I love me some neon signage – I think it goes back to my physics days when I was thinking I would go to school for lasers (yeah, that was a thing back in the 80’s). A coherent light source contained in a mirrored tube of neon gas with one end partially silvered that could emit a beam – the grandfather of lasers was a neon sign. There was a school in Rensselaer IN that had a program. I don’t think that program exists anymore (at least I couldn’t find it). But that was the beginning of my interest in the materials sciences.
-Rat