My adventures in this hobby cover sixty plus years in most gauges, starting with some MARX at about age four and then Gilbert Flyer for about nine years. Brief incursion into HO post Flyer, but then the usual hiatus during late high school years, college, military service and marriage. About 1972 at age 30, I acquired a 384 freight set and caught the tinplate bug. My adventure continued with postwar O, MARX and MPC. Visits to local flea markets and TCA meets yielded multiple original boxed Lionel standard sets, whose engines required wheel replacement as well as some detail parts. Incursion into LGB at that time which led to multiple engine acquisitions and an elaborate layout. After the LGB came the Lionel Classics state and Blue Comet sets and a 390E passenger set. This evolved into some G gauge Lionel and eventually three live steam gauge one locos hauling LGB cars. Then more MTH Tinplate Traditions state and BC sets along with more LGB. Then a jump into Lionel O scale with two JLC Challengers and multiple MTH O scale locos. When the Brute and its Showroom cars came out, I had to have a set. More standard with Lionel's Commodore Vanderbilt and Hiawatha sets. In 1997, we purchased a train depot/home called Bear Creek Junction and I had a large multi-gauge layout in the former waiting room. When we moved back to Nashville, I set up both an O and standard gauge layout there, thus having layouts in two homes in two states. Fast forward to 2022 where I have three concurrent loops of standard, G gauge and Lionel 2" gauge for the battery powered train sets. Total investment of multiple $$$$$'s over those sixty plus years! But can you really put a price on the pleasure and happiness that a peaceful hobby provides?
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