A Place to Dream, Escape & Return to Childhood

A place to dream, escape and return to childhood for me:

Arnold

Of course my trains are an escape & return to childhood for me.

Playing Cowboys was a lot of fun for us in the woods surrounding Kennedy Airport in the late 50's and early 60's. Sometimes I wish that I lived in the west so that I could wear a cowboy hat and boots again. One would get more than funny looks, based on people's assumptions, if one were to wear these items here in Eastern NY.

I do have a large Disney Davy Crockett collection of items that I display - it brings me back too

Running my blue Lionel Santa Fe #634 switcher on a figure eight shaped track all stretched out on the floor. The engine just coming by and emitting a sweet smell of ozone. Always wish I could have shrink myself down to size and ride inside the engine.

Life sure got more complicated once I got past 18.

Arnold, I'm sure you need a place to escape dealing with what comes in your chosen profession.

Arnold, another great question!

I grew up in rural Western Pennsylvania 15 miles from where we live now.  We had few neighbors.  When my dad said someone was a neighbor, they could have lived up to a mile away.  There were plenty of hills and 'cricks', woods and fields to explore.  One highlight was that we lived about a half mile from the B&O old Pittsburgh & Western line from Pittsburgh to New Castle.  By the time I would watch trains the heavy mallets were gone, and there were lots of trains pulled by dark blue F-units.  Standing by my bicycle at the crossing, I would always get a wave from the cab and the caboose.  There were so many freight cars, mostly boxcars, from so many different railroads.

My HO layout growing up had a B&O F-unit and caboose.  Now I have mostly Western Maryland engines, but I also have an ABA set of F3s in that dark blue and a B&O Mike to remember my maternal grandfather who passed on before I was born.  He had been a fireman on that same line before he went to serve in The Great War.  He was disabled rescuing a fallen comrade from an attack with mustard gas.

Building my layout and running trains takes me back to when I built an HO layout on a 4x8 sheet of plywood in a dark but dry cellar in the 1960s.

@Arnold D. Cribari posted:

Later, I will tell you what inspired this expression that I recently saw on television.

Was it the narrated close on "The Dating Game" episode of The Goldbergs sitcom (Season 8, Episode 18)?

"... you can always look back, but you can only live forward."

What, me worry?

Arnold who pays you and how do you keep coming upon with these wonderful topics? Yes my trains take me back to my childhood and are my escape but more than they keep me close to my father and grandfather who have both passed. My father in 1985 and his father in 1969, My dad loved the trains and his dad worked for the MC Railroad in Pittsburgh where I grew up to the age on 9. Have have acquired a lot of Western PA cars and buildings for the layout. in their memory. Looking to acquire a ALSO S2 to have painted in 1949 MC colors in his memory as my grandfather worked for the railroad during the steam to diesel transition years.

Arnold as the say in KoolJock world "Just keep the hits coming" wonderful topics you start.

Rick, I think Arnold missed his calling!! 

Sounds like Rod Serling's "Walking Distance" or "A Stop at Willoughby"  episodes of Twilight Zone.

Running my trains does not take me back to my childhood to be honest. The modelling I do now is so much different than what I did as a kid. It does provide that dream and escape though. Six years in a manufacturing environment, an engineering education, and an OGR membership mean I can spend as much time as I please making things in my brain become reality mounted on plywood. THAT is priceless for me. There isn't much positivity of any kind at my job. Hearing "good job" is rarer than getting a raise. So I appreciate the good juju here on the forum and there on my small/growing layout.

The extra parts of my railroad take me back to my childhood quite a bit. I'm talking about the research side. My grandparents were kind and patient and didn't mind driving down along the Mahoning river while I asked a thousand questions about the big empty mill buildings. Of course we would catch an occasional train and we would chase it. They were Conrails for a little while. Doing the research now for my model railroad has taken me back to my childhood. There aren't many mill buildings left but finding out what was on a specific property and how things were situated constantly makes me thing back to those trips downtown with my grandparents. Plus I chase the trains I stumble upon. My grandparents has a lot of connections to the mills in terms of stories and employment too so it's cool being able to connect the dots and understand their lives better although they aren't here anymore. That's definitely the strongest link to my childhood and it's not something I expected to experience when I decided to get back into the hobby. 

This is a great topic!!

"Dad.  Can you fix this?"

John

For me it's not a return to childhood. Years back when I had my first heart attack - with no health insurance because I was a new hire - I had to leave the hospital that I was actually working for and go home. On the way, I stopped at the train store I used to shop at (French's in Baltimore) just to calm down and breathe. So, at the bottom of it all, there is a sense of peace that I get from trains.

