I just had a personal email exchange with a buddy and fellow modeler, and we got on the subject of what got each other into the hobby and what has kept us there.
He remarked that Atlas is what got him into the hobby and I agreed. We both started with Atlas turnouts and Atlas sectional track, later moving to Atlas flex track. My first locos were Atlas diesels before picking up a few Bachmann steamers. But Atlas was my first influence.
And, I would never have gone DCC without the guys at my LHS suggesting an NCE system after I had started out with DC and a few MRC power packs.
And, without the help and advice from my three LHS, now all gone, I would not be in the hobby today. Once they were gone, these forums kept my interest and kept me in the hobby.
How about you? What influenced you to get into the hobby, and what has kept you there?
Rich
Alton Junction
After getting out when I was a kid in favor of other things (Hot Wheels, Nintendo and Sega games, Legos), what got me back in was a $5 Life-Like train set from a garage sale. To this day the Santa Fe GP38-2 is still a poor runner, but I don't know when I would've gotten back into trains without it! And what keeps me in is that I find them interesting.
_________________________________________________________________
I am a relative youngster in the hobby, having started only a little over a year ago. For me it started with a visit to the San Diego Model Railroad Museum. I was working in San Diego and had some extra time before my flight home. Some of the guys I was working with recommended a visit to the museum, so my wife and I went. After the visit we thought this was something we could enjoy together, me with the trains, and Sandra with th scenery.
Honestly, the strongest influence on keeping me engaged in the hobby has been the regulars in these forums. I have received the encouragement and information necessary to keep me going.
Richard
richhotrainWhat influenced you to get into the hobby, and what has kept you there? Rich
My Dad was the biggest influence and my fascination with trains.
I really don't know what has kept me interested..
By golly come to think of it, some times I feel like my Grandpa on my Dad's side and feel like it was a misspent life but,on the other hand like my other grandpa I loved every minute of it and wouldn't take a minute back..
Larry
Conductor.
Summerset Ry.
"Stay Alert, Don't get hurt Safety First!"
ENJOY !
Mobilman44
Living in southeast Texas, formerly modeling the "postwar" Santa Fe and Illinois Central
Guess I get to be the odd man out. It started with pictures of trains. Trains represented a romantic view of exploration, freedom, travel, and history rolled up into one thing. I could look at the old b&w pictures and imagine where the people were going, where the freight would end up, the lives of the old men in the road gangs. I wanted to know what they knew, and feel what they felt. Somehow that spilled over into wanting to make the scenes come alive for me. Then I added imagination, love for detail (I was a machinist and accountant at different times before becoming a computer specialist) and the electrical work which I like. DCC made it come together for me though. I let the hobby lapse for about 40 years and when my son got to be around 10, I decided to show him my old HO trains I still have from the 60's, and to buy some new ones (that still ran) and do it together. He doesn't have the bug as much as I do yet, but I keep thinking that someday he will pull old trains out of HIS attic and tell his son that these were grandpa's...and maybe that cycle will continue.
Modeling B&O in the early 50's.
I've long suspected there are generally two types of model railroaders, as far as how they got into the hobby. One group got a toy train set as a kid, and because of that, became interested in real trains too. The other group grew up near a rail line, or had a relative who worked for a railroad or was a railfan, and through exposure to the real trains became interested in model railroads. It would be interesting to research the two groups, see how their early years affected their layouts etc.
It was so long ago, somewhere back in the Eisenhower administration, but it was The Train Under the Christmas Tree. I never wanted to put it away, so it became a set of Lionels on a 4x8 sheet of plywood. Eventually, I sold those and moved to HO so I could have more of a model railroad and less of a train set. Atlas track, Athearn trains. When I finally graduated from college and moved away, and my Mom sold the house and did the same, I had to box up the trains and take them with me.
I kept them for 30 or 40 years, never opening those boxes, moving them from basements to attics as my life moved from place to place.
Finally, my wife suggested that I set them up, mostly because she was tired of seeing me in front of the computer screen all the time, wasting my time playing games. What she was expecting, of course, was The Train Under the Christmas Tree. It turned out to be a bit bigger than that.
