It may just be the greatest hobby on Earth—even if it's somewhat esoteric.

But there are hundreds of circus model builders out there, and this year they're showing off their miniature circus reproductions during the free national convention of Circus Model Builders (CMB) at Showfolks of Sarasota this week. One builder is even coming from Australia.

“Most of us are the same as me. When they were very young, their parents would take them to the circus and they loved it they started building models of it,” says Wayne Scheiner, 80, an officer of the CMB. The international group has roughly 750 members, which started connecting like-minded builders in 1935 and has since become a hub for exchanging tips and ideas, like how to “kit bash” (that’s when builders combine both old and new kits). There are annual conventions and events, and there’s even a bi-monthly magazine.

It all started for Scheiner when he was 8 years old. His grandfather took him to see a Ringling Bros. Circus show in Chicago in 1952. “We walked out in the menagerie section, and I scooped up some sawdust and used it in my tent for the model I made in my basement," he recalls.

Today, his North Port garage is a circus museum, where he built a 1/87th-size model of the 56th season of Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey Circus under canvas—the last year it toured. It's just one of roughly 65 models Scheiner has built over the years. Altogether, he says, they're worth roughly $10,000. That’s minus all the knowledge that goes into their architecture, of course.

He says Ringling was famous for buying surplus equipment after World War II. They had coaches that were repurposed hospital cars, and animal cages were repurposed ammunition carriers used to house lions, tigers, and the 50 elephants that toured with the show. They also used the elephants to dismantle the circus and the 2,000 lb. poles used to hold up the big top. Scheiner knows what each numbered wagon was for and applies those specific details in each of his builds.

For Mary Fritsch, the details come into focus behind a magnifying glass. Originally from New Jersey, the 87-year-old Sarasota resident and her daughter, Lynn Lakner, create N-scale circus replicas—the smallest grade a builder can go. Sometimes Fritsch finds the tiny model people between her toes when they fall after she works on them.

“Almost anyone who knows me says I'm crazy. 'Why would you do it at all and why on such a small scale?' My sons just roll their eyes at us,” she says. She and Lakner call themselves the “Tweezer Sisters” because they use tweezers to put all the tiny components of the model circus together. 

The former elementary teacher picked up the hobby after Scheiner and Donna, his wife, introduced her to it. "At the time, I said, 'I have a lot of stuff but I have room for N-scale,'” she says.

The duo is less concerned with exact timelines replicas and like to indulge in their own tastes, as illustrated by a tiny Bello Nock figurine in one of their tiny circus scenes. "Lynn made the hair part out of clay, and painted it with a needle," Fritsch says. 

They also have high-wire walkers on bikes with a piece of screen below as their net. There's a freakshow with a mermaid and a two-headed camel. But nothing goes to waste. "The lions and tigers are eating the rest of the camel because I had to cut one head off of one to make the two-headed one," Fritsch says.

There's also a petting zoo and game booths, and people eating cookies and fried chicken. There are even raccoons sifting through garbage containers. An airplane flies a banner that says “Tweezer Sisters."

"We have fun. Our circus is doing stuff. The more we do, the more we laugh. It's just all so amusing," she says.

The CMB convention isn't a competition but, Scheiner says, the "weird and really good-looking models will be in the CMB magazine."

For a model that’s available to check out year-round, he recommends visiting the one made by Howard Tibbals at the Tibbals Learning Center. Tibbals passed away last year and left a circus model-building legacy behind.

There's also a permanent model circus at the Showfolks of Sarasota, which was hand built by the Leech Bros. and is 8 by 20 feet, including a big top, menagerie, sideshow, many of the back yard tents and the unloading of the circus train.

Check out 40-plus models of the circus April 13, 14 and 15 from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. daily at the Showfolks of Sarasota, 5204 Lockwood Ridge Road, Sarasota. Admission is free.