Mark I think you are absolutely correct Arnold did miss his calling. Not sure what that would have been! A toy trains philosopher with all his great questions. Wonder if he uses the same thought process in his day job?

Like Rick, the trains keep me close to family. Most of my collection was left to me by my Dad, who passed nearly 20 years ago. I watched him build the collection, going with him to York and on many of his "hunts" when people would respond to his classified ad when I was a kid. When I'm in my train room, surrounded by the toy trains he loved,  I feel my Dad's presence and the unconditional love he gave to his family.

I have a high-stress occupation, and the trains are a big-time source of stress-relief. Spending time in my train room--even if it's just a few minutes--is a total escape from the worries of the day.

Arnold when I first saw the title on this thread, I knew it was you who started the thread.  Your topics are philosophical and thought provoking .... always greatly enjoyable.  Thanks for being a wonderful part of this forum.

Model trains for me do sometimes take me back to being that little boy who would stand eye level next to a layout in a store and just stare at the scenery and trains on a layout.  Just watching always brought me an extremely unique kind  of  excitement  and joy.  At times I now once in a while get down on my knees next to the layout so that I'm eye level, as I was when a little boy, and am able to almost feel that special kind of joy.  

I think too that trains bring a connection with my parents, long gone now, and Christmas times past.  Christmas was always the happiest family time in my house when growing up and of course the trains were a centerpiece to every Christmas.  

My model trains also connect me with the magic of real trains of the 1950s when I was a kid.    The mystery of not knowing what the next train will be ... passenger, fast freight, local freight, work train, a lite engine move, a caboose hop, a unit train and if so what kind?  What kind of locomotive will be in charge and how many engines and cars?  Where did the train come from and where is it going?  Wondering about all those different railroad heralds painted on the sides of freight cars..... there were many railroads back then.   At that time there was such an abundance of mystery conjured up whenever I saw trains.  Today's trains are pretty predictable and leave me with little to no real wonder at all.... although I still enjoy seeing them pass by.  

Trains take me to history books and googling information regarding old short line railroads in my state that have been defunct for decades.  I learn not just about those old roads but about the social aspects of local society during those times. I greatly enjoy learning the histories.  

I can't say that every time I walk into my train room the little kid in me suddenly appears.  Every once in a while yes, that kid is present when I walk in the door.  I welcome him whenever he appears and wish he'd come visit more often.  What I can say, with absolute certainty, is some aspects of this hobby  such as creating scenes/scenery, weathering freight cars, and just watching the trains run, bring me calm and peace through the creative process.  

Thanks to all who have shared their joy and made wonderful contributions on this thread.

What inspired me to start this topic was the television program, American Expereience,  about the life of L. Frank Baum, who wrote the novel: The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. During that very interesting program about Frank Baum's life, the expression: "A place to dream, escape and return to childhood" was used. I made a note of it because it is so applicable to our hobby.

Incidentally, there were a lot of real trains shown during this television program. Arnold

@artyoung posted:

On the way, I stopped at the train store I used to shop at (French's in Baltimore) just to calm down and breathe.

French's on Conkling St. was were I got back into trains in the late 70s. I took my dads trains, ZW and O22 switches there to get them refurbished and left with enough stuff to build my first Christmas garden that year.

Jerry

Now, I will share how model trains have been a place for me to dream, escape, and return to childhood during most of my life.

Childhood: First, like many of you, my childhood was filled with Lionel trains. Both of my parents loved them, and were very generous in gifting me very nice Lionel trains and accessories, a ZW, and 027 track and switches in the 1950s through the mid 1960s. There were Lionel trains around the Christmas tree during most of those years, and my father built me a very nice, trestled 027 layout on a 4 x 8 plywood board under the staircase in our basement when I was 11 years old that stayed up until I was 14.

The love of Lionel trains existed on both sides of my family.

On my mother's side, there was my Aunt Ruth (my mother's sister), who helped my first cousin, Billy (about 10 years older than me), build a beautiful large O27 Gauge layout (about 8 x 16) in the back portion of their large finished basement in their sprawling split level home on 5 acres of land surrounded by farms in Pennington, NJ. In addition to receiving Lionel trains from my parents, I also got them from my Aunt Ruth, who also gave me a subscription to Model Railroader magazine every year through my teenage years through my 20s.

