Rick Soller embarked upon his collecting career at the ripe old age of ten. Rick's childhood visits to an uncle in New Lexington, OH who lived near the New York Central railroad often culminated in a trip to the tracks with his brothers. There the boys would put pennies on the rails, hoping to retrieve flattened coins after long, heavy freight trains rolled by. To pass the time between trains, sometimes Rick and his brothers would throw rocks at insulators! 

Rick Soller  Gurnee, Illinois  Born Oct. 14, 1957  Collecting Since: 1967 Specialty: non-glass non-pintype. Rick's collections of the various odds and ends associated with our hobby are conservatively estimated to include over 1,000 items. Subspecialty: porcelain. Numbering approximately 500 different U-numbers, this porcelain collection includes a no-tie Sindlinger patent model and the only known U-1834 specimen. Subspecialty: commemoratives/ private issue/novelty. One of the most complete collections of this type known -- containing close to 200 pieces.

One day, though, the urge to destroy was overpowered by the urge to possess. Upon spotting a pair of porcelain insulators on an abandoned pole, Rick convinced his brothers to boost him high enough to remove them. Two U-292 mottled brown Thomas signals were soon in Rick's hands, and with that find, another collector was born. 

Rick's initial find was quickly joined by more insulators; some found at his grandfather's farm; others purchased at a local antique store; still more found during explorations along local railroad lines. By the time Rick was making preparation to attend college at The Ohio State University in 1975, he had gathered about fifty different pieces. 

At Ohio State, Rick pursued an education in economics, receiving a B.S. in Business, with a minor in communication. He built upon his communication studies by continuing on to receive a Masters degree in that field, at Northern Illinois University. During graduate school, Rick's involvement in the hobby moved to a higher level. As a break from his studies, he began walking old railroad lines with greater frequency. It was also during this time that Rick discovered "Crown Jewels" magazine and realized he was not alone in his passion for insulators. Rick attended his first show in 1983, and from there his interest expanded even more so.

For a five year span after finishing at Northern Illinois U., Rick taught at the University of Wisconsin -- Oshkosh. This left his summers free to hunt insulators, and he gradually built his collection to a few hundred pieces by the time he elected to undertake Doctoral studies at The Ohio State University in 1988. 

Something extraordinary happened to Soller in his first class at Ohio State -- he met the woman who would eventually become his wife! Born in Wauseon, OH, Nedra Adams was pursuing an educational objective closely matching Rick's. Married on May 14, 1994 in a private ceremony at the Lake County (IL) Courthouse, they departed the very next day on a college-sponsored tour of China.

Rick and Nedra had actually planned to marry in China, but that proved impossible as neither were of Chinese citizenship, and the minister accompanying the tour only had authority to marry couples within U. S. confines. Imagine their surprise at being given a Chinese wedding ceremony by the communist party head of the Foreign Language Institute in Xi' an, China! 

While abroad, Rick found about two dozen insulators and had them shipped back by the proverbial "slow boat from China". Rick notes that insulator shipping proved to be the most expensive part of the trip. 

U-1334 from China

Since 1992, Rick has been teaching public speaking, interviewing and mass communications classes at the College of Lake County in Grayslake, IL. Rick has managed to integrate his hobby into his courses quite effectively. In his public speaking course, he talks about insulators as an example of a personal interest speech. Insulators are used again in an example of an informative visual aid speech. Also, Rick uses insulators in a demonstration of a research speech, and in a persuasive speech he highlights the values of becoming an insulator collector. Nedra, who also teaches public speaking at the College of Lake County, uses Rick's insulators similarly in her classes. Rick enjoys the fact that none of their students leave class ignorant of the insulator hobby. 

Rick is highly involved at the College of Lake County. In addition to his teaching duties, he serves as a member of the school's Faculty Senate, information technology commission, student suspension appeal board, and governance coordinating commission. Outside of college, he sits on the board of the Friends of Lake County Museum. 

Rick is one of a small group of individuals who enjoys and actively undertakes insulator research. Because he had relatives in New Lexington, OH, his earliest research efforts traced the history of the New Lexington High Voltage Co. Soller has also extensively researched the Kenosha Insulator Co., J. R. Holcomb's Improved Metallic Insulator and the life of R. D. Mershon. While researching Mershon, Rick uncovered a small quantity of Mershon's biographies and made them available to the hobby. Interestingly, photos in this book provide the only known documentation that General Electric produced the porcelain insulators used on the famous Telluride line.

Soller's quest for information has resulted in his membership in every local club and subscription to every relative periodical he can find, including industrial publications such as Insulator News and Market Report. He' maintains an extensive library of insulator-related material, and willingly presents this information wherever and whenever he can. His work has been seen at the last few Nationals, numerous local shows, and on the Internet. He is a frequent speaker at club meetings, and is personally responsible for producing the Greater Chicago Insulator Club newsletter eight times a year. 

Some of the research Rick is involved with requires him to have on hand large quantities of insulators. He has well over a hundred CD 128 Pyrex as an aid to his project of identifying the various letter codes found on these insulators. Likewise with R-4 Continental Rubber Works. All told, Soller is in possession of 700 crates of insulators, which he estimates to contain nearly 10,000 individual pieces.

Typical storage module: 4 crates wide by 
8 crates high by 7 crates deep!

Rick likes to tell the story of the best show he ever attended, the 1987 Fresno, CA national. He had the summer off from his teaching position at the University of Wisconsin, and decided to drive to California. For companionship he took along some huge substation pieces which, Rick was sure, would be very desirable at a big national show. Plotting his route to Fresno, Soller placed a call to Chris Hedges in Kansas City, MO, hoping to stop and see his collection. An enthusiastic yes was the reply, coupled. with an invitation to stay overnight. That turned out to be just the beginning of the hospitality Rick would enjoy on his transcontinental journey. 

From Kansas City, Rick ventured north to Iowa, visiting Dan Wagner before ending up at Paul and Carol Ickes. Once again, Rick received an offer to stay overnight. Because the Ickes had to leave for work early the next morning, they told Rick he was welcome to look through the items they had for sale, lock up when he left, and send what he felt they were worth when he returned home. By journeys end two weeks later, Rick had been, on four separate occasions, extended the hospitality of an overnight stay by a fellow collector. It has been said time and again, but bears repeating here -- insulator collectors are some of the nicest people to be found. 

There are quite a few reasons for 
Rick's smile on these shelves!

The Sollers have recently moved into a new house, so a lot of Rick's and Nedra's free time is spent turning their house into a home. For a change of pace, they like to go gallery hopping, generally in search of art for all their new walls, but always on the lookout for that elusive insulator-related painting. 

With all that Rick is involved with, he's glad that he can access the variety of insulator activity on the Internet. When possible, he uses his few free hours throughout the teaching week to keep up-to-date with the latest electronic insulator sales and discoveries. On the Internet, Rick has found web pages by porcelain insulator manufacturers Lapp and Suzhou (China).

An increasingly popular venture among collectors, Rick included, is an Internet auction known as eBay. Soller notes that he's been surprised by some of the prices he's seen there -- some too high; some too low. He has noticed quite a bit of strategizing on eBay, particularly in the area of last minute bidding, suggestive that our hobby has a strong competitive element. Hopefully, through the efforts of collectors like Rick Soller, our hobby will remain strong and competitive for years to come.