These forums, my LHS (still going strong) and train shows have kept it interesting. Although I'm still a "lone wolf" modeler, I connect with others here, there and at those events. I get to see what's possible, and what's different. I'll give a shout-out to Walthers, too, for giving us a single point-of-contact for many manufacturers. And, as a scenery guy, I really like the structures from Jim at City Classics which fit into my era so well.
Now, I'm close to retirement, and a probable move from this house where I've lived for 30 years. Instead of mourning the loss of the trainroom I have, I look forward to the trainroom I will have. There are mistakes I've made that are too much to fix in place, so I've got plans.....
It takes an iron man to play with a toy iron horse.
My dad was the person that sparked my interest...back in the early 60's before kindergarten. He had built a very simple HO layout on a sheet of plywood and put it under the Christmas tree. After years of me getting upset that the trains were put away till next year, he finally set it up in the basement for me year round. That is when I consider my real time getting started in the hobby...when I did things on the layout without my dad's assistance. That was 1971 and I was nearing 10 y.o. So after that I got to ride on a local freight train with him and his cousin...rode on a Reading Alco RS3 #448 from Topton to Alburtis Pennsylvania in a snowstorm.
There was no turning back! I was a train/railroad addict from then on.
Working for Conrail offered considerable inspiration. Was at Enola from 1988 to 1994.
I got back in to it actively 3 years ago when I started building my layout. Northern Nevada has little to offer for a non gambler who has more 'cultured' interests. I stay home on my days off...no where to go. I work on the layout while listening to classical music.
Modeling in HO...Reading and Conrail together in an alternate history.
May I add............
I've been a member of this forum for about 13 years. Frankly, if it wasn't for the Forum and some really helpful individuals herein, I suspect I would have "sold it all" 5 years ago.
Thank you!
wjstix I've long suspected there are generally two types of model railroaders, as far as how they got into the hobby. One group got a toy train set as a kid, and because of that, became interested in real trains too. The other group grew up near a rail line, or had a relative who worked for a railroad or was a railfan, and through exposure to the real trains became interested in model railroads. It would be interesting to research the two groups, see how their early years affected their layouts etc.
Stix,There may be a third smaller group that was seeking a hobby and decided model trains would suit their hobby desires after watching a PBS TV program featuring model trains or by chance seen a issue of MR in their local library.
I knew a guy(haven't seen him in 10 years or so) that got started in the hobby simply because he always wanted a Lionel train set when he was a kid and he simply fulfilled that dream.
Well, it was my Dad in the guise of Santa Clause, who sparked my interest in trains and model railroads. My Dad was a train nut himself all of his life, although he never built a layout of his own. As a lad, he used to take his bike to the railroad line a few miles away from his home to help the guard lower the gates at a level crossing instaed of going to school. Believe me, that habbit changed quickly after my Granddad - a teacher himself - found out! After the war, he read an ad from a Japanese train buff seeking contact to German aficionados. He wrote a letter to this gentleman - the starting of a lifelong friendship. Dad used to take us to the train station each weekend, so we could watch trains. He taught me everything I know about those staemers which were still the main traction in my childhood days.
With that firm foundation, it is no wonder I stayed in the hobby ever since that start 50 years ago. There have been times when my interest meandered to other things, like education, job, family, but the bug was always there. Even though staying active in this hobby has turned into a major undertaking due to to financial and health reasons, it´ll stay on until that loco is coupled to the train for the final journey. What makes it so important for me? Just one word - friendship.
As a kid I witnessed the end of steam. What kid isn't drawn to steam when standing near a motionless N&W A and feeling the ground tremble under your feet just due to the massive amount of boiling of water and functioning of air pumps, the generator whine, the smells, etc. They are living machines, respirating like some giant black monster in repose.
Steam brought me to model railroading and it will keep me there, in spite of two 10 year lapses in the hobby since 1959. My relatively recent re-incarnation was due solely to fabulous narrow gauge R-T-R Blackstone products at prices that are truly affordable to a narrow gauge fan. DCC and Sound was also a deciding factor.