On my father's side was my Uncle Mario (one my father's brothers), who built a big O Gauge layout (also about 8 × 16) with ramps on which the trains ran to different places, including around the furnace, in the basement of my grandmother's home in the Fleetwood section of Mt. Vernon, NY. He built the layout for my first cousin, Jimmy (about 5 years older than me).

Cousin Billy became a serious modeler (like many of you) in his teenage years, and sold his beautiful Lionel trains to buy very nice HO trains. He also glued together models of air craft carriers, destroyers and airplanes. He regrets having sold his Lionel trains (because they appreciated in value), but he has a big HO layout in his May's Landing, NJ home.

Cousin Jimmy's trains were put into a storage facility when he was an adult, and were stolen, which broke his heart and the heart of his mother, my Aunt Dolly (my father's sister). (Uncle Mario was a life-long bachelor, who lived in an apartment near my grandmother's home.)

Like many of you, I took a model railroad sabbatical from about age 16 through my early 30s (but still looked at the pictures of Model Railroader magazine during those years). This sabbatical was mainly due to having a few crushes and being obsessed with girls, and being a serious student.

When I got married and then had kids, my Lionel trains were resurrected. My young children and I, with the help of the same ZW I had as a 2 year old, filled them with electricity, bringing them back to life like the Frankenstein monster.   

Escape: I can't think of a better way for a divorce lawyer and mediator like me to  escape, in a healthy and positive way, than having a hobby like model railroading. Hence, my lyric: "In my little world, I leave this troubled world behind."

Return to Childhood: Every time I go down to my basement, do anything on my layout, and run my O Gauge trains, including the same Lionel trains of my childhood and the mostly Lionel and MTH trains of my adulthood; every time I take photos and videos of those trains and layout; and every time I read and post anything on this Forum, and open another issue of OGR Magazine.

I think many of us on this Forum have much in common.

Arnold

@Mark Boyce posted:

Arnold, another great question!

I grew up in rural Western Pennsylvania 15 miles from where we live now.  We had few neighbors.  When my dad said someone was a neighbor, they could have lived up to a mile away.  There were plenty of hills and 'cricks', woods and fields to explore.  One highlight was that we lived about a half mile from the B&O old Pittsburgh & Western line from Pittsburgh to New Castle.  By the time I would watch trains the heavy mallets were gone, and there were lots of trains pulled by dark blue F-units.  Standing by my bicycle at the crossing, I would always get a wave from the cab and the caboose.  There were so many freight cars, mostly boxcars, from so many different railroads.

My HO layout growing up had a B&O F-unit and caboose.  Now I have mostly Western Maryland engines, but I also have an ABA set of F3s in that dark blue and a B&O Mike to remember my maternal grandfather who passed on before I was born.  He had been a fireman on that same line before he went to serve in The Great War.  He was disabled rescuing a fallen comrade from an attack with mustard gas.

Building my layout and running trains takes me back to when I built an HO layout on a 4x8 sheet of plywood in a dark but dry cellar in the 1960s.

Arnold, After reading your comment about so many of your parents, aunts, uncles, cousins who liked trains, I thought I would supplement my initial post.

I had an uncle (Mum's oldest brother) who had an American Flyer layout.  I only saw it once, when I was no more than 5 years old, because they moved away then.  I can still picture a view from the bottom of their stairs.  I must have been impressed, since I can recall it 60 years later.  Another uncle (Mum's sister's husband) built a 4x8 HO layout in his basement.  It was truly a Plywood Pacific.  We ran trains a couple of times.  His real love was boats and RC airplanes.

I told Dad I wanted a train set, but he said they were too expensive for a Christmas gift.  As was often the case, in his wisdom his answer was for me to save my money.  He gave me a quarter a week if I did all my chores, and I sometimes got a dollar for my birthday from one of my grandma's.  Eventually, I had saved enough for an HO set, so one Saturday he took me clean into Pittsburgh, (probably to the store my uncle suggested since they lived in Pittsburgh) to buy a train set.  After Mum got tired of it on my bedroom floor, I said I needed a sheet of plywood.  You guessed it, Dad said save your money and I'll take you to get it.  After getting the plywood, I built a frame for it out of scrap lumber Dad had.  I used plans from one of 3 Kalmbach books my uncle with the Plywood Pacific had bought for himself.  He also gave me 3 or 4 inexpensive plastic building kits he had purchased, but never had built.  His own interest in trains had left the station for good.  I used Dad's hand tools and an assortment of various sizes of screws to build the layout.  (When I was growing up, Dad had no power tools except the lawn mower.  He and I even cut up trees with a two man cross-cut saw.)  As the years passed, I modified the layout basing it on another Kalmbach book.  I ran trains through high school and while commuting to 2-year college.  I was too shy to ask girls out and I didn't have a car, so I ran trains until I was 20.

