What sparked you interest in toy trains?

[Brutus]

Grayson, it's long gone.  Was in an open top box in dad's basement for years and years, then at some point some of us kids (can't remember if I was in on this or not) played with it on the concrete floor wthout tracks down etc - it ended up in pieces and thrown away.

[AlgomaCentralfan]

My Dad would bring out the Lionel trains when I was a kid and put them around the Christmas tree.  They where his from when he was a kid (Post-war Steamers, ATSF F3's and a switcher and some freight cars).  As a kid I always enjoyed riding on the Metra with my parents to downtown Chicago also and we would go to the then Marshall Fields.  My Dad bought a few small Marklin trains there and over time he had aquired many other Bachmann, Tyco and Atherton HO trains from flee markets and garage sales.  But Lionel had me hooked.  I can't explain it they just look and sound like real trains even without realistic sounds and smoke and they are far less delicate.  I especially fondly remember getting the Pennsylvania Alco FA passenger set in the late 80's.  I will forever be an O gauge fan of all manufacturers.

[dsmith]

When I was 7 years old in 1957, I received a Lionel 205 Missouri Pacific train set for Christmas.

Two Years ago, when visiting a local train show, all the memories of that train set under the Christmas tree came back.  So now I have been building this Lionel Postwar 027 layout.  All of the engines, cars, accessories and scenery that I only dreamed about as a child have come true!

[Anonymous]

What sparked my interest in toy trains?  My love of real trains, I suppose.  I'm really not sure just how or why I came to love trains, but I've been enamored by them for longer than I can remember.

I can pinpoint the source of my love of O gauge toy trains specifically, however.  Back in the 50's, my uncle had a Lionel Scout set.  It was no longer around by the time I was born, but there is a photograph of my mom, aunt and uncle playing with it.  From the first time I saw that picture as a little kid, I HAD to have a train like that!  This lead to a quest for an "antique Lionel train".  I had HO and G scale, but still desperately wanted a Lionel.  I can remember as a kid being under the false assumption that Lionel trains and three-rail track were no longer made and were all collector's items worth thousands of dollars.  My dad once put an ad in the paper looking for Lionel and the only response we got was a woman with a bottom-of-the-line set from the 60's with a 1060 or simmilar steam engine that she wanted $500 for.  It had the box and I remember her saying that it was especially rare because the number on the engine and the set number on the box didn't match up!  And no-we did not buy it!

When I was 10, I finally got a vintage O gauge train.  It was a boxed Marx four-wheel plastic set from the late 60's/early 70's with a 490 steam engine, NYC tender, blue NYC gondola and bright orange NYC Pacemaker caboose, plus a six-inch tin DL&W hopper car in electric blue (to this day one of my all-time favourite Marx cars) and a big pile of track.  I was ecstatic!  My O gauge collection slowly grew with another Marx plastic set and a couple of Lionel cars and when I was 12, I finally got my first Lionel engine, a 1955 600 M-K-T NW-2 switcher.  I'm 20 now and have lost none of my love for toy trains.