By the time the school History Fair rolled around during my 9th grade year, I had learned an important lesson: Talk about what you know. (My previous attempt at Stonehenge afforded me this wisdom ... They just looked like big rocks to me.) A new year brought a new chance, and prized among the things I knew something about as a 14 year-old was streetcars -- New Orleans streetcars. (Indeed, is there another kind?) I've ridden NOLA cars all my life, mostly because I have a father who has ridden them all of his. My dad grew up off of Carrollton Avenue in the 1930s and 40s, and green streetcars form an integral part of his childhood memories: riding the St. Charles car downtown to go shoe shopping with his mother; hearing the cars rumble by outside on a Sunday morning while at the Carrollton Presbyterian Church; watching them line up in rows at Napoleon Avenue to carry crowds of swaggering Mardi Gras revelers back to their homes and hotels. In my own childhood, rare was the trip into the CBD that we didn't find time to ride a car in from Palmer Park, just for the fun of it, or at least drive by the Willow Street barn to see what was waiting on the outbound tracks. Back at home, as a kid, I'd spend hours riding my bike around the neighborhood: every corner a new car stop, in every block I was the motorman. Sufficed to say, in later years, when Mr. Welch insisted that we each enter the History Fair, NOLA streetcars made for the obvious choice. Dad and I spent hours making a display board full of pictures, and together we built a 1:48 scale mock-up of a St. Charles Avenue scene ... complete with a runner jogging down the neutral ground. In the end, my project made it all the way to the state competition, winning first place in local history and second place overall.

Like I said, always talk about what you know.