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LAKE HIGHLANDS J A N U A R Y 2 0 2 6 I A D V O C AT E M A G . C O M

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ja n 2 6 contents

LAKE HIGHLANDS ADVOCATE VOL.32 NO.1

PROFILE 8 Unlocking Doors DINING 10 Back Country BBQ FEATURES 6 25 moments in 2025 14 Toby the Dog 18 Ticket to 1954 22 Healing with Horses

Toby has been a fixture of the St. John’s Episcopal campus for just over a year. Read more on page 14. Photography by Lauren Allen.

November MLS home sale statistics*, plus annual totals

REAL ESTATE REPORT

D I ST R I B U T I O N / A D V E RT I S I N G 2 1 4 . 5 6 0 . 4 2 1 2

a r e a h o m e va l u e s

SUB SOLD AREA NOV. ‘24 1 3 2 5 3 6 4 19 5 3 6 5 7 5 8 0 9 8 10 6 11 2 12 1 13 6 14 4 15 5 TOTAL 78 AVG -

SOLD NOV. ‘25 4 1 2 5 6 0 2 0 4 4 3 1 4 0 7 43 -

Avg Days on Market YTD 50 53 46 85 55 27 40 38 55 59 30 39 47 26 37 687 46

Avg. Sales Price YTD ‘25 $511,422 $391,435 $410,835 $287,893 $473,521 $774,121 $819,839 $854,338 $694,497 $351,948 $899,100 $751,269 $833,463 $818,629 $699,096 $9,571,406 $638,094

Avg. Sales Price YTD ‘24 $518,878 $420,188 $382,977 $268,893 $524,363 $728,506 $733,911 $667,537 $671,786 $397,720 $1,070,582 $932,933 $741,312 $852,979 $731,973 $9,644,538 $642,969

President/Editor-in-Chief: Jehadu Abshiro jabshiro@advocatemag.com Chief Operating Officer: Alessandra Quintero 786.838.5891 / aquintero@advocatemag.com Digital Marketing & Analytics: Autumn Grisby agrisby@advocatemag.com Founder: Rick Wamre 214.560.4212 / rwamre@advocatemag.com ADVERTISING CONSULTANTS Frank McClendon 214.560.4215 / fmcclendon@advocatemag.com Catherine Pate 214.560.4201 / cpate@advocatemag.com Brandon Rodriguez 972-754-3942 / brodriguez@advocatemag.com Kennedy Cox 214-796-8626 / kcox@advocatemag.com John Lynch jlynch@advocatemag.com Classified Manager: Prio Berger

Sponsored by:

25 MOMENTS IN 2025

Compiled by AUSTIN WOOD TRE JOHNSON DRAFTED 6TH OVERALL. After a record-breaking freshman season at Texas, Tre Johnson is drafted by the Washington Wizards with the No. 6 overall pick in the NBA draft, making Johnson the highest draft pick to ever have played for Lake Highlands.

SKILLMAN STREET ARCH BRIDGE OPENS. In September, Kathy Stewart and other local officials gather for a ribbon cutting ceremony for the Skillman Street Arch Bridge, a project that had spanned close to two decades from its inception.

BIRDCALL THROWS IN THE TOWEL. After years of anticipation, Lakeridge Village lists the space once planned for Colorado-based chicken concept Birdcall as available in February.

WHITE ROCK ELEMENTARY STUDENT GOES VIRAL. White Rock Elementary student Ava Meyers gains national attention after an impromptu visit to Duran Duran frontman Simon Le Bon’s home in London.

WATERS EDGE OPENS. Owners Kate and Chris Vahdani open Lake Highlands’ first commercial winery as part of a national franchise concept in May.

TRIPLE D HELLO VISITS DUMPLING. Guy Fieri visits the Walnut Hill location of Hello Dumpling in February and learns how to make braised beef soup noodles alongside owner June Chow.

DALLAS CHILDREN’S THEATER DIFFICULTIES. The Dallas Children’s Theater announces programming and staff reductions in June due to ongoing financial difficulties. In September, nonprofit veteran Michael Meadows named interim Executive Director.

BOB JOHNSTON DIES. After decades calling Wildcat football from the press box, Bob Johnston dies in November and is replaced by Chip Waggoner.

