# Did Your First Train Set Come to You as a Christmas Gift?



## Guest (Dec 11, 2018)

For me, yes it did. Christmas morning when I was eight years old. I woke to find a Plasticville village with a Lionel Berkshire freight set running on the layout. That particular Christmas, many of my buddies also received a train set. It was the must have gift for boys that year.

Our O-Gauge hobby has stayed with me since. Not many Christmas gifts can have such a profound impact on the future.


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## seayakbill (Jan 16, 2016)

Yep, first train set delivered by Santa around 1950 was a Marx wind-up. The following year Santa delivered a Lionel 2026 steamer set.

Bill


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## ogaugeguy (Feb 3, 2012)

Yes, an American Flyer set from the late 1940's which I proudly still have today. It even survived being in a house fire thirty years ago which consumed my parent's entire home.


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## Dieseler (Jan 29, 2014)

Yes back around 1965
.
Fast forward to early 1990s at Berwyns Trains which had relocated from Tinley Park i knew the owner Tom somewhat and his mother very nice folks as a side note then on harlem ave. Most recent location is now on ogden ave around oak park ave. Anyways fell in love with the blue comet set which came out around 1976 and the Mrs knew it as i had mentioned it.

After telling her about it was going to pull the trigger and decided shortly afterwards to call the store and was told they sold it.
Well it was sold to my wife along with another blue comet car that was a separate sale car for the set .
Still very nice set as only ran several times and put back in there boxes.


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## Tom47 (Dec 8, 2012)

My first train was delivered by Santa in 1954. I still have the train plus more.


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## Spence (Oct 15, 2015)

Santa bought my Lionel Scout in 1956. I've been hooked ever since.


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## BanjoSlaughter (Nov 6, 2018)

Yes sir;

My uncle bought me the Firefox HO set in 1985 when I was 8; I would spend hours each day playing with that set until I was 14. I wish I still had that old set!


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## PatKn (Jul 14, 2015)

My first train set was given to me on Christmas 1957. I was 5 years old. It was a Lionel Super-O Berkshire freight set with a ZW Transformer.


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## seayakbill (Jan 16, 2016)

PatKn said:


> My first train set was given to me on Christmas 1957. I was 5 years old. It was a Lionel Super-O Berkshire freight set with a ZW Transformer.


WOW Pat, you must have been a really good boy that year. That was one of the top of the line sets.

Bill


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## Chugman (Jun 17, 2015)

My first Lionel set I received at Christmas time and it was very exciting. I had saved for almost two years and my Mom had matched my savings (early 401K) until we finally had enough money to buy it. We ordered it from our local Coast To Coast store, which was the only place you could get one. When it arrived, we wrapped it together and I couldn't open the box until Christmas eve. Was very hard to wait that year.

After my first bicycle, it was probably the best Christmas present I ever got.

Art


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## Guest (Dec 11, 2018)

This is a picture (from the internet) of the set Santa brought me for Christmas 1949. I was born a week later so I don't remember receiving it that Christmas. Lionel trains were always there, just part of growing up. That Christmas gift let to a lifelong hobby for me.


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## PDDMI (Oct 25, 2015)

Here is mine from 1949...the 027 #1115 Lionel Scout Outfit and an ad that had it priced at $15.95.

















The next year I received the 6 Unit Erie 2023 Twin Diesel with Magne-traction...it was priced at $57.50...but could be bought for $6.00 on terms! Pretty sure my folks...ur, I mean Santa bought it that way too...


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## bluecomet400 (Sep 13, 2015)

My first complete set; this was under the tree on Christmas Morning, probably 1972 or 1973. 


John


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## Bