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1988. Bachmann Spectrum GP-30 CSX road name $55.00 complete. (I still have it, anyone want it? ) That was all the rage in the day. Tech II supposedly was the top power you could get according to MR. You were told that command control and personal computers will run your railroad someday... Little do we know then that the INTERNET IS the railroad today? Instead of fighting thru packed Greenburg trainshows looking for that one OOP item, you can spend a few hours on EBay and find it. Athearn Kits (Blue Box) were about $2.40- give r take a little, now some of these appoach 10.00 with prices on Ebay sometimes topping 50- for NIB Pickle tanks from Athearn. I made $3.35 minimum wage pushing a library computer hooked into a network that was insanely fast for the day but inadequate and very very obselete today when compaired to DSL. Heck, I could run that entire County's network on THIS computer and internet connection at once. Brass 4-8-4 in the WM paint scheme for the Western Maryland imported costs about 570- (I think.. not sure) which was WAY expensive for the day. Now at about 1250 retail it is STILL way too expensive today. I think gasoline was about 75 cents a gallon, milk 1.50 a gallon a Atlas NICKEL silver switch was about 8 bucks against a good old brass for maybe 4 dollars. Super detailed dioramas shown in mall is smiled and pointed at with comments of "Wow very nice choo choo..." Today's exravagant displays are followed with "Wow that took alot of money to make" And there are folks that can take a bit of paper, pencil and a paperclip and create a award winning model for any show given enough time. Today's models require every little componet painfully manufactored and then slowly assembled while constantly recheciking against the EXACT prototye. And in 1988, everything was availible ALL the time. To walk into the hobby shop thru the year is to walk into a place where nothing needed to be special ordered a year ahead of time, new products were released on time and there were room in homes to actually run a pernament layout. Now we squeeze into tiny apartments and soothe each other with a 2x6 branch attached to a 4x8 foot layout. I think I better stop here.... The best for last... a certain lionel O gauge trainset was able to be assembeled for about 200 dollars in rolling stock and about 300 for the matching engine. Today such a complete set commands 1500-2000 at a show and you had to marry into the sales man's family and raise his grandchildren before you were given the oppertunity to buy it for yourself. Smile!
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