I packed all the trains and buildings away when I moved away for my first job.  When I moved back, I got them out, but was sad they had been damaged in the summer heat in Dad's shop.  I threw them all away.  I still have those Kalmbach books though.  I got back into trains after I got married when I was 28.  My wife has always supported my hobby.  She says it is good, she always knows where I am.  I still remember those days often as others recount their childhood interest in trains.  Whenever I see that blond headed boy looking in the window of my Menards hobby shop building, I think of him as me (Except I never wore shorts and still don't.  Shorts aren't a good idea tromping around the woods and fields like I did or kneeling in the garden pulling weeds)  I need to paint his legs to resemble long blue jeans. 

My love of railroading probably began not long after the day I was brought into this world. My maternal grandfather, William Schubert, worked for 42 years on the Pennsylvania Railroad (PRR), the Standard Railroad of the World (and he never let you forget that about the PRR). He was a freight conductor. Ever since my first conscious memories (vague though they may be) I heard stories about the railroad from a veteran railroad man to whom the railroad was not only a job, but, almost a "religion". As early as 3 1/2 years old, my grandfather took me on day trips using his free pass as a retiree to places like New York City, Harrisburg, Philadelphia and Washington DC. I loved seeing the PRR GG-1's coming into the station and, as a result of visiting the previously mentioned locations, I gained a life-long fascination with large and ornate urban railroad stations as well as large east coast cities, in general.

On the Christmas before my 3rd birthday, Santa left me my first Lionel train set on the floor around the Christmas tree, a Lionel 736 Berkshire steam locomotive and freight cars. It became a central fixture in our home every Christmas thereafter. My father built a platform for the train. Each year a new accessory was delivered by Santa. When my brother came along, another train set was added and the platform was moved to our basement and doubled in area as an "L" shape. As I got older, I was allowed to help my father assemble the basement train layout every year. From working at my father's side, I became very well versed in electrical circuitry and installation thereof as well as acquired skills in the use of hand tools, carpentry and optimizing visual appearance of the display.

I remember, on Christmas day, my maternal grandfather and grandmother would come to visit to exchange presents and share a midday Christmas dinner. After dinner, my grandfather, even though his legs were bad from 42 years climbing on freight and cabin cars as the PRR called cabooses, would make his way to the basement to see our trains and watch my brother and I run them. From this, we learned much about prototype operation. We got "corrected" for things like blowing a whistle in a tunnel or running through a passenger station way too fast if we weren't making a station stop. I learned whistle signals like how to blow for a grade crossing and the signals of 2 short blasts when moving forward from a stop, 3 blasts when moving backward from a stop, etc.

Also, on our Christmas layout was a new Lionel operating signal bridge that my father wired to have the lights change as the train approached. That year, as my grandfather supervised on Christmas day, we were running the trains and, suddenly, in my grandfather's not so subtle voice, came the admonition, "What are you doing running through a red eye?!!", the railroad term for a stop signal. It turns out that my father had wires crossed to the signal bridge. My grandfather then yelled, "RANDY (my father was Randolph, Jr. I am the 3rd), come down here and fix this signal!" My father came down, unscrewed the signal bridge reversed the 2 wires and all was well thereafter.

After high school, the trains were left in storage for many years down my parents' basement. Though I did not  have time or space for the hobby, I never lost my love and interest in railroading. I fed my habit by visiting museums like the B&O museum in Baltimore and many visits to Strasburg as well as reading and studying the history of the Pennsylvania Railroad. I joined and am still a member of the Pennsylvania Railroad Technical and Historical Society. I also accumulated a collection of books on all aspects of railroading with a heavy emphasis on the PRR..

The preceding is enough from the ghost of Christmases past. Fast forward to April 1, 1989 when at age 38 I was married for the first time to my beautiful wife, Terry. It has been wonderful 32 years and we are still going strong. When I was 44 years old, my only son Chris was born. Having me for a father, his fate as a railroad junky was sealed. When he was 2 1/2, Santa brought him a Lionel Thomas the Tank engine set that appeared under the tree on a platform with several buildings in a snow scene. Beginning the model railroad hobby with my son proved to be quite a magical and nostalgic trip back to my earlier years. Very early on, Chris wanted to help assemble and dismantle the layout and learned, at a very early age, to use hand tools, wire the track and lighting as well as carpentry skills. My brother gave Chris our old trains for Christmas one year and the torch was passed. Our layout, the "Great Northeastern Railway", became permanent and expanded. Though Chris is rather busy at age 25, I am still try to keep the layout going as best I can. It reminds me very much of my early years with my father, brother, grandfather and my O gauge trains that I still love to this day.