Model railroading has virtually been reborn in my eyes since I left it in the late 90's. Time to get back in, I thought in 2010. I guess I'm here to stay now that I will retire for good in 20 days at 68.
If I can't fix it, I can fix it so it can't be fixed
I modeled German WWII armor and one day looking at what was available at the store left me bored. I found an Athearn Amtrak dome coach that looked interesting for some reason and I bought it. Well one thing led to another i.e. more cars and finally something to pull them. I got out of the hobby and got married. My mother called me a few years later and said she was going thru the storage shed in the back yard and found the trains and was going to throw them out. I went over and everything was still imtact! I worked on a new module yesterday!
RMax
I owe my interest in this hobby to my departed dad, he was a major railfan and avid HO practicner to the point that he was permitted to build a 5 X 10 layout on his Navy ship! During our time in Japan in the late fifities we would frequent Tenshodo Hobbies for the latest offerings, I still have those early brass examples, probably 90% of them articulateds with no particular road being favored which he continued to buy new and used for the next 30 years, the so common of the times Athearn, TM, and others long forgotten comprised the remainder of the fleet. Upon retiring and several relocations, we built and operated numerous HO/HOn3 layouts including one that consumed the living/dinning room which pleased mom to no end! I had a Uncle involved in the hobby as well, he presented me with a Jupiter-119 set in a glass display case for my 10th birthday.
These memories keep me in the hobby, true many a moon has passed, but i'm considering HO for my next endevor and enjoying those memories while making some new ones to the fullest!
Dave
Both my parents had influence in my interest in trains.
Mother had traveled by trains around the country in one of her first jobs. She liked the real thing and had the foresight to take me and a friend on a short ride from Manchester to Rutland, VT on a regularly scheduled STEAM passenger train, knowing they were vanishing rapidly from the rails. When Lionel came out with their pink "girls train" she was appalled, "trains are black" she said. She also enjoyed going on excursion trains later with her grandchildren.
Dad didn't live near the tracks, but they did run through town bringing feed and the like that the farm needed.
They bought a used pre-war Lionel 0-6-0 set with a 4'x7' table that had a paint and sawdust scenery base. Over the years I bought/was given more to go with it, including a newer set with knuckle couplers, which didn't match the older ones (a great disapointment for all).
After their divorce, mom would get me to get the trains out and play with them. I usually set them up under the Christmas tree, but found tinsle a real pain. When she bought a trailer and a piece of land with a garage on it, she mixed and poured the cement for a floor, so we could use it as a family room. Original table was set up and Plasticville buildiings joined the trains on the table. There were also other things in life, so never progressed much further with layout building.
Mom remarried and I got a room in an old chicken house that had a wood stove for heat. Added tables and kept getting things for Christmas' but was still too busy with other things to do more than add space and track. Never got to reading magazines to get me really going on the scenery. Didn't know of anyone with a layout to inspire me. Did get an older cousin in the remarriage that imported Japanese HO brass locomotives, but I was still a Lionel guy, much to his chigrin.
College and Uncle Sam got things put away and a change in my stepfathers business took over my room. Whenn my kids came along I tried to start them in HO, which was almost affordable on my salary, but a damp cellar and a poor job on my part of introducing them to the hobby, they had little interest.
Bought our own place, no place for a layout, lousy cellar, small rooms all filled with other things and too busy farming to do anything. Brought the Lionel down from the graage for the grandchildren one Christmas, even added a passenger set. Kept it in the house, better environment. The next fall a fire went right up through the closet where they were stored. Pre-war and a few others survived.
When building new house, wife pointed to a framed in space and said that's the train room. Too busy farming to get more than a 4'x8' with sons trains running. No scenery. Room had several transient occupants, oldest son, mother-in-law and storage, but my dream was there and I started going to train shows picking up a little here and there for THE DAY when I could retire and have time to set up my dream. Semi-retirement came, but at the same time second son returned to the nest and you know where he settled.