HILL COUNTRY FLOODING. In July, the Kerrville Daily Times and Dallas Observer break the news that a Lake Highlands Elementary student was among the Camp Mystic campers killed following catastrophic flooding in the Hill Country. Strouderosa travels to the area to support relief efforts.

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GROUND BREAKS ON BUSHMILLS ROAD. Crews break ground on nonprofit-organized Bushmills Road Park in October, signaling a major win for the Dallas Greening Initiative.

BACK COUNTRY BBQ CELEBRATES 50 YEARS IN BUSINESS. Scott Collard and Back Country BBQ staff celebrate 50 years in business off Greenville Avenue. The business first started off Ferndale Drive in 1975.

FOREST LANE SHOOTING. Two are injured in a November shooting in the parking lot of a Forest Lane Walmart. The shooter, identified by police as a 23-year-old man, dies at the scene from self-inflicted gunshot wounds.

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11 14 13

DECEMBER ABRAMS ROAD CRASH. A multi-car crash leaves two dead and a McLaren coupe totaled near Forest Meadow Middle School during school hours. Following community backlash, the City orders a traffic study that has yet to be released.

WALNE PARK RENAMED. Lake Highlands North Park officially renamed in September for the Walne Family, members of whom have represented Lake Highlands on Dallas City Council.

KATHY STEWART, TRUSTEES REELECTED. District 10 Council member Kathy Stewart is reelected to a second term alongside Lake Highlandsarea Richardson ISD Trustees Regina Harris and Rachel McGowan.

LAKE HIGHLANDS BASEBALL WINS PLAYOFF SERIES. Head Coach Andy Parker leads Lake Highlands baseball to its first playoff series win in over a decade against South Grand Prairie.

DAVE CULWELL OPENS BURGER SCHMURGER. Lake Highlands neighbor Dave Culwell opens his first brick-andmortar restaurant in April after years of operating as a pop-up.

NORTHLAKE ELEMENTARY PRINCIPAL RETIRES. After helping facilitate campus turnaround in the 2010s. Mary Kellagher retires as principal of Northlake Elementary in May.

19 ST VINCENT WINS YET ANOTHER GRAMMY. Lake Highlands-born musician St. Vincent, aka Annie Clark, wins three Grammy Awards for her studio album All Born Screaming.

20 CITY PAUSES ALLEY PICKUP TRANSITION. In response to considerable resident outcry, Dallas Sanitation Services delays a plan to transition customers receiving alley trash collection to curb service in October. An updated plan is expected to be presented to the City Council in early 2026.

22 BLADE ATTACK AND GUN FOUND AT LHHS. Lake Highlands High School parents raise safety concerns in October after one student is injured during a school bus paring blade attack and a gun is found on campus in the same day.

BOND 2025 PASSES. In May, Richardson ISD voters approve a $1.4 billion bond package that will pay for middle school transitions in Richardson, stadium upgrades, technology purchases and facilities maintenance.

WHITE ROCK COFFEE TURNS 20. Nancy and Robert Baker’s neighborhood-born business celebrates two decades in business in May. Since opening in Lake Highlands, White Rock Coffee has expanded to six more locations across Dallas.

D i s co v e r t h e M a g i c ! Infants to Kindergarten | Applications open January 15 TEDALLAS.ORG/ECEC 8 5 0 0 H I L LC R E ST R OA D | 2 1 4 . 7 0 6 . 0 0 2 0

TOWER ARTS PRESENTS

STEEP CANYON RANGERS

NICK AND NORA HAVE A SECOND PAIR OF EAGLET. Local celebrity bald eagle couple successfully hatch and fledge two eaglets for the first time. The pair had lost one of two eaglets in a storm the previous spring.

BOUTIQUE COUNTRY CLUB DEBUTS NEW NAME IN SEPTEMBER. After tentatively going by “Boutique Country Club”. Nick Clark and Dawson Williams’ family-oriented members club finally gets an official name: Stronethrow.

