I’m inside Rick Bell's house in Harborcreek. I cannot believe what I’m seeing. It’s a very impressive model train display. It’s like a museum about Northwestern Pennsylvania history.

Model railroad track and model railroad trains are everywhere you look in Rick’s basement. The display covers three rooms of the basement. The track runs through walls. It runs through tunnels.  It expands over the washer and the dryer. The display is the result of forty years of devotion to his beloved hobby.

"I've never counted locomotives and cars,” says Rick. “I don't know what the investment is. I don't want to know what the investment is.

One of the most frequent questions people ask Rick is “How many feet of track?”

"I can't tell you," he always replies.

Rick constructed all the buildings and scenery for his display. The thing that makes Rick's model railroad display so impressive is that he dedicates the display to the history of Northwestern Pennsylvania and its ties to the railroads. There is a tribute to Corry with a replica of the Corry-Jamestown Office Furniture factory. There is a replica of the old Erie Coke plant at the foot of East Avenue in the city. I am admiring a replica of the passenger platforms during the busy days of Union Station. Rick built a replica of the former Pennzoil refinery in Rouseville in Venango County. He built a miniature Sharon Steel plant in Mercer County. How about the Straub Brewery in Saint Marys? It's all here in this basement.

"This is my full-time job man. Model railroading. I love it,” says Rick.

Rick is recently retired from Emergycare where he served as a paramedic and a dispatcher. He is a longtime member of the Fairfield Volunteer Fire Department. He's responded to a lot of pain and suffering. Rick lost his son in Afghanistan. He's undergone heart bypass surgery. His model railroad has always been the place to go to relax and put his mind at rest.

"It's something where you can retreat to from the stresses of everyday life in our modern society,” he says.

Rick displays black and white photographs that hang above the very same scenes he built for his railroad. He adds tiny antennas onto his locomotives to make them look more authentic. He spent 50 hours building one miniature tower. Impressive.

"I'm determined to enjoy every second of my life until my dying breath," declares Rick.  "And this is going to be a big part of it."

 Some days, Rick has as many as 14 other model railroad enthusiasts visiting his basement. They have food and drink and spend a few hours with the trains.