Now I have enough stuff for a 13'x22' layout and only a 7'x14' room to put it in. My little 4'x6' sits in the middle of it, awaiting some more scenery pratice before it gets stood on its side and is replaced with an around the room shelf. A ceiling is in the works, then more work on the room before starting the layout.
I think just plain stubbornness has kept me in the hobby. I schedule my dentist appointments so that MAYBE I can catch sight of Amtrak heading south through his town. I enjoy going to shows, building kits and have even done a little scratch building. Have gotten a couple of folks started. Maybe someday I'll even have time to join up with a few others to share our layouts.
Have fun,
Dad and I were into MRR since I came into the world. Also real RRs played a big part in our lives. Once I got into the real world my mind was set on making money and with only a high school education that meant long days of being on the job. I remember my longest day was 261/2 hrs once. 16 hour days were the norm. While a lot of my friends went north to work in the resource industry and paid cash for their houses after two years, I made similar money but got to stay in Vancouver. I worked hard and played harder, though all that time I always had MRR in the back of my mind.
At thirty nine I decided to sell my average house in Vancouver for a monster house out in the country, same price ( thinking large trainroom). At forty I married a drop dead gorgeous girl I had been good friends with for fourteen years and we had two great kids. She is a Veteranarian and she has a fleet of Golden retreivers to keep her busy and I have my trains. We are both retired, I am 57 and she is 52.
Extreme sports are far behind me now as I am so full of arthritis I can barely get out of bed some mornings. Other days are okay.
About ten years ago my son had his Thomas layout set up on a 5' x 10' sheet of plywood. He asked if I had Thomas when I was a kid and I told him about the electric trains his Grandpa and I played with. Well that was it, I made the long perilous journey to the farthest reaches of the crawlspace and Thomas disappeared, the old electric train was set up and the rest is history. I have my room sized layout with lots of space to expand if I ever get that far.
My Dad told me to make as much money as you can when you are young because you never know how your health will hold up. I took his advice and now live a very comfortable life. I can't even Golf anymore but at least I have my RR and I owe that to my Dad being a train nut. This forum gives me the social interaction to go with my hobby and I thank you all for it.
Brent
"All of the world's problems are the result of the difference between how we think and how the world works."
richhotrainWhat influenced you to get into the hobby, and what has kept you there?
As far as I know nothing "got me into" the hobby, I've always been here. Loved trains and had toy trains of one sort or another as long as I can remember, and even before (see it in home movies you know). I remember crying when my parents would stop on the over pass to see the train go by below.
I assume that same magnetic attraction to the steel rails is what keeps me here. I don't need model trains as railfaning has the same attraction, but I think the models let me re-create or re-capture elements of the railroad history that I can't go out and observe first hand.
22 years old, and have my dad to thank. I got a 4X8 layout plus a Lifelike GP38/Caboose for Christmas one year. I still have that layout. I also have a local club to thank.
(My Model Railroad, My Rules)
These are the opinions of an under 35 , from the east end of, and modeling, the same section of the Wheeling and Lake Erie railway. As well as a freelanced road (Austinville and Dynamite City railroad).
fallNflagGuess I get to be the odd man out. It started with pictures of trains. Trains represented a romantic view of exploration, freedom, travel, and history rolled up into one thing. I could look at the old b&w pictures and imagine where the people were going, where the freight would end up, the lives of the old men in the road gangs. I wanted to know what they knew, and feel what they felt.
A visit to the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago got me started at age 6. Then a LifeLike trainset at age 9. And the photos in MR and RMC magazines my mom bought for me got it going.
The original V&O story, I bought each RMC as it came out, really did it.
I never liked the way the LifeLike or Tyco or AHM locomotives performed. I got an Athearn F7 supergeared and a few free rolling, comparative to the AHM stuff, Athearn BB kits and I knew I could get stock that was reliable and performed well. It was a good base for the future.
From about age 15 to late 20's, cars, girls, and then....um...beer....used up my hobby dollars and I didn't think much about the hobby. I got married and I've been back in the hobby for about 20 years now. My wife is supportive, but thinks its dorky.
