toy Trains finest photo, layups, and more great tales of Lionel and American Flyer history.

This year’s annual special interest publication from Classic Toy Trains is on the way to the printer! All-Star Electric Trains salutes 30 years of toy train history with Classic Toy Trains magazine.

Shown here are some photos I took at the SIP’s “pin up” several weeks ago. A pin up is where the Art Department meets with the editorial staff and shows them the provisional story layouts. These are literally pinned up on a wall.

 The stories are posted in the order they would be placed in the magazine.

 Usually there are minor tweaks to the layout – headline or subhead font colors, image sizes and placement, track plan questions, and all the other graphic issue that might arise.

The staff also examines the placement of the stories to try and balance out the content.

In this case a few things were re-arranged in the order, and a few held out to allow more space for other stories.

In the end, the purpose is to present you, our readers, with the most graphically appealing hobby experience possible. 

The first half of All-Star is pinned up on the left side of the pinup room.

The other half is on the right side of the room. Let the battle begin.

Roger Carp is the proud papa of All-Star and the magician who brings it all together.

From left to right as seen from my phone, are Mike Soliday, Kalmbach's Art and production Manager; Rene Schewitzer, Editorial Assistant (and Garden Railways magazine's Production Editor), Steve George, Kalmbach's Vice President of Content; Carl Swanson, Editor of Classic Toy Trains; Lisa Schroder, Art Director of All-Star Electric Trains, and on the right, the ever loving Roger Carp – King of Postwar Train History.

Roger and Lisa ponder 'pull quotes' in a story layout.

Roger checks out Kent Johnson's track plan while chugging his Starbucks!

Notations are made on the wall copies to confirm the group's changes.

Roger comments on the rarity of the postwar prototype in the opening spread of a major feature.

Roger checks the balance of Lionel, American Flyer, Marx, and other features in the table of contents flow.