What is your 1st Childhood Memory that got you started with Trains?

My first memory of trains is that of being held by my mother so that I was hanging over the edge of Whitley Road bridge to watch the trains leaving Eastbourne station. I can clearly remember looking straight down the funnel of a streamlined Bulleid Pacific (Spam Can) locomotive as it passed underneath, and being enveloped in a wonderful warm cloud of steam and coal smoke. After that I was hooked for life. 

In 1956 my mom (Welsh), brother, and myself had taken the liner "Ile de France" from New York to England to see my grandparents who lived in Chester (they owned a corner store there).  While there we went to London to visit my aunt and uncle.  My mom and brother went back to my grandparents home, but I stayed an extra 2 weeks with my aunt and uncle.

 

When it came time for me to go back to my grandparents, my uncle put me on the wrong train, the train he put me on was a non-stop to Scotland, instead of Chester, from what my mom said.

 

He put us (me and their cocker spaniel Juno) on the train and left to get the tickets, when he got back, the train was gone

 

Here I was, a young kid from Virginia, on a train with a bunch of folks I could hardly understand (I'm sure they had a time with my accent as well).  All I recall is crying the whole way (I'm sure that made everybody comfortable), but was happy when they stopped the train to let me off.  When my mom and grandparents arrived I was sitting in a station (not sure where) eating cookies and drinking milk.  My uncle had them call/radio ahead and got them to stop the train.

 

Been interested ever since.  I wish I knew what type of engine and cars that made up the train because I think I would try finding a model of them

I picked up some Mighty Casey when my kids were little. The only two freight cars we have are a blue boxcar, and a gondola. The boxcar originally had paper B & M logos on the side. The labels feel off due to age, and I put them away. I think the gondola was red, but I am not positive. They are stored in my attic, I'd have to go and look.

There were also some yellow passenger cars.

We have straights, curves, and 90 degree cross tracks. I think switches may have been made, but we don't have any.

1.  Watching SP trains near Heights Blvd in Houston TX.

2.  Watching SP trains along US 90A Ft. Bend Co.

3.  Watching SP trains along US90 Alleyton to Schulenberg TX.

4.  Watching 3R O strains Sears layout N Sherpherd Dr Houston TX.

My earliest memory happened in 1953 in the capital of Midwest railroading, in Chicago. Everywhere you turned there was some form of railroading going on, from the variety of grand terminals to the el. In particular, the CNW terminal was a feast for the senses.Consists backed up the the bumpers, row after row spewing steam, the smell of cigar smoke and short order foods, the newspaper stands, the gate keepers st the big loading gates, the destination signs being constantly changed ,,,the 400 so polished it looked like a mirror surface...for a kid it was a place of wonder..

Christmas 1942!

 

Under the Christmas tree at age seven. I received a Berkshire freight set together with a dealer Plasticville display.This is something I will never forget.

Watching trains on the approach to the Hellgate Bridge from my bedroom window in Astoria, Queens. It is actually my earliest memory of anything at all. That is the only vision still in my head from the first two years of my life in that apartment.

 

Jim

 

age nine christmas eve about 12midnight.  that is when i got my first train.  

There are two, both around 1950.  One was riding behind steam power on the LIRR's "Fisherman's Special" to Montauk.  The other was riding a monorail on the ceiling of a large gallery of Wanamaker's department store way downtown in Manhattan at Christmas time, and passing above several American Flyer and Lionel display layouts.  There were lots of other toys too, but the trains were the only ones that mattered.

 

(formerly "New Yawk") Pete

I'm pretty sure my initial interest in trains stems from frequently seeing B&O trains crossing the concrete overpass that spanned Mahoning Ave.--the most direct access from my boyhood home on Youngstown's (OH) west side to what was then a bustling downtown Youngstown.

 

My first toy train was a Lionel tinplate set that actually belonged to my older sister.  For a couple of years in the late 1940s, I would set up that train around the Christmas tree and then be immersed in my imaginary world for hours on end.  

 

Around 1950 or so, I got my first "real" Lionel set--a top-of-the-line model, and for my birthday a few months later I was surprised by a huge layout that my father arranged to have built for me, off-site, and then transported and erected in our basement one Saturday while I was away at my music lessons and lunch with my dad.  That was the beginning of the beginning, and it changed my life forever, which I guess is kind of obvious. 

 

I cannot imagine a more fulfilling hobby!

There were actually two events for me.  The first was riding the Strasburg Railroad at age 3.  Yes I vaguely remember it!  More importantly the other memory was my first trip to NYC at age 6 in 1975 on the NY&LB.  The opened ended CNJ coaches were memorable, but the GG1 in Newark was what finally did it for me.  I've been fixated on that locomotive ever since. 

