Sitting around thinking about cool model railroad places brought back a memory of a restaurant my family visited on a trip to NYC in the 50’s. The waitress would take you order and then your food would be delivered by HO trains set up around the restaurant. Just wondering if anyone else has ever come upon a place like this.
Mainetrains [banghead]
There was a place similar to that in Carney, just north of Parkville Maryland. (North of Baltimore) They used Lionel trains. This was also in the mid to late fifty’s.
I remember one place that had a Lionel running on a shelf up near the ceiling, but it didn’t deliver food. Still fun to watch as a little kid.[:)]
Governors Restaurants in the Bangor/Old Town area in Maine have that type of set up. Fun to watch now as an old fart!
Mainetrains [banghead]
New Jersey has at least 2 RR theme resturants. In Westwood, Bergen County, northeastern NJ, is the IronHorse. No running trains, but all kinds of RR models & memorabilia.
In Beachwood, Ocean County, south Jersey, is JP Huntington’s. Not only all the decorations, but two glass cased running HO rr’s, each about 3’ wide, 4’ high (plus legs) and 10 or 12’ long, with 2 or 3 trains running on loops, a reversing trolley, and GREAT scenery!! This one is the grandsons’ favorite!!
There’s a restruat down in the Ozarks of Missouri, (in the town of springfield, theirs also one in Ozark and one closer to AR that I can’t remember were it is) that’s called Lamberts. (A bit of info on Lamberts) It’s a chain of 3 reastrunts in the Ozarks (which is a “region” in MO), and the reastruant was featured as a good place to pig out on the travle chanel, and yes it is a good reastruant. But any way, they do have a small single basic loop of G scale suspended from the ciling but it’s in the hall that you use to exit the reastruant, so It’s not used for food delivery.
There was a train that went around the bar/resturant back in NC. It was called Hams. It was a good place to hang out, but the train didn’t do to good. The drunks normally reached up and knocked it off, and it would break. I think before I moved to Pa, they got rid of it. I also believe it was a Lionel.
P.C. Juntion in Door County WI (a mile or two east of Egg Harbor on E) delivers your food on a G gauge train.
There are several Youtube videos of this. Here is a short one
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RyWxEH8Ze70
Dave Nelson
There is a restaurant by the station at the start of the grand canyon railway that does the train around by the ceiling deal. It’s name is something like Mama’s something.
“HO” ? Even with long trains of coal cars or gondolas, the food had to be in pretty small portions. A chicken leg or small hot dog had to be about the largest item on the menu. LOL.
Dick
Texas Chief
What kind of itty-bitty food did this restaurant serve?.. Waitress! Where is my half-pound steak with fries?
Mark
If we’re talking about railroad restaurants, a barbeque place in my town has a lot of Katy and MoPac pictures, memorablia, etc. and a (Pullman?) dining car attached to the building you can eat in. I don’t know if the car is actually a Katy diner, it may be an old Frisco car or something else.
Jeez, give me a break. It was over 50 years ago. Maybe back then servings in a restaurant weren’t so big that most went in the garbage. Or maybe the trains were bigger and my memory has gotten smaller.
Mainetrains [banghead]
In the fantastic 60’s series “Thunderbirds”, I recall an episode where the boys from International Rescue visited a fab restauant; the food was delivered by Tri-ang Hornby HO/OO locomotives, rolling stock and track. But since the Tracy boys were puppets and stood about 2 feet tall, the portions were, in consequence, just the right size.
And Dick van Dyke produced a contraption in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang which eventually served breakfast to his Dad and kiddies via plates on train wheels that shot off a train track.
FAB. Thunderbirds are GO!
Brian (age 49 - can’t you tell…?)
Plymouth, UK
I’ve just looked at my post above and am somewhat appalled that I am not allowed to type in the name of the man otherwise known as Caractacus Potts - when I write his surname, only asterisks appear. Can’t think why…
No wonder we don’t hear from him much any more.
Brian
Just remembered, we used to have a resturant that had a restored dining car, a caboose, and a steam loco!! You could eat in the caboose or dining car, which had been used by Queen Elizabeth II on a tour of the USA some years ago. The owners had hired an english gentleman to restore the beautiful marquetry of the diner. It became a Victoria Station, but is now the home of a research company - no more food or visitors!!
Brian, in American English, the gentleman’s last name is slang for lesbian - male type.[:O]
Can’t even use the politically correct name!! How about girls that like girls - or will the mods catch this?!