From the editors: a CTT blog - Classic Toy Trains Magazine

1

Air Power: The O gauge Windmill from Woodland Scenics

Posted 5 days ago by Bob Keller

I have never tried modeling farming on my layout. I do, however have two ceramic barns (bought cheap) as filler for odd spaces left over from mainline curves. I always thought a farm would require too much real estate on an O gauge railroad. Until now, that was the end of my interest in three-rail agriculture. But not so much these days. The bolt out of the blue is that you don’t need a farm to use this. A green patch and a few cows or horses will work, or even a run-down, abandoned log...

4

My Best Christmas Train Memory

Posted 21 days ago by Bob Keller

I was fortunate to have an amazing uncle when I was growing up. The year I was born he got me a Lionel starter set. He ran a store that seasonally sold trains (Lionel, American Flyer, and Marx) and he added to my fleet every year until about 1967 when the store stopped carrying Lionel. I still have all my postwar trains and they all still run. In fact, in about 1992, I took my gear out of the box. When I fired up my no. 1033 and hit the juice, and my Seaboard NW2 lurched to action, it change ...

2

Christmas in July? Why not!?!

Posted one month ago by Bob Keller

It was pretty well-known around Classic Toy Trains that I had 600 or 700 Christmas songs on my computer, and that anytime of the year one might pass my office and hear Jingle Bell Rock, I’ll be Home for Christmas, Don’t Forget to Feed the Reindeer, or Christmas at NORAD. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ykzpUmKNw_Q Christmas music can be a palate cleanser year-round and can get you thinking about cool snow in the midst of a heat wave. The late Dean ...

3

A true "Christmas in July" memory

Posted one month ago by Rene Schweitzer

Note: Click on any photo to enlarge. We at CTT are celebrating "Christmas in July" this month! Some of you might remember the Kalmbach magazine Collecting Toys. It was a start up magazine that was a spin-off of Classic Toy Trains that featured toys of all kinds, from die cast, play sets, action figures, new toys, and more. When I started working at Kalmbach, I split my time between CTT and Collecting Toys. It was a fun magazine to work for. The editor, Tom Hammel, would atten...

1

Attending the TCA National Convention

Posted one month ago by Roger Carp

My wife and I just returned from a fantastic week spent in New Mexico, with the highlight for me being the opportunity to attend and speak at the annual national convention of the Train Collectors Association. If you have never taken the time to attend a national convention sponsored by TCA or another of the toy train collecting or operating organization, I strongly recommend doing so. The convention, held in the magnificent city of Albuquerque, featured a number of tours to see local collectio...

4

Thank you, Richard Kughn

Posted 2 months ago by Bob Keller

Thank you, Richard Kughn It would be hard to come up with a name of anyone who changed the face of the toy train world than Richard Kughn. Like many of us in the hobby electric trains were an exciting part of our childhood, and they were memorable in his. The main difference between he and most of his fellow enthusiasts was that he was in a position to change the course of the hobby. In my case the trains went into boxes in the late 1960s and other than for re-packing, didn’t co...

1

Toy Trains and Our Dads

Posted 2 months ago by Roger Carp

Whenever Father’s Day approaches, I think about my many years as a father and my many years as a son. All of them have involved toy trains. Like many fathers, I made sure my two sons had an electric train set to enjoy. Specifically, I brought home from Classic Toy Trains a K-Line diesel freight set for them to play with more than 25 years ago when they were very young. The three of us played with it for a few years until the novelty wore off. Looking back more than 60 years...

5

What is the most unique building on your layout?

Posted 2 months ago by Bob Keller

What is your layout structure you’d call the most unique? Like most O gauge hobbyists, I buy the buildings I like, and only later think about what I’m going to do with them. I mean my central city is composed of ceramic buildings, but I’ve got several MTH multi-story buildings (my fave is the Menlo Park Tool & Die Co.), a few Lionel structures, a large number of kit-built businesses, and the rise of Woodland Scenics and Menards structures has resulted in a tower of stack...