I was about nine years old when my two bachelor uncles gave me, my twin brother and older brother a 736 Berkshire freight set for Christmas 1953. About five years later, after the trains were put away after Christmas, I climbed up on a stool to view the engine stashed away by my father in a small space in the basement. I lost my balance on the stool and fell backward, with the engine in my hand, and hit the back of my head on the floor and the 736 landed on my index finger and dislocated it. I wasn't suppose to be doing any of this so I just acted like nothing ever happened when I went back upstairs where the rest of the family was watching T.V..  That finger hurt for a long time and I still have that engine today.

I got my first Lionel train for Christmas, 1951, when I was three.  It stands out for me because that Christmas morning, my parents kept on pointing under the tree, waiting for me to get excited.  For some reason, the idea of getting a toy train from Santa -- like the ones I used to see at the hardware store -- was so incomprehensible to me that I couldn't see the locomotive at all.  Much later in life, I learned that there's a name for this phenomenon, but at the time, I just knew that I couldn't see what my parents were making so much fuss about.  It wasn't till they actually reached under the tree and touched the Lionel 2026 that I finally saw and understood.  That 2026 and the gondola and two tank cars that came with it are still with me today, running and looking like new.  But they have a lot more company, now.

 

Even further back, I can just barely recall -- I must have been no more than a year old -- the Lionel layout my grandfather made for his daughters (one of whom was my mother).  There was a Lionel #1400 streamliner on it, and I'm its custodian today.

 

My mother dragged me across town to watch Robert Kennedy's funeral train go by. It sparked my interest, and I started riding my bike out there to watch the railroading action.

 

I think before that, I was semi-indifferent about the 2046 set that went around the tree each year.

 

I have no idea where this photo was taken .... its from Fusco's RFK funeral train collection. I just thought it cool with the GN boxcar (not that there was anything cool about Robert Kennedy's murder). Also, that Mercury in the photo was as my very first car when I was a kid. Lol.

 

 

In 1948, I received my first Lionel 027 tinplate boxcar on my second birthday. I received an addtional car on every following birthday until I finally received the steam engine to complete the train set. Then I was old enough to actualy connect the track together and run the set. This was my fathers first set and it still runs today.

I have a vague recollection as a toddler from when my parents rented a house near the GN mainline, while my dad was on a long-term auditing job.  At night I watched the headlights play across the room from side to side, and I listened for the approaching locomotives.  So I was hooked on trains early.

 

Later, 3 or 4 year old Christmas I received a huge plastic push-around train set in a single 9-foot long box - lined up  from engine to caboose.  Quite a few cars, black steam engine with a bell at the front, caboose.  Comparatively, it was G scale or larger (but not scale in any way - just a cheap plastic toy).  I wore that baby out, but it was grand while it lasted. 

 

Perhaps the next year I received a wind-up Marx tinplate set with track.   Loved it.

Probably when I was eight or so, I received a Marx O-gauge set, plastic cars.   I installed a battery-operating headlight in the loco with a cheap switch cannibalized from some other broken toy.

 

 

 

Growing up in the mid-90's, it was good old Thomas the Tank Engine on the TV and in the form of wooden railway that was my first step into the fascination with trains. I'm sure most kids of today had it the same way.

My first memory is from a few weeks before Christmas of 1959.  I was 5 years old and there was a mysterious table covered with a tarp, that had appeared in the basement.  Christmas morning, I found out that it was a layout that my father built with used trains and track.  My Mother had a fit.  He had spent $100 on those trains.  I still have the trains.  Sadly, I haven't found any pictures of that layout.

Here you go  Jim!

 

That's it, Hugh. With motive power from a much different era of course.

 

Jim

 

 

My Grandparents farm fronted on Maryland rt 301 and has the Popes Creek secondary across the back field. I remember PC and Chessie Engines and cars heading to the power plant. I could hear the horn for the crossing and ran out the back to count cars.

Im in the same boat. My dad made me a 8x4 U shaped table for me. my Mom laid all the track and i couldnt see it till she was done. It took me 30min to re lay all the track cause mom had it all wrong. Still to this day she brings it up.

My Dad and Grandfather set up a 4x8 Lionel layout platform for me and my older brother on our basement floor every Christmas.

 

My earliest memories were: bright moving lights, loud noises, and that unforgetable O-zone smell: Lionel 252 passenger set on the move.

Well for myself I would say it was Christmas 1976...my dad had given me a DT&I switcher set for christmas.  Plus there were all the trips to the racetrack to see the BN's E units.  I can still remember standing on a bridge with my father and as one went underneath us the engineer saw me and he waved.... and I have been hooked ever since.

 

LEE, You haven't changed a bit.

 

Great post's and photo's everyone, Thanks.