SUNDAY, UNDAY, JANUARY 25 | 5:30 PM HPUMC WESLEY HALL THE EVENT IS FREE TO THE PUBLIC. For more information, visit hpumc.org/towerarts

january 2026 lakehighlands.advocatemag.com 7

p ro f i l e

REHABILITATION REIMAGINED Christina Melton Crain helps formerly incarcerated individuals start life after prison on the right foot Story by AUSTIN WOOD | Photography by KATHY TRAN

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hristina Melton Crain wants felons on the street. And no, the former Gov. Rick Perry-appointed chair of the Texas State Board of Corrections isn’t advocating for a Gotham-style takeover of society by experienced criminals. Instead, Crain is trying to keep justice-affected individuals, as she calls them, from making the same mistakes that landed them inside in the first place. A Kimball High School graduate, Crain finished a master’s degree at the University of Texas at Austin before being awarded her juris doctorate from Oklahoma City University in 1991. In her over 40 years practicing law, she’s mainly specialized in juvenile cases and representation. But, up until 2001, her experience with criminal justice and the corrections system had been limited. That year, Gov. Perry appointed her to the Texas Board of Criminal Justice, an experience which she describes as eye-opening. Crain went on to serve as the first and only chairwoman of the board and is credited with significant reforms during her tenure, including the introduction of a program intended to soften procedural barriers during family visits. As her term ended in 2008, Crain knew her work in the field wasn’t finished. In 2010, Crain founded Unlocking Doors, a nonprofit organization created to smoothen individuals’ transition into society and prevent recidivism — the economic impact of which its CEO and president stresses when emphasizing the organization’s importance. Operating out of a north Greenville Avenue office tower, Unlocking Doors serves close to 1,000 clients a year, most of whom are referred to the nonprofit while still incarcerated. Crain’s team finds employment, housing, healthcare and other services for clients with one of the organization’s 300 plus partner organizations. The organization’s model has a 92% success rate, Crain says. To learn more about how Unlocking Doors achieves that success rate, we sat down with the former President of the Dallas Bar Association and current University of Texas System regent for an interview. Here’s what Crain had to say. H OW ’ D YOU G E T I N TO C R I M I N A L J UST I C E ? No one in my family went to prison. I didn’t do criminal law. And then all of a sudden, one day, I get a call from Gov. Perry, and he says, “I want to put you on this Texas Board of Criminal Justice.” I’m like, “What the heck is this?” A couple months into it, I was pretty much wowed by the whole thing. It’s not like a lot of boards and commissions where you just get together to rubber stamp. It is about lives, and it just resonated with me. Plus, in my law practice, I represent children who are abused, neglected and injured, and a lot of their parents have been involved in the criminal justice system. WHAT ARE SOME MISCONCEPTIONS YOU THINK P EO P L E H AV E A BOU T R ESTO RAT I V E J UST I C E ? A lot of times when people hear rehabilitation or restorative justice, they’re thinking that we’re just letting the person off. It’s “nobody can be rehabilitated,” and that can’t be further from the truth. Now, are there a lot of people that we will never help? Absolutely, because there are a lot of people that just don’t want to be helped, but it starts with the person. That’s our model here, you can opt

into our program. It’s not mandatory. We talked about making it mandatory at one point, going to the state asking public officials to say, “If you’re coming back to Dallas, this ought to be a mandatory program.” We decided long ago that it was never going to work, that it was best to make it an optional program, because then when the person walks through the door, we know at least they are saying up front to us, “I want a fresh start.” W H AT W E R E T H E E A R LY DAYS L I K E ? Shoestring budget, basically taking a very small concept and forming a board. They were friends. They were people involved in the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, some judges, etc. You would go to every meeting that became available just to get the word out that we are here. And by the way, we’re here to work with everybody. So it was making sure people understood why we were different and why we were relevant in the space. I think that was super important to understand that we’re just not another reentry organization. It took five, six years to kind of really start resonating with everybody, and then we moved to this space and built this out, and all of a sudden we started getting noticed. W H AT D O ES T H E P RO C ESS LO O K L I K E ? You fill out several assessments on your own. We have a career key that you fill out. We have a benefits calculator you fill out. And then there’s what’s called BEI, it’s a behaviors and experiences inventory that you fill out. And then we have a psych form that you fill out, that we just added this year, and then you get placed with a broker. Our reentry brokers are our case managers, because they’re really brokering the relationships. We don’t provide the service, that’s how we’re unique. Tier one brokers are going to take you and they’re going to do the full-on evidence based assessment. It’s the one that TDCJ uses. So our folks have to be trained in it. It’s going to tell us everything, from number of incarcerations, education history, children, health care. Everything. So that broker is going to take all these assessments and is going to work up a plan for you. The tier two broker is going to take that plan and is going to start making referrals for you, based on the needs that are in that plan, to one of our 300 partner organizations. Then we can add that person in or that group in as a partner, but once all those referrals are made, we’re going to keep track of you as you’re working that plan. W H Y I S T H I S SO I M P O RTA N T TO T H E G E N E RA L PU B L I C ? I’ve got to look at the return on interest is, and I’m in the people business, but yet, how does this fiscally affect the community? And so I think, roughly, it’s about $80 a day for the general population offender at TDCJ. So if you take that and you amortize that over somebody being incarcerated, let’s say they get out and then they come back, and then they get out and they come back. Think about that. I mean, it’s crazy, whereas, on average, for the general guy that walks through our doors, it costs me maybe a buck a day.

This interview has been edited for clarity and brevity. january 2026 lakehighlands.advocatemag.com 9

fo o d

SMOK FO FIF YEA

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KING OR FTY ARS

Back Country BBQ owner Scott Collard has introduced new flavors to get the business to 100 years Story by AUSTIN WOOD

Photography by JUSTIN SCHWARTZ

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Back Country has kept its cafeteria-style food line in place since first opening in 1988.

ike any industry, there’s always going to be change in the barbecue business. Innovative smoking techniques, never-before-blended rubs and novelty proteins pop out of the woodwork almost every time Texas Monthly prints an issue. Longtime staples close and are replaced by newer, decidedly-Instagram forward concepts serving platters built for influencers’ cameras. And as any pitmaster will tell you, meat prices are anything but fixed. But, sometimes, change comes in the form of new blood working the pit. Scott Collard bought Back Country BBQ in 2016 after spending 40 years working his way first from the dish pit to the register, then from the smoker to the manager’s office at Big Al’s Smokehouse. Over the last decade, he’s introduced new menu items and tampered recipes — a delicate dance at a business that first opened near Ferndale Road and Northwest Highway in 1975 before moving to Vickery Meadow in 1988. “At first, we didn’t change a whole lot,” Collard says. “But I slowly changed things over the years. Some of my recipes, I think they’re better.” Still ketchup-based like its predecessor, Collard’s barbecue sauce recipe utilizes juice from caramelized onions and lemons to create a sauce he says is “sweeter and tangier.” Regulars, apparently, haven’t had too much of a problem with the alteration. “Nobody knows that I’ve changed the sauce,” he says. “Nobody has noticed it, but I’m getting compliments on it. They know something’s different.” Recently, he and his team added jumbo bacon-wrapped jalapeño popper “bullets” smothered in the mixture to the menu. Aside from slight alterations to a few other recipes and incorporating chicken wings on select days each week, Collard is also throwing a higher quality of protein in the smoker these days with a menu advertising angus beef briskets and duroc pork shoulders. “(The key is) good employees, good barbecue and happy customers,” he says. “And it’s gonna be the quality. You’ve got to have quality food. You can’t just go down and buy something. The lowest bidder doesn’t get meat around here.” But not all changes have been welcomed by longtime customers.

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“The potato salad, I left alone. I tried to change it, but I got some real big kickback on that,” Collard laughs. “They said, ‘Don’t change that potato salad.’ And here’s the funny thing, french fries, I tried to change french fries. They don’t sell. You just don’t realize how much you sell until you do something different.” What is selling well is brisket, sausage and pork and beef ribs, a speciality for Back Country. Collard uses choice two-thirds brisket as he believes USDA Prime-grade beef to be too fatty to smoke, while hot links and jalapeño sausage are made in-house. Another longtime staple that hasn’ t gone anywhere is the homemade chili con carne, served without beans (Frito’s optional) in true Texas style. The stew is made with house-ground brisket and typically simmers for a few hours. While many recipes call for flour for structure, Collard says he’s been able to forego it since switching to brisket. “I don’t know. I’ve yet to figure that out. Something just thickens. Maybe it’s the brisket, because I’ve always made it with hamburger meat.” Back Country BBQ marked 50 years of business with a special anniversary celebration this August. At the celebration, Earnest Griffith Jr., who loaded hickory into the Back Country pit for over 45 years following its opening, met with old customers and shook hands. The restaurant looks largely the same as it did when Griffith would have first walked through the doors in 1988. And it’s still serving the same homemade peach cobbler and banana pudding. And cole slaw. And beans. And, albeit with a few small tweaks, brisket. But the biggest constant for Collard? The most important part of his business still walks through the front doors. “It’s all about the customer and it’s all about the way the meats are prepared. When you’re serving that excellent brisket to that customer, and they’re happy, that’s all it is.” Back Country BBQ, 6940 Greenville Ave., 214.696.6940, backcountrybbq. com

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While Toby spends most work days on campus, he lives with Newsome and her husband after hours.

THE FURRY CHAPLAIN Toby the goldendoodle has become a St. John’s celebrity Story by AUSTIN WOOD Photography by LAUREN ALLEN

“ I F YO U S E E T H I S GU Y, H E L O O K S A LITTLE BIT LIKE FOZZIE BEAR,” St. John’s Episcopal School Chaplain Shannon Newsome says of her assistant chaplain with a laugh. As teasing as it may sound, she’s not wrong. Sitting at about 2 feet tall and weighing 26 pounds, the 2-year-old goldendoodle’s curly auburn coat looks as though all it’s missing is a pink polka dot scarf and pork pie hat. But then again, he’s already got an armoire full of costumes for chapel and a staff badge for official duties. Toby — short for Tobias, or “God is Good” in Hebrew — first arrived on the Old Lake Highlands Campus as a 10-month-old pup a few days before Halloween 2024. Newsome’s children had attended a school with a resident canine previously, something she says impressed her deeply. “I had actually seen a situation and so it was always inspiring to me,” Newsome says. “It was powerful for my kids growing up. And so it was kind of a dream, I had to bring a dog into our school.” In what she estimates to have been a year-long process, Newsome consulted with large ISDs and smaller schools with dogs of their own to explore the feasibility and safety of having one at St. John’s. In her research, and despite being admittedly “gunshy” of medium or large dogs, she learned that small dogs are less likely to handle large, overstimulating group environments as well as other breeds, which led to Toby being adopted from California after a year of training. After therapy dogs were brought in for finals as a test run, school leadership got on board and “hired” Toby as the school’s emotional support dog. “We went to every single primary and Lower School class with him, and talked about his health and safety and how for the kids to interact with him, and gave real specific instructions, and then kind of

reinforced that coming into this school year,” Newsome, who children also refer to as “Chappy,” says. He’s since become a campus celebrity, with two different colors of T-shirts sporting his likeness and even goldendoodle stuffed animals lining the walls of the campus store. Newsome says he especially enjoys chase, yak cheese sticks and ear rubs. A typical day begins as Toby arrives on campus each morning, when he and his direct report visit each primary and lower school classroom. After that, he heads to the church to prepare for daily chapel, where he “blesses” with his tongue and stars in live action performances of Bible stories. In the past, he’s been costumed as a bishop, lion, donkey and fisherman complete with a bucket hat. “Toby always has a role, but somehow everybody seems to always remember what Toby is doing, and that’s how they remember the story,” she says. “So, you know, in Jonah and the Whale, Toby is the whale, or the big fish. He’s got a big ol’ fish head on, shows up and gets on top of the student playing Jonah.” St. John’s uses the stories to teach students lessons on values like care, responsibility and respect. Along with courage, gratitude, joy, honesty, curiosity and service, they make up the school’s guiding Lion Values. Jake Minton, the school’s dean for Primary and Lower School, says Toby has helped to reinforce the values, e ven when he’s not dressed as the school’s mascot. “Toby’s here to care for us. We’re also here to care for him,” Minton says. “And practicing our care with an animal, helps us get better at it with other humans and with ourselves and so really leaning into that a lot in the primary years.“ After chapel, Toby typically enjoys some vitamin D and exercise while chasing squirrels in the school’s green space, with a nap to follow. Newsome doesn’t

january 2026 lakehighlands.advocatemag.com 15

We worked with Bart during one of the hottest housing markets in recent history. Bart stuck with us through several offer cycles, and each new house he found was better than the last. His background in architecture and construction is a huge plus. He always has a flashlight in the car and is ready to crawl down below a house. You won’t be disappointed with his skills and work ethic. Thanks Bart for everything! -Maggie M.

Toby often wears costumes themed after the stories the children are learning, like this fish costume for Jonah and the Big Fish.

