By Emily Jones
Idaho State Journal
POCATELLO – Shayne Stoakes still remembers the distinct smell of the passenger trains he rode as a child, a faint diesel odor mixed with the scrumptious smells of food cooking in the dining car.

He remembers hearing the clicks of the tracks as the train moved.

"The motion of the train is neat," he says. "You can feel all the weight. It's hard to grasp."

It's those memories and others Stoakes hopes to invoke in visitors to the Community Corner of "Yesterday's Tomorrows," a traveling Smithsonian exhibit on display at the Idaho Museum of Natural History. Four of Stoakes' paintings are on display this week, and the exhibit runs through April 24.

Along with the Smithsonian displays, the exhibit features pieces from the Don Aslett Cleaning Museum, and other local displays like Stoakes'.

Each of Stoakes' pieces, from the black-and-white of the 8444 steam locomotive traveling through Pocatello to the vividly-colored picture of a woman standing next to two streamlined trains, is filled with details, and show how styles of trains developed over the years.

Detail is vital to his artwork, Stoakes says.

"If you're going to do art of any kind, you've got to be correct about it," he says. "I'm creating a scene that someone remembers. It jogs their memories."

In the paintings, visitors can see how trains changed from the more traditional style of the 8444 to the more futuristic, streamlined trains of the 1950s.

"The streamlining, that was a big deal," Stoakes says.

The evolution of trains matches the exhibit, with its study of how transportation and other ways of life have evolved, and provide a local angle.

Trains are a vital piece of U.S. and local history, IMNH Educational Resources Coordinator Rebecca Thorne-Ferrell says.

"This is what built Pocatello and the United States. This is why we're here," she says.

"Yesterday's Tomorrows," a traveling Smithsonian exhibit is on display at the Idaho Museum of Natural History. Four of Shayne Stoakes' paintings are on display this week. The exhibit runs through April 24.