 

As far as I can figure out, it was most likely the book "The Little Engine That Could", which I had my mother read to me a zillion times (while my father was in WWII). I must have been 2 or 3 (1944-45). Also, we lived with my grandparents in Queens, NYC during the war, and my grandfather used to take me to a nearby overpass to watch the steam trains. I was a train nut before I got my Lionel set for Christmas in 1946...a 224 with freight cars. From 1949 to the early '50s, I spent MANY hours watching steam express and electric commuter trains at the Hollis, LI, NY train station whenever we visited my other grandparents. I was very lucky last month to find on eBay a photo of a steam passenger express approaching my Hollis station platform dated 5/48. Talk about memories!

I can't pinpoint my earliest childhood memory.  I remember when I was of single digit age painting highways on our 4X8 sheet of Homosote.  Also glueing Plasticville utility poles on it and stringing Mom's thread to simulate wires.

 

My Lionel 681 set was purchased for me (also Dad) for my second Christmas, 1950.

 

Many individual memories followed including going with my Dad to the Juniata Yards to pick up his PRR paycheck.  K4's pulling varnish were headed to the Altoona station and then on to fight the Curve.

 

Collecting, and knowledge thereof, began around 1972-73 with a visit to ABC Hobbies in Evansville, IN.

 

Great memories, all.

Several years back, I asked my mom about a "snapshot" that I'd had in my head all my life.  I was very young, remember looking out a window and seeing a downtown-scape with golden sun reflecting off the buildings.  She told me it was St. Louis, early in the morning.  We were on our way, via passenger train, to meet up with my dad and visit relatives in West Virginia.  I was two, it was 1964.

Christmas, 1966, brought a Lionel 19244 freight set.  I remember (yes, I do) being absolutely AMAZED.  I felt like I was being entrusted with heavy equipment.  I'd put everything together, then, when done, reverently disassemble and put it back in the box.  I even remember when we had the genius idea to get rid of the box.. but I still have the set.

I enjoyed reading everyone's post this weekend.  Thank you everyone for sharing.  After I started this post on Friday night, I watched "Christmas Toy Train Stores" from TM Books & Videos.  This is a new video that was just released this past week.  It is a nicely done video including a Christmas train layout at the Richard Nixon Library and his interest in trains.  Also there is large Christmas layout of 3800 sq feet on the video and several toy train stories.  If you like hearing about toy train stories like me, this is a good video to get.  

My first train set...Marx windup in 1955 when I was 5.

My first electric train...Lionel 205 MP diesel train set in 1957 when I was 7.

When I was three or so, the folks got me a wind up Marx 0-4-0 with some O 2 rail tin-plate 027 track.  Real train memories go back even further.

 

 

It is fortunate you have photos of you riding the Mighty Casey engine.I had one too,but no photos.The restoration of my engine is complete and is going to be ridden by my brother's little grandson this weekend.I will post photos here afterwards.

Dan

My first train trip did it. It was 1948 or '49. Mom, my sister, and I rode the New York Central sleeper to La Salle St. station, Chicago. Then that same sleeper from Dearborn station, Chicago to Los Angeles on the Santa Fe. I encountered Charlie Chaplin in the pullman corridor....didn't know who it was. Pretty sure the trains were the 20th Century, or Comodore Vanderbilt to Chicago and the Super Chief,  or the Chief to LAUPT. My dad flew out later...surprised us. After our visit with the LA relatives we also returned home by train.    

Dan

Your Mighty Casey looks good.  Good job in restoring it.  I did see your video of it as well and it sounds great.  My memories of the Mighty Casey are very vague.  I know I had 2 cars with it and enough track to make a circle in our basement. I am glad I was able to get a couple of photos from my mom.   Do you have any of the cars or just the engine?  Thanks for sharing.

 

Ken

First train memory? C&O coal trains running though the center of Ashland Ky where we lived at the time. I wanted my own train....thus the hobby I have to this day.

 

And to complete the circle I rode those same tracks last week on Amtrak riding home from Los Angles. I looked out the car window at the road where I watched the trains from.....55 years ago. Life is cool.

Dad was never one for many gifts, but He always gave the Big one.

Must have around 1965, My brother and I found a Lionel Scout set under the Christmas tree. But it didn't move until we rewired the power.

Dad never was good with electrical stuff.

A few years brought a Santa Fe Warbonnet F-? with dummy and more rolling stock. Eventually we got the Big Transformer and lots of Super O track. All of it showed up under the tree, set up, chunk at a time. I don't recall ever seeing a box so some of it might have been used, but it was wonderous to us.

I recall as a young teen, We had enough track to lay a loop around the outside of the (small) house and run the train. Power had to be connected to the slight uphill run to make it work.

Those were the days my friends.

Watching the #6 EL train from my grandfather's shoulder is one of my earliest memories. I can remember being carried down Middletown Rd to the EL.

Peter