7

A look inside Kalmbach's David P. Morgan Memorial Library

Posted 2 months ago by Rene Schweitzer

Note: Click on any of the photos to enlarge Did you know that Kalmbach houses one of the largest private collections of railroad photos and reference materials in the United States? It’s called the David P. Morgan Memorial library, and it resides on the second floor of our building. The creation of the library must be credited to founder Al Kalmbach, who started accumulating materials in 1934, when The Model Railroader began publication. When Trains magazine started publishing in...

4

Trains in unexpected places: Rene visits the Neville Museum in Green Bay WI

Posted 2 months ago by Rene Schweitzer

Click on any of the images to enlarge! Last Friday, I drove to Green Bay to visit the Neville Public Museum. They had a history of Green Bay display that looked interesting. My mom's side of the family lived in Green Bay for decades. It's not a large museum but they had some train-related items I thought you might like to see. First, they mentioned the Chicago & NorthWestern Depot (right across the street from the museum), which is now home to Titletown Brewery's restaurant. I blogged ab...

2

The Lionel Illinois Central E6

Posted 3 months ago by Bob Keller

After I was done testing the Illinois Central A-A combo (See Classic Toy Trains July 2019) , I decided to try something off the wall. Would the trailing powered unit function on it's own, or would it need the companion for operation. I was actually pretty pleased with the results. First, no sound was produced by the unit. I presume the sound command board is in the lead unit. It did produce a nice, steady stream of smoke. Speed range matched the A-A combo and each A unit racked up 1 po...

1

The O gauge no. 279-4493 Sprecher Brewery from Menards

Posted 4 months ago by Bob Keller

The hobby demanded it! Menards supplied it. One of the most often requested additions to the Menards building line has been a brewery. The Wisconsin-based home improvement chains delivered with a hometown hero of sorts: The Sprecher Brewery. Based in the Milwaukee area, it was the city's first craft brewery, arriving on the scene in the 1980s. The company started in an old industrial building and later built a new brewery and visitor's center. The company is actively involved in community eve...

1

O gauge County Suites Hotel from Menards

Posted 4 months ago by Bob Keller

This isn't your grandfather's roadside motel! The new no. 279-4427 County Suites is the perfect stop for your O gauge tourists or businessmen. The structures looks as modern as any chain hotel you'd find out on the interstate, and better yet, it has a modest footprint (roughly 12x12-inches) that might find a home any any layout. The structure is fully decorated and assembled and features four stories plus a rooftop patio for entertainment. Rooms are a mix of occupied and unoccupied, s...

7

Have any uncommon road names you run in your trains?

Posted 4 months ago by Bob Keller

It has been said there has been more than enough New York Central, Pennsylvania, Union Pacific, Santa Fe equipment made for toy trains and I tend to agree with that to a point. Most CTT readers would recall the days when being stopped by a freight train was almost an adventure. As the train rolled past you scanned the cars for the most exotic and remote road name you could find. Also high on the list was reading any advertising copy like “Route of the Chief,” or “Southern Se...

0

New CTT posters!

Posted 5 months ago by Roger Carp

UPDATE: Learn more about the 6464 series of boxcars in my new Professor Carp video! Too often when I’m visiting the homes of toy train operators and collectors, the walls of their basement or attic where they display their treasures seem especially bare. Maybe a dusty old lantern hangs from a hook, or there are faded photos of vintage cars and planes. Fortunately,Classic Toy Trainshas the answer to your decorating woes. We are proud to offer an exclusive set of three full-color posters d...

6

My 2020 (the engine, not the year)

Posted 5 months ago by Bob Keller

Getting back into the hobby in the early 90s was pretty thrilling. Most of the places I had lived since my trains went into the box in the late 60s simply didn’t have anyone that sold Lionel trains except during the holidays. There was one hobby shop that sole largely rusty track, but no rolling stock. At Christmas, the Melbourne, Florida Sears store was the only spot I could find new trains. But Sears was selling just sets, not any of the other gear you need like track, transformers, or...