Arnold and Mark after reading both your updates I needed to add on to my posting. I had one uncle who's son loved Lionel trains also and I remember being in my aunts basement where he had I guess an 8x8 layout. Him and his father had issues so he lift with our aunt he was about 10 years or so older than me. He disappeared from our lives along with some of his trains. Around 1973 or so I was back in Pirrsburgh visiting that uncle with my sister and her boyfriend and I ask my uncle what ever happened to my cousin Donnies trains. To my surprise he talk me up into his attic and said there is what is left of them. I still have the 736, coal ramp, milk car and  several other operating accessories and the Type Z transformer today. The funny part is we lived in FL at the time and my sister's boyfriend wanted to take home some Coors beer which was not sold in FL at that time so 3 case of Coors Beer and all the trains were packed up and checked as luggage on the flight home all declared as toy trains.

I think a lot of people into 3 rail are into building the layouts and collecting the rolling stock they could never have had as kids. There's not a thing in the world wrong with that!

As for me, and I probably shouldn't reply here as my layout isn't 3-rail and it represents all the stories and visits to East Tennessee I had as a kid. I heard about the railroad I model a lot growing up and visiting the area. I was surprised when I finally saw the first decent book on the subject, when I was a kid. I later used birthday money to buy my own copy, which I still have to this day.

I escape to a time and place I used to imagine walking up and down the "hollers" of the Blue Ridge as a little kid. I haven't been back since 2005 but I feel more a pull to that place than where I actually grew up in Florida.

I don't model the years I was a kid, as the RR I love was standard gauged in 1950 and dieselized a couple of years before I was born, so I never saw the 3-footers there. I did, though, see #12 running at Tweetsie RR as a little kid.

Also, I've always loved the 1940s. I can't put my finger on why, but it's such an interesting time.

But I model for love of the place and time I model, not so much for the love of the trains themselves if that makes any sense.

Thanks for sharing everyone - running trains does not so much bring me back to childhood, but it does allow for escape and dreaming while watching my trains run in a somewhat realistic miniature world. I do find I now have items I either had or wanted as a kid (at that time in HO).

My buddy had a permanent family layout on what must have been slightly bigger than 4x8 which they stored on ceiling hooks 10 months out of the year. At the time it was a dream layout with lots of Lionel operating accessories. There was not an inch of extra room to fit anything else in. That was a fun layout to run in the 60s. The old SF SuperChief was absolutely my favorite. I wonder what happened to that layout.

I suppose re-finding trains helped me remember the hours of time I spent building models, trying to rig up motors to make things work, painting and on and on - just trying to figure out how things work. The hobby today allows me to do just that. 5 years ago this was not even on my radar.  No kidding - the grand kids excitement over a simple floor loop triggered something. huh ...

Thanks John, Mark, Rick, Bill, Arty, Blue Comet (Ben?), Jerry and Randy for your contributions, all of which are a pleasure to read.

It seems to me that model railroading for us transcends our trains and layouts.

Arnold

I can return to times in my past that I enjoyed. I can identify with Mark. I grew up in northwestern Pa in Warren which boasted "15,000 friendly people" - half that size today.
I loved to go with my Dad, who worked for the Post office, when he would take mail to the RPO on the passenger  train at night when it came through from Erie going to Philadelphia. We only had PRR on the "Main line" This would have been in the 1950's. The first engines I remember were the Steam engines with their intimidating size and noise.It was fascinating watching them fill the water with the huge water spout. When the Diesels first appeared they were stunning with their sleek clean shape and quietness. The engineers now in the front. They still had the steam pushers from Warren to the top of the hill in Kane. I still model the area. The local ESSO station with my wife's 65 Mustang and my 1965 Galaxie 500 with the race team. (I still have my 1965 Galaxie) What a fabulous hobby..... Great thread

Turtle 2, My aunt had a '65 Galaxie 500.  Dad had a '62 Galaxie 500, and I had a '69 Galaxie XL.  My aunt's '65 was my favorite styling of the three.  It was a copper color that you don't see often.  It's great you still have yours.

I have one of those Wolf's Head tank cars too.  I have never seen the Tiona car before.  Nice Esso station.  The last I was in Warren was about 10 years ago.  It has been ages since I was in Kane.