She always asks...'how come your trains don't look like the ones in those magazines"
If there comes a day where there are no magazines or no forums, I'm pretty sure I would still be in the hobby.
- Douglas
Unlike some people who began with model railroading in their early life or later being retired. I was l was lucky to be born with railroads and trains in my blood, unfortunately I'm not working with railroad which gets me mad. The railroad that bought me in the hobby was a 1980s or 1990s Santa Fe El Capitan puzzle going thru the snow in upper state Arizona nearby or past Flagstaff.
Amtrak America, 1971-Present.
The Train Under The Christmas Tree!!!... it was Dad's (departed 2009) S-scale, a little more than a circle as I recall. He had some diesel models and a streamlined 4-6-4, but it was "Blackie", the 4-8-4, or maybe it was a 4-6-4... I don't remember. But anyway, it was the non-streamlined steam loco, with all it's moving parts and gizmo's... then the "smoke" when he would add fluid to it!
A while later and I was old enough and I got a Lionel 027 set for Christmas, and each year after for a few years I would get another piece or two to add to it. Somwhere around teen years I got some HO stuff and I built a small 4x6 layout that saw all kinds of abuse with all kinds of "stuff". That layout had a "HO" slot car track on it too which saw a lot of racing as I was a NASCAR fan by then (this was around 79-80+)... this was okay as it got me into scratch-building, as I remember scratchbuilding a service station for the layout... of course, this was as "full serve" was in it's dying days. Incedentally, several of my first jobs were at "full serve" stations; I remember all too well (and miss the days of) checking oil, coolant, tires and cleaning windshields!
The hobby got packed up and put on hold for years with not much thought till I bought the land I am on now about 9 years ago, moved my mobile home there and added onto it. The "train room" I built actually started as a "music room", but quickly turned into the train room with the thought of "I finally have somewhere I can actually build a layout"!
I've sinced received Dad's S-scale stuff, still in boxes after going through it, ashamedly, as I would dearly love to display it. Unfortunately, space and budget do not allow for the nice display cabinets I feel they deserve, but someday that will happen come #e11 or high water!
Happy RR'ing!
Duane
Wow, I just read through all of the replies to this thread, and I didn't realize what I had started.
Great stories, guys !
My first layout was a 4x16 foot lionel. I had it until fast cars and faster women came along. After my son was born, I decided to build an HO layout. I purchased the biggest piece of junk ever made, the Chatanooga choo choo.
While Tyco got me back into the hobby, they almost drove me out. After a trip to the LHS, Atlas locomotives replaced the junk Tyco. Atlas track was installed and Athearn trucks went under the Tyco cars. The derailments stopped and life was good.
Jim
This subject has been touched on before but at the risk of boring some I see no reason not to tell the story again.
As a young kid I was allowed to watch my brothers play with their Marx O gauge but never allowed to touch it. They burned the motor out before I was old enough to be allowed to run the train set.
Years later, long after I had moved out of the house, my mother asked me if I wanted what was left of the train set and I said "sure". The locomotive was in parts with the motor being a total write-off, but I managed to find a replacement motor at a swap meet, and next I had a crude layout up and running. Unfortunately I found the tin plate stuff to not be as interesting as I thought it would be.
That led to HO with my wife buying Hogwart's express for me for Christmas and I haven't stopped since then.
I'm just a dude with a bad back having a lot of fun with model trains, and finally building a layout!
Rich,
Nostalgia is powerful stuff.
When I was in High School my best friend had a large Lionel layout. He got me into Lionel but when College came along I sold my trains. Fast Forward to 7 years ago when my wife and I were dating. I met her cousin Adam who has quite a bit of Lionel. When.he came to visit he would play with wooden trains. I suggested we get a train set that he could run when he was here. We had neither the space or the money for Lionel so my wife bought one of those cheap shop rite setssets with Life Like junk. Any how it got the bug back on me. I still have the shop rite loco.
Recently I wen back to my roots by buying a post war Lionel set from a friend selling it on the cheap. It will be good for round the tree use.
Joe Staten Island West
I was sitting by some tracks as a kid, and a train went by.
It still works on me today.