8

Wild Blue Yonder: MTH USAF 44 tonner

Posted 5 months ago by Bob Keller

Being somewhat under-employed these days, you’d think I’d have an unlimited amount of time to run trains. Not so. In fact, prior to last week, I hadn’t run a train in the basement in about a year. A few months back I asked Jack Sommerfeld to track down an MTH US Air Force 44-tonner, and he did. But it has been sitting in its box for about two months and enough was enough. The first thing was to clean off the junk that had accumulated on the right-of-way. Next I dug out my ...

7

My favorite train books ... when I was a kid

Posted 5 months ago by Bob Keller

Like most of us in the hobby, I have pretty much been a life-long train goober. While an uncle gave me a train set for my first Christmas, I had the usual assortment of real toy trains (Auburn rubber locomotives, little die-cast push metal steamers), and I even used my brass Casey Jones steam engine bank (with a happy face cast into the firebox) to pull imaginary trains. When I started reading, my first elementary school had no library. But the second school I attended did. It was a bit shy o...

1

Loco Lookback 7: Lionel's Westside Lumber Shay (CTT Feb 2001)

Posted 6 months ago by Bob Keller

It is very possible that the greatest show on tinplate rails isn’t a circus train, but an industrial locomotive. It has motion, sound, and just might be the slowest engine on anybody’s layout: The Shay. Shay’s are geared locomotives designed for high traction, slow speeds, and with small wheels that didn’t damage track that just might not meet Class 1 railroad standards. The locomotive used vertical cylinders that drove a longitudinal shaft that drove axles thro...

4

On the Test Track: MTH RailKing RDC set

Posted 6 months ago by Bob Keller

I used to say that I wasn’t a passenger train guy. Oh, I had the no. 2400 series cars from when I was a kid, but I rarely ran passenger trains. Then I noticed that I had quite a New York Central fleet: Williams streamlined and heavyweight sets, a Lionel traditional heavyweight set, an AMT streamlined set, a RailKing Aerotrain set, the jet-powered RDC, and a bunch of Williams Amtrak gear including Amfleet and Superliner cars, and, oh yeah, that Metroliner set. Is there a supp...

2

New stake trucks from Menards

Posted 7 months ago by Bob Keller

Just rolling into Classic Toy Trains are the new staked delivery trucks from Menards. The latest addition to the Plug & Play line are nicely detailed trucks in a 1950s design that fits in with any railroad modeling the late 1940s to the early 1960s. Where most previous Menards trucks have been a mix of plastic and die-cast metal, these are crafted with plastic. This allows greater detailing such as wood texture in the stakes, side grills, hand grabs, and simulated rooftop running lights. ...

2

On the Test Track: Vintage style with the MTH Q-type subway set

Posted 8 months ago by Bob Keller

The no. 30-20427-1 Q-type subway set from MTH Electric Trains was the first equipment I tested as a Contributing Editor and it was a fun run. The original cars were originally assembled between 1903 and 1907 for Brooklyn Rapid Transit (BRT), and were re-built in 1938 to accommodate the surge for the 1939 World’s Fair. They were primarily wooden and were erected by a wide several companies. They appeared similar to passenger cars operated by steam railroads of the day, and travelers ent...

2

A pre-Christmas visit to Sommerfeld's Trains

Posted 8 months ago by Bob Keller

Sure it was a cold Wisconsin day, but it didn’t take much effort to get me out of the house last week in order to run up to Sommerfeld’s Trains in Butler, Wisc. Ages ago I’d asked Jack to track some stuff down for me and I hadn’t followed up on the search. Hey, I could have picked up the phone and asked, but what fun would that have been? I arrived a few minutes before he opened and there were already a couple of cars moving in to park behind me. Before I left, it w...

