Lionel Nation 2 (2008)
This is belated review of last year’s Lionel Nation 2 from TM Video. A review of Lionel Nation 3, the most recent installment, from earlier in 2009 will follow in a hopefully, more timely manner.
This second in a series of videos which focuses primarily on toy trains, primarily 3-rail, primarily Lionel, is a worthy successor to the first. This is an in depth view of toy trains for about 1/3 of the viewing time and 2/3 from the hi-rail perspective The toy train segments are those on John Potter’s prewar layout and the originals of Lionel’s first run of Conventional Classics from the postwar period. The hi-rail segments are set on Norm Charbonneau’s magnificent layout featuring his weathered PRR and NYC steamers, various first generation diesels from the same railroads, weathering, scenery and buildings on this now well known layout, and a segment on the Lionel Acela. Tom and Jeff McComas, and Joe Stachler’s usual thorough and informative, but not intrusive narration is heard throughout. This video is about 65 minutes of three rail operating and collecting pleasure with something for everyone: prewar, postwar and modern era, toy train and hi-rail, whimsical material and prototype and scale modeling.
The music is once again by Jim Coffey, which isn’t necessarily close to my musical tastes (Bach and the Beatles), but not a deal breaker as it is muted and complementary to the visuals. As is their usual approach, TM Videos introduces yet another clever and attractive technique for displaying segment titles, employing a Lionel Legacy handheld screen blowup for this purpose.
The first segment, taking up about 1/4 of the video is an extensive video catalog and tour of John Potter’s prewar collection and layout. John is an Operator/Collector so both aspects of toy trains receive detailed attention, including John’s beautiful collection and his personal approach to operatin