Imagine a few times every year, the 20 or so folks in the world who owned Leonardo Da Vinci paintings hopped on a Zoom call for some housekeeping. Anyone know how to dust 500-year-old oil paint? Do not try switching the frames! Any auctions coming up?
The Mona Lisas of Columbia reside on an old rail line. They are the 22 Cockabooses, the greatest tailgating contraptions ever conceived by the human brain.
By now, the story is well-known — how Ed Robinson and his wife, Cathy, came up with the idea, purchased the unused train tracks just outside Williams-Brice Stadium, acquired nearly two dozen cabooses from Illinois Central Railroad then began selling the hollow steel containers for $45,000 a pop in 1990.
Over three decades later, people are still awed by them. A few weeks ago, “College GameDay” went into Cockaboose No. 22, guided by owner Garrett Humphries, who welcomed the cameras into his palatial rail car and told folks that years ago, he was the one rattling the magic box inside the Cocky suit.
What he didn’t divulge was the lesser-known position he currently holds: president of the Cockaboose Homeowners Association.
Yes, the Cockabooses have an HOA. It goes by the name The Cockaboose Corp., and has been in active standing with the South Carolina Secretary of State’s office since July 1990. Surely, it has to be the coolest HOA in South Carolina — which is along the lines of like saying Disneyland has the coolest tax filings ever.
And why is it necessary? Why must the Cockabooses need an HOA and a board and hold meetings? Sure, you can sleep in them — granted, few ever do — but no one lives in a Cockaboose. (Each is only 270 square feet and the water is shut off during the winter.) So why the need for an overseeing entity?
“The association actually governs the exterior of the property, so anything with the outside of the Cockaboose or the grounds,” Humphries said. “Anything on the inside of the units is (on) the individual owners.”
In simpler terms, the HOA is the guardrail to protect the legacy and tradition of the Cockabooses. To ensure, for instance, that a Clemson fan with too much money doesn’t buy one just to paint it orange.
“You want to also protect your investment,” Humphries said. “Just like with your home.”
What does the HOA do?
By purchasing a Cockaboose, you become a 1/22 owner in The Cockaboose Corp., and like any HOA, pay the dues, which just had a large increase. The fees spiked this year by over $1,700 — up to $5,000 annually for every Cockaboose.
As Humphries and the board started looking to the future, creating five- and 10-year plans, they realized major costs were looming — stuff on the outside of the Cockabooses that will need to be covered by the HOA. Deck repairs. Room maintenance. And, sometime in the next decade, every Cockaboose is going to need to be repainted with expensive, specialized paint fit for old rail cars.
“It’s either everybody gets a huge assessment or they pay for it over a 10-year period,” Humphries said.
Sometimes, too, the board will meet if South Carolina asks to use the Cockaboose name (which The Cockaboose Corp. owns the trademark to) — such as USC naming a premium space “The Cockaboose Club” or modeling a Cockaboose for a new Cocky entrance.
“There had to be discussions about using our name and the image,” Humphries said.
Those are the big-ticket items the board talks about in its quarterly meetings. Most of the time, though, the Cockabooses’ HOA is like every HOA, enforcing small rules so they don’t get big.
On the morning of the LSU game two weeks ago, Thomas Faulds did not wake up wanting to be the bad cop. But, darn it, consequences of not being the bad cop will be far more of a hassle. And, so, the sign had to come down.
The University of South Carolina — which owns two Cockabooses — hung a banner 100 feet from Williams-Brice Stadium. Nothing crazy. Just a generic garnet banner with the name of one of its colleges — more of a place mark than anything. But it was on one of its Cockabooses — and the bylaws of the HOA are very strict about no signage, as they are about other things, such as owners not being allowed to rent out their Cockaboose.
So Faulds, part owner of Cockaboose No. 3 and a member of the five-person HOA board for the past six years, walked over and kindly asked it be removed.
“That’s probably 60% of the job is the gameday nuances,” Faulds said. “Like, ‘Hey, somebody’s got two coolers sitting on the sidewalk next to their caboose, can you get them to move it?’ ‘Hey, their music is really loud. Can you talk to them about turning it down next game?’ ”
As Faulds describes his volunteer position on the HOA board, it begins to sound like work — which feels like the entire antithesis of the Cockabooses in the first place. What’s the point of owning the greatest tailgating structure if you’re spending your Saturdays as the banner police?
“The board is like a shortest straw thing,” said Faulds, a 1994 grad of USC. “What happens is you get passionate about some things you wanna see done, so you end up talking about it with other caboose members and they end up nominating you. … It’s not for everyone.”
When Humphries got on the board, one of the first things he did was create a uniform canopy color — black with the “Block C” South Carolina logo. He was also big on planning for the future, wanting to avoid a massive $60,000 bill in the future when he could have just been paying $500 monthly for a decade.
A local lawyer was on the board for two years, Faulds said, until board meetings were conflicting with depositions. But his passion project were the roofs — they had just been painted and they were already bleeding and turning a pinkish color. “He wanted to dive in on that,” Faulds said.
These are some of the things being tackled by the new crop of Cockaboose owners. In recent years, a number of the original owners began to age out of Cockaboose ownership and were able to earn a hefty return on their $40,000 investment from the first Bush administration.
How much does a Cockaboose cost?
Since 2017, Humphries noted, there’s been about 50% turnover in Cockaboose owners. A number of those sellers, Faulds noted, are selling them to their friends and, thus, very few actually hit the open market.
“One was sold for $199,000. It was a steal, but it was an inside deal,” said Faulds, who said he bought his Cockaboose with five friends in 1999 for $30,000. “The rest of them have been in that $220 (thousand) to $230 (thousand) range. I think that’s probably what they’re estimated at today.”
But Cockabooses are not a monetary item — if you have to ask if you can afford a Cockaboose, buy a boat instead. Cockabooses are one of those few things in the world that with ownership almost comes a permanent suffix on your name: John Smith, Cockaboose owner. Cockaboose owner Jack Brown.
“You don’t own a Cockaboose if you’ve got money problems,” Faulds said. “To prove this, the first whiff of (money problems), they sell them. Divorce? Cockaboose sells. Business goes soft? Cockaboose sells. They are the canary in the coal mine for rich people.”
Saturdays on a Cockaboose, though, can quell plenty. You can price out a Cockaboose, but it’s hard to find the value of hosting the coolest tailgate in South Carolina.
Getting to welcome friends to your Cockaboose. To sip cocktails as A/C cools you in September. Or not needing to buy actual tickets to the game, because you can watch from the Cockaboose with a cigar. Or watching a train enthusiast walk by, staring at it like it fell from Mars.
“People are fascinated by them,” Faulds said. “It’s fun to make people happy.”
This story was originally published September 25, 2024 7:20 AM.
