Best Christmas Train Memory

Model Railroader General Discussion (Model Railroader)
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MERRY CHRISTMAS TO ALL!!!

I’m sure this theme has been done before, maybe even this year, but I would like to invite everyone to share their best memory of Christmas and trains. Model railroad or the real thing.

For me it was probably around 1960 (I was born in 1951). Electric trains were beyond the budget for my parents. We had gotten a used Lionel set a few years early but never got it to run. Creighton University where my Dad worked held a Christmas party each year for the families of faculty and staff. Faculty wives took turns making the arrangements for the party. When it was my Mom’s turn she decided to use part of the budget for the party to hire someone to put up a train layout. She located a guy who put up a large Lionel layout. It was all on plywood and I’m guessing it was 20-25’ long and maybe 10’ wide but it seemed much larger than that to me. He had a lot of the animated Lionel accessories, coal loader, log dumper, a station from which a uniformed railroad man would pop out the front door as the train passed. Others which I can’t remember. It was a simple oval with a few switching spurs. It was a huge hit. I spent most of the party watching the trains doing their various chores and there were lots of other kids around the layout as well. That probably more than anything else was what got me hooked on trains.

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Very nice thread and answers how so many of us got into this hobby.

My first memory was 1941 right after Pearl Harbor. I was just three, but remember with incredible clarity my first experience with electric trains. What was supposed to be a gift for me, morphed into a serious hobby for Dad with Mom in full support. I only got to play with this thing after Dad went into the service a month later. I still have visions of both Mom and Dad…elbows on floor and butts facing the heavens playing choo choo with my Christmas gift.

I still have most of this train…it stayed with me somehow for seven decades, survived over a dozen moves, 8 years in the military, and four countries…and the damn thing still runs!!! Four years later when dad left the service, this little Lionel train set infected him rather seriously and after our final move to a huge house in New Jersey in 1946, it expanded to immense dimensions after extending under a three car garage. Dad became a “trainaholic” and an expert and was my teacher for two decades until house was sold.

This story was commonplace years back, but unfortuately today thing are much different at Christmas time. What is sad is that so many of the basic skills this hobby requires are what is necessary to navigate life today. Oh well…progress!!!

HZ

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Hi, and Happy Holidays to all!

As a 10 year old in the early '50s, I had a Marx train set and was able to expand upon it for the next year or so. Of course Marx was the “cheapie” alternative to Lionel or Flyer back then, and I had what we could afford.

I lusted for Lionel, and to a lesser extent - American Flyer. Three of my friends had Lionel layouts, and a fourth had a Flyer layout. Man, I was not jealous, but I sure did envy them.

At age 12, I got a job delivering the Herald American (Chicago) on week afternoons and Sat/Sun mornings. Along with that, we had to collect the weekly payment from our customers - which extended our hours greatly, but also yielded some nice tips, especially at Christmas time.

Yes, my younger friends, that was a seven day a week job for a 12 year old!

Anyway, while doing my “collecting” the week before Christmas, I accumulated enough tips to allow me to go shopping at the local Western Tire & Auto Store. Yes, they sold Lionel trains!

I picked out a $20 work train set, with the 1615 0-4-0 switcher. And, with an extra $2, I got an NYC black gondola too. Man, I was in hogger’s heaven!

Soon I was building a layout in the basement, and suddenly the birthday and Christmas presents were all Lionel related - “switches”, large transformer, rolling stock, and a Burlington diesel.

I was with Lionel for only five years, and then went to HO, where I have been ever since (ex one summer of N). But I can say this without hesitation, I had more fun with that Lionel setup than any of the HO layouts I’ve had since.

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Christmas 1988 and I at 5-years old said enthusiastically, “a train set!” when my family asked what I wanted for Christmas. It was one of those plastic trains with the plastic track, I think it ran on batteries. My dad made a “tunnel” from a cardboard box. I don’t think it survived more then a few months, as sadly trains like that, and my heavy-handed playing style, did not mix well. All that said, the train bug bit and bit hard.

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That first trainset. Mid sixties, tyco, HO. It got me started on a life long hobby, that I can always find great memories from just about every christmas! I think they get better every year. As we get older the trains seem to get better and better!