5

Loco Lookback 6: O gauge P&LE 2-8-4 by MTH (CTT January 2005)

Posted 8 months ago by Bob Keller

Now where was I? Oh yes, welcome to Loco Lookback no. 6 The A2a-class Berkshires of the Pittsburgh & Lake Erie Railroad is a pretty sad one. In the waning days of steam operation, the company decided that it needed to replace its World War I-vintage H7-class 2-8-2 Mikados with newer power. The railroad didn't believe there was a viable diesel on the market that could meet its requirements. So in 1945, the P&LE convinced parent New York Central to begin replacing th...

1

A "sweet" Halloween gift

Posted 9 months ago by Rene Schweitzer

What does a box of Dots candy have to do with toy trains? Plenty, if you are the Railroad Museum of Long Island! But, I'm getting ahead of myself. . . My favorite movie candy is Dots. My husband chooses Sno Caps, but I always pick Dots (the traditional flavors). Imagine my surprise when he tells me I have a "Halloween gift" to open. It's a custom-run Lionel boxcar. . .with Dots and Crows graphics! The car was produced by the Railroad Museum of Long Island, who has a history of having these cu...

6

Christmas (special issue) is coming soon!

Posted 11 months ago by Rene Schweitzer

Most regular readers know that most years CTT publishes a stand-along special issue. Topics have varied from track plans, Lionel showroom layouts, Electric Trains from A to Z, and more. This year's special issue is one near-and-dear to most of your hearts, Christmas and Electric Trains. I've come to realize in working for CTT that many of you strongly associate toy trains with the holidays. During the past months, Roger Carp has been hard at work to find the best and most amazing Christmas-re...

5

Holy cow! Another new structure!

Posted one year ago by Rene Schweitzer

Farmers, hold onto your cows, because the Greater East Martian Cow Abduction Co. has landed! If you attended the International Toy Train Expo, you will have seen this structure already. Menards has released something different--a UFO scene! This scene comes with the UFO, a shed, trees, figures of a farmer, cows, and aliens, and of course Jack the German Shepherd. The UFO has colorful LED lights on the top and around the perimeter of the ship. There is also a "tractor beam" light unde...

4

Loco Lookback 5: Williams New Haven Rectifier electric (Nov 1999 CTT)

Posted one year ago by Bob Keller

I bought my first Williams diesels some time before coming to Classic Toy Trains. They were a pair of GP9s and a New York Central Alco PA A-B set. It was awesome when I got them and they are still pretty impressive, though they shy more than a few of the bells and whistles even the most basic engines have today. What impressed me about Williams in the mid-1990s, was the firm’s drive to make new, well-running basic models at decent price points. You also could find...

0

ON THE TEST TRACK: The new Williams by Bachmann Amtrak F59PHI

Posted one year ago by Bob Keller

These days it is really unusual to receive two new locomotives within a day or so of each other. Last week it was the Atlas O Trainman line Dash 8-40C. This week it is the Amtrak F59PHI passenger locomotive from Williams by Bachmann (WBB). Our quick lubricate and run showed a good performer. A conventional locomotive, it operated well above 6 volts and was smooth running.The steady engines sounds were nice and the horn was superb. The F59PHI has become something of a design icon for both Amt...

0

ON THE TEST TRACK: The new Atlas O Trainman Dash 8-40C

Posted one year ago by Bob Keller

Behold the no. 20032007 (TMCC) Union Pacific Atlas O Trainman line Dash 8-40C. The model is offered in conventional ($269.95) and TrainMaster-equipped ($429.95) version. The model requires O-36 diameter curves. The Command-version includes TrainMaster, Improved RailSounds, Cruise Commander speed control, remote couplers, and a smoke unit. The conventional version has operating horn and bell sounds and ditch lights that oscillate the the horn is blown. First, the model looks g...

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