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16 lakehighlands.advocatemag.com JANUARY 2026

want to overwhelm him with both chapel and the carpool line, so his afternoons are typically open. His owner’s office door even has a flippable sign to indicate whether or not Toby is open for visitors. Other times, however, he has more serious business to take care of. “Some days, depending on what’s going on with with with kids in the school, Nancy or I or somebody on the student formation team may text or walkie Chappy and say, ‘Hey, we could use a Toby visit over here. We have a friend who would really appreciate seeing Toby right now.’” Minton says. Nancy Avery, the school’s director of mental health and wellness, recalls one instance where the goldendoodle played a particularly important role. “We had a younger friend who was struggling a little bit with behavior, and I thought Toby has just been such a great asset for primary and Lower School,” Avery says. “So I reached out to Shannon and just asked if Toby could just join us for a quick session. And she did, and Toby came right in, and the student was so receptive to the lesson.” “He kind of gets very excited when he comes in my office, because he has a basket of goodies, and so Toby was kind of displaying some excitement about those, and then he calmed down. And so we were able to just correlate that lesson of behavior that Toby was displaying with the behaviors that the student was displaying.” Now, after turning two in December, he’s a fully registered service dog who can fly on planes, been awarded a Good Canine Citizen certificate and recently earned his American Alliance of Service Dogs Certification. Newsome hopes to eventually get him out to the carpool line, but in the meantime, he’ ll continue to focus on honing his thespian capabilities. Avery says that while he’s had a big paw in lifting students’ moods, his reach goes even further than that. “So for me and my own mental health, he has been such a comfort to just know that that’s there, and I think that that’s that that’s for everybody, not just our students but our employees as well.”

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january 2026 lakehighlands.advocatemag.com 17

CHUGGIN’ BACK TO 1954 LLOYD KEYSER HAS A SERIOUS TRAIN COLLECTION Story by CAROL TOLER

THE FIRST FLOOR OF LLOYD KEYSER’S Lake Highlands home is like most others in the neighborhood, with a dining room, kitchen and study. Climb the stairs to the second floor, though, and you’ll be stepping into another world. The retired mechanical engineer from Cedar Rapids, Iowa, has recreated locations — including his hometown — from his childhood. He’s installed a specialized framework to put HO gauge trains and their tracks at eye level, and he’s set up dedicated lighting to monitor tiny details. An enhanced air conditioning system keeps the temperature perfect year ‘round for people and trains alike. “I’ve been interested in trains since I could say ‘choo-choo,’” Keyser says. “All through elementary school, high school and college, I was into it deep.” Keyser is dedicated to realism and accuracy, and he’s focused on prototype models from one specific year — 1954. American trains that year were in the process of transitioning from steam to diesel, and each model he runs was operating in Belle Plaine, Iowa, where he often visited extended family. “I joined the National Model Rail-

road Association back in 1954, and I’ve gone to hundreds of national and local conventions since then,” he says. “I’ve given over a hundred modeling clinics, written 42 magazine articles and had four books published on the Chicago Northwestern Railroad.” To build the extensive setup in his home, Keyser removed a large section off his roof. At the time, he reassured his dear, now-departed wife Mary that the move would only be temporary. “I got a 40-foot pool cover to put over the roof while we were working, and when I came home from work, I would roll back and remove the existing roof. I designed a truss from wall-to-wall, 14 inches deep. I put in 27 of those and decked it, and I got a contractor to help me build the walls, creating a 16-by-36-foot open room.” Mary, he claims, was encouraging throughout. “She was a big supporter,” says the 94-year-old. “This is a fantastic hobby. It keeps me alive. It keeps me thinking. It keeps me going. She always knew where she could find me if I was missing.” Keyser was like many American children of that era — at the age of 3, he started with a windup train, and at 4, he found a Lionel set under his

18 lakehighlands.advocatemag.com JANUARY 2026

Lloyd Keyser’s love of trains began when he received a windup set at age three. He’s hoping more young people will take up the hobby.

Christmas tree. That gift from his father sparked something inside him which has lasted 90 years, and he keeps that first train on a shelf over the antique desk in his workroom. “I was ecstatic to get it,” he recalls. “My grandfather and dad built a train table in the basement 4-by-8-foot, I think it was. They had tracks and switches and so forth, and I played with that all the way into high school.” As a young boy, he recalls borrowing his cousin’s bicycle, riding to downtown Belle Plaine, sitting on the foundation of the signal bridge on Seventh Avenue and watching the trains. He admired a few relatives who worked on various aspects of the railroad system during World War II — from

Photo courtesy of Dallas Area Train Show/ North Texas Council of Railroad Clubs.

conductors to brakemen to roundhouse pipefitters. When he got to high school, he admits to bumming rides on the Illinois Central caboose from Cedar Rapids to Manchester. “You’ve got to talk your way into that,” he laughs. “I left my bicycle over in the weeds, and sometimes I’d ride a freight train from Cedar Rapids down to Silvis, Illinois, and back.” Keyser has meticulously researched the schedules for 1954 trains across the Midwest and recreated towns and structures from Belle Plaine, Iowa, to Plymouth, Wisconsin, to Wausau, Wisconsin. Each train car has a color-coded card, not unlike an old-fashioned library card used to check out books. The cards indicate whether the train car is a “set out” on a side track or a “pick up,” ready to be added to the train. “All of the cars you see here are ’54 or before,” he explains. “I’ve built a lot of them, but not all, and I’ve built the backgrounds, including buildings, silos, stations and trees. That bridge, for example, is on a highway in Missouri. I photographed, measured and drew and scratch built it.” It’s not enough, Keyser says, to just “put a bridge” on the track. He requires the period-appropriate scene from the burgh he is recreating. He visits the town and sizes it up, then heads straight to their library or preservation society. He looks for books with old photos which depict the downtown area from 1954. He wants to get it right.

“I drove into this town on one of my trips and thought, ‘Man, there are some super buildings here. I have a place for that town.’ So, I started taking photographs and doing building mockups.” Keyser’s idea of a perfect site is one with a condensed downtown or industrial district, with buildings clustered close together around the train depot. Of course, in 1954 small town America, trains were more pivotal to commerce than they are today. In some cases, he purchases train cars exactly as he wants them to look, and in some cases, he builds them from scratch. Often, it’s a mixture of the two. In a technique called “kit bashing,” he takes parts from different model kits and combines them to create exactly what he wants. “The black portion of this car is primed and ready for paint came from a car kit,” he says. “It’s very accurate — exactly what I needed. I just extended the sides, put a roof on it and detailed the ends. Everything you see that’s light in color I built from Styrene (a kind of plastic). It’s all scratch built.” Train enthusiasts generally fall into three camps — collectors, interested in finding mint condition train cars in their original boxes and displaying them, and freelance and prototype modelers, who select a specific era and railroad. Of the quarter million modelers in the United States, Keyser is part of the smaller subset called prototype modelers. He gets together with 10 fellow model railroaders to eat

breakfast every Friday, and the longtime buddies make plans for their next operating session. Once a month, they gather to run the trains. At age 94, Keyser is realistic about his future — and the future of the trains. When he’s gone, the new homeowner isn’t likely to want to keep the specialized setup, so he’s already making plans. The train set will be sold or given away, and the wires and switches will be salvaged. The benchwork will go straight into the trash. Keyser travels often to give clinics on modeling, but not as many young people are taking up the hobby these days. “There used to be people doing more of this,” he says of building cars and backgrounds from scratch. “Young people today like to take it out of the box, set it on the track and run it.” He does have advice for neighbors who’d like to spark an interest in their child or grandchild. “I suggest beginning with the Lionel set,” he says, pointing to the antique model on his wall. “You can always build on that with a little encouragement. And take them to the big train shows, like the ones held in Plano. Between Saturday and Sunday, close to 20,000 people walk through that show.” The Dallas Area Trail Show will be held Jan. 17-18, 2026, at the Plano Event Center, 2000 East Spring Creek Parkway. Admission is $11, and children under 13 are free. There will be two full days of clinics, plus tables, vendors.

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H O R S ES HEALING HUMANS Healing meets husbandry at White Rock Stables Story by AUSTIN WOOD Photography by LAUREN ALLEN

“WHAT DID YOU NOTICE ABOUT THAT EXERCISE? What did you notice about yourself ?” White Rock Stables instructor Julie Wilson asks 11-year-old Evie. The exercise in question takes place in a riding ring toward the back of the 14-acre property neighboring Flag Pole Hill Park. Standing a few feet away, Wilson watches on as Evie leads two-year-old Balou, an Irish sport horse standing nearly 16 hands (five feet) tall, across the sand. Following a few turns around the ring, she asks the student if she’s comfortable letting the horse off its lead for “liberty work.” While both student and horse eventually get on the same footing, at first, there’s some trepidation — it’s a 1,000-pound animal, after all. “Really a lot of it is directed towards having her look at herself, like when she said, ‘Well, I don’t think he’s going to follow

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“Realistically, my intent and purpose is, in addition to creating harmony with horses, is to carry on the legacy that Tex Sr. started here back after the Depression. His son was very good at that, too. Both Tex Sr. and Jr. were caretakers of man and animal kind. This was one of the first places I actually felt accepted in life.” Facchiano says she’s been looking to provide more opportunities for the community to engage with the stables for a while. She describes the sessions, as they’re offered now, as a trial run to see what neighbors would want in a structured program. The sessions are free of charge, with most of the interest coming so far from families with adolescent children. Sessions are typically kept in groups of three to keep both horse and student comfortable. Before anything else, Facchiano meets with the children and their families to assess energy levels and mood, both of

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New Year, New Glow which can have a big impact on the animal, she says. “If the kid is frightened, then we’re more apt to just take them around and show here’s the four amigos, here’s the three amigos, and let them pick up peacock feathers,” she says. “But if they’re a little bit older, and they’re willing to put their hands on the horse, then we would like to have them have that experience.” Children who pass the test can lead, walk alongside and pet the animals. In special cases, participants can even paint a horse’s coat, an experience that marries the freedom of vulnerability with artistic expression. That freedom, Facchiano says, is the key to what she’s trying to achieve with the sessions. “We’re not here to tell them they’re right or wrong,” she says. “It’s never about whether you’re right or you’re wrong. It’s about letting them have the freedom to express, and if art helps them get calm enough to start opening up, to feel some things about their life they like or don’t like, then that’s kind of the whole idea.”

2025

Mon. – Sat. 10:00 – 5:00 9850 Walnut Hill Lane, Ste. 226 (at Audelia Rd.) 214-553-8850 thestoreinlh.com

ASK ABOUT FALL TREE & SHRUB PLANTING.

brumleygardens.com 214-343-4900 10540 Church Rd. LANDSCAPE DESIGN AND INSTALL. FALL PLANTS AND MUMS ARRIVING DAILY

january 2026 lakehighlands.advocatemag.com 23

A Next-Level Real Estate Experience Price and availability subject to change. Information deemed reliable, but not guaranteed.

SOLD, Represented Buyer

SOLD, Represented Seller

8904meadowknoll.daveperrymiller.com

9316 Forestridge Drive

8017 Deer Trail Drive

8904 Meadowknoll Drive

5 BED | 4 BATH | 3,968 SQ. FT. | $1,850,000

4 BED | 3.1 BATH | 3,457 SQ. FT. | $1,349,000

5 BED | 6 BATH | 4,458 SQ. FT. | $1,295,000

The B·A·R Group

214.444.8044 info@thebargroup.com

PENDING

7112ambergrove.daveperrymiller.com

SOLD, Represented Seller

6838 Kingsbury Drive

7112 Amber Grove Court

9605 Covemeadow Drive

3 BED | 3 BATH | 2,248 SQ. FT. | $799,000

4 BED | 3.1 BATH | 2,525 SQ. FT. | $699,000

3 BED | 2.1 BATH | 2,246 SQ. FT. | $675,000

Debbie Sherrington

The B·A·R Group

Wendy Lucas

214.762.6957 debbiesherrington@dpmre.com

214.444.8044 info@thebargroup.com

214.384.2050 wendylucas@dpmre.com

PENDING

10016linkwood.daveperrymiller.com

UNDER CONTRACT

10040 Lakemere Drive

10016 Linkwood Drive

10631 Larchfield Lane

3 BED | 2 BATH | 1,663 SQ. FT. | $674,999

3 BED | 2 BATH | 1,700 SQ. FT. | $655,000

3 BED | 2 BATH | 1,638 SQ. FT. | $610,000

Warren Sibley

The B·A·R Group

Aimee Schreiner | Dwell Partners

214.810.1050 warren@dpmre.com

214.444.8044 info@thebargroup.com

830.370.1895 aimee@dwellpartnersdfw.com