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For me it was Dec 26th (64/65?) and the trip to Woolco to buy AHM freight cars for 99 cents and a N&W 2-8-8-2 for $4.99 that’s around 66% off IIRC.

I came home with 15 cars and that 2-8-8-2. Quite the haul for around $20.00 plus tax.

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I have trains as far back as memories go, but my first Electric train came for Christmas when I was 4 years old, a 4x6 green painted sheet of plywood with a lake made from aquarium rock and a loop of Lionel track with a double ended siding. It came with a Lionel Hudson steam engine, which I still have to this day although missing some wheels. Whistle in the tender - gone after I disected it and a search light flat car and cattle car with magnetic cattle that went in and out. It was a pretty great set up for a 4 year old.

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Woolco still had a lot of good stuff when I got back into the hobby in 1977, a lot of it AHM. Did you shop at the ones in Columbus? The one in Graceland was closer to me but the one out near Broad and Hamilton seemed to have a better selection and I would stop in there when I was on that side of town. It wasn’t quite as cheap as what you got but still good prices.

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For my fifth Christmas, around ten years ago, my parents got me a bachmann Santa Fe flyer set, and I was thrilled. I had wooden Thomas trains, but I always wanted to have a real model train. Set it up, and I was hooked.

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When I was a small child, our family moved to the Chicago area from Tennessee in the late 1940’s. For a few years, my parents took us to Marshall Fields Department Store in Downtown Chicago to see Santa Claus and the Toy Department ! … We traveled to downtown Chicago via the old Burlington Route, and the suburban passenger trains still had old coaches and steam locomotives.

The Toy Department each Christmas season had a large display of Lionel Trains. I was always very excited to see all of the Lionel trains and accessories on the dispaly layout. Of course, I asked Santa for the most expensive Lionel trains. Apparently, he could not fit my wish list in his sack to deliver to me. Instead, my first train set was a Marx. A year or two later I did get a Lionel train with a steam locomotive. I continued to play with the Lionel train for a few years. Eventually, my Dad got me an HO train for Christmas.

Since, then I have always had HO trains, but I did try N scale for a few years.

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I had always had the old Colorforms toy trains since I could remember. Then the first Christmas that I can remember I got a whole new set of them with a lot more track, plus this set had a battery powered locomotive and passengers in the cars which you could remove and play with. There was a big downtown department store that had a train scene in one of their display windows. And then there also was the old O gauge train layout at the Chicago Museum of Science and Industry. Those got me hooked on electric trains. Finally for Christmas in third grade I asked for a Tyco set I saw in the Sears catalog but instead on Christmas morning I found a Lionel Pioneer Dockside Switcher train set, set up and ready to run. I instantly loved it. It was bigger than HO and bigger than my play trains. It was a level above any other toy I had. Several other kids got HO trains that year but looking back I can tell you that the Lionel trains were built great and were perfect for kids to play with while the HO trains quickly broke and went off to the island of unwanted toys. I’m glad that I received the Lionel set instead of HO at the time or I might have also lost interest. That was a time when layouts were built on carpet on Friday night and had to be picked up by Sunday night. Lionel trains were great for that. I build hundreds of weekend layouts over the next few years until I went into HO with a permanent layout, that I got the first sets of as Christmas presents.

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It was Christmas 1963, when this 7-year old got his first train set. It was one of those infamous Marklin HO scale starter sets with a fantasy 0-6-0, two tinplate fourwheeler passenger cars, an oval of tinplate track and a powerpack. The set was acoompanied by a Faller kit of a little train station, which I assembled at that very day. I still have it (in fact, the only thing that survived those 52 years since then).

Each year saw an addition to this frugal beginning, be it more track, rolling stock or a new loco. Life was good then!

Over those 5 decades I have built a number of layouts, but I have never enjoyed them as much as I did that simple oval of track set up on the family´s dining table for a few hours (it had to be cleared for the meals…)!

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I don’t remember the year, but it must’ve been in the late '40s, I got a plastic battery-powered train set: red 0-4-0, blue tender (also a 4-wheeler, though it had fake 4-wheel “trucks” molded into the bottom of the sides), and two yellow passenger cars with the same molded “trucks” to hide the metal wheelsets. It ran on 3-rail track, like Lionel and Marx, and used a yellow battery box that held four D-cells. It had a simple forward-reverse lever and ran at one speed–getting slower and slower as the batteries died.

Mom let me set it up on the pad atop the dining room table, and I scrounged cardboard boxes from the kitchen wastebasket to make buildings, cutting rectangualr holes for windows. I also cut “tunnel” holes in a flattened-out corrugated box whose upper edge was contoured to look like mountains. I didn’t get to enjoy it for long, as batteries weren’t nearly as good in those days–and were somewhat of a luxury for a family with three growing boys. And anyway, my big brother had a prewar Lionel, with one track switch (manual, of course), that Dad had made portable by fastening the track to a sheet of green-painted plywood. This was apparently a premium set, as it had an uncoupling track section, for remote uncoupling, in the siding. It was actuated by a standard Lionel accessory control, a little red button in a molded black Bakelite box, screwed down on the table’s edge.

When my big brother joined the Air Force, at the beginning of the Korean “Police Action,” I inherited this setup–for a very brief time. Since the only place to put it was on our sun porch–and then only in the winter–I didn’t get to use it much and Mom sold it to my aunt for my 6-year-old cousin. I don’t know if it was part of a Plan, but we moved from the little town of Pewaukee, WI, to the Big City of Waukesha, seven miles away, in the summer of 1953, and my folks gave me an Amereican Fl

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Did you shop at the ones in Columbus?

Yes,I shopped at the Woolco store located in the Great Southern shopping center on South High St… Rode the South High(To Great Southern) bus.

What Christmas money that wasn’t spent at Woolco was spent at Frank P. Halls at 187 South High St buying upgrade parts for those AHM cars like trucks and X2F couplers with coupler boxes.

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My best train memory is when my deceased wife purchased me a Lionel “Polar Express” I love that train and it was a HUGE surprise when I opened the box for Christams. It is also a huge hit with my girls who help me set it up under the tree every year. Bitter sweet memories. I still Love her.

YGW.

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I was a north ender. Didn’t get to the southside that much. I think I was in the Great Southern Shopping center one time but can’t remember for what.

Do you remember the song a local band recorded called Franklin County Woman. It mentioned a lot of the southside landmarks.

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Christmas 1976, the year that started my love of trains.

Kevin

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This didn’t occur to me the first time I read your reply but my earliest vivid memory was also when I was three. It was my 3rd birthday. I remember people asking me how old I was and I would hold up 3 fingers and say “three”. I still remember what I got for a present. Nothing train related. It was an Indian head dress and a rubber tomahawk. My friend PJ was invited to the party. I’m guessing 3 years old is about when most of us start developing memories we keep for a lifetime.

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My best memory of trains and Christmas isn’t of models. It entails a journey on a real train. It was back in December of 1960 when I was a college student trying to get back to the Mid-West on a holiday break from school in New York City. I was originally due to fly back, but a vicious Noreast’er hit the City and closed down all airports for days. In that era, airlines still took responsibility for helping passengers get to their desitination. And the one on which I was booked arranged for a train out of Penn Station to take us west. The train we boarded was filled with many young families of men in the armed service, who had been forced to return to the US due to the closure of army bases in Germany. They too had originally been scheduled to fly home, but they were stranded at Idlewild (now JFK Kennedy) Airport, and eventually bussed to Penn Station to take the train along with the rest of us. All starterd well, but it proved to be a bitterly cold night, and as our train set out across Pennslyvania, we had to make frequent stops to allow train men to go out and unfreeze switches with blowtotches. Whether due to the many delays or unexpected volume of passengers, the train soon ran out of water and food. Fortunately, it was still the era when vendors got on at major stops to sell drinks and sandwiches. But due to the delays that the military families had experienced in this age before ATM’s, many had run out of cash to pay for these necessities. So someone in our car took it upon himself to go down the aisle, asking for cash donnations to help the out those families lacking the money to buy anything. One of the mothers got up and thanked us all, just before we reached Altoona and the train lights were extinquished so we could look out and see the train snake around the famous curve on a moonlit snowy night. Further back in the car, a solitary passenger began to sing “Silent Night,” and bit by bit the rest of us joined him. What followed was a magical moment on that train with

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Frank - this is the nicest Christmas memory I have ever heard or read. So touching! Thanks for sharing it with us!