As always the Mid Ohio show was a blast this year and flew by entirely too quickly. It's hard to believe once again it's behind us already.

This year I was able to prearrange a few deals with some collectors to bring some killer pieces home. I have a specialty collection of porcelain insulators with Canadian railway markings. Most Canadian railway-owned telegraph construction used a standard design for its porcelain insulators that is now called U-1131 by collectors. This style is similar to the CD 143 style found in glass with various railway markings. The vast majority of porcelain units with these railway markings are found in a white glaze so it seems at first that they would be boring to collect. Personally I find them to be a lot of fun to collect, to the point that they're some of my favourite pieces by far. Some have a great deal of character. Some have some oddball marking variation. For combinations of these two characteristics, there are some rare ones out there that I've worked hard to try to gather.

This year I was happy to grab these four thanks to trades with some outstanding collectors (you know who you are!). From left to right:

C.N.R. U-1131/U-132, wet process and likely made by New Lexington (evidenced by the unusual profile and the presence of a filed base edge). This one has an exceptional amount of crazing. This is the most messed-up, fractured example I've ever seen but the damage seems to have been from manufacture as it's solid as can be, and the fractures don't go all the way through to the inner side.

CPR U-1131 in dry process porcelain. Some evidence points to these dry process, recessed-marked units having been made by a pottery in St Jean, Quebec, though this information isn't entirely reliable (write to me if you'd care to know more!). Nearly identical examples can be found with both CPR and CNR markings and most are pretty uniform in quality. This example is among the most messed up ones I've ever seen, with most of the glaze missing from the dome and a large glazed-over chip on the base. Woohoo!

Perhaps the best piece I've added to my collection in 2023 is this U-1131/U-132 with a very odd, bullet-shaped profile and a light blue coloured C.P.R. ink stamp. This one is made of dry process porcelain. It has a lot of crazing and poor glaze adhesion on the crown, and the marking is exceptionally crude - it almost appears to have been hand-written. This example was apparently dug by the late Jerry Turner in the Pittsburgh High Voltage dump in Derry, PA. Multiple collectors have corroborated that story, and yet this seems a very odd piece to have been found there given its porcelain and glaze quality. It's very different than any of the other known PHV-made U-1131/U-132 examples known. I waited a long time to find a good trader to be able to get this one in hand as these blue ink stamp examples are quite rare.

Lastly, a Czech / Merklin-made U-1131 with a green ink stamp. These are very common across most of Canada, but this example has an odd brassy/black coloured staining all over its surface. I'd seen photos of this one around for years but had never examined it in person. It turns out that it's most likely altered in someway, and the collector I obtained it from also believed so. The staining appears to be on top of the glaze, as it also appears on top of some base flakes on the underside. Whatever happened to this one I will admit it does have an interesting look and I'll hold onto it as a curiosity. If anyone knows how it came to be this way I'd love to hear from you.

I'm looking forward to seeing everyone in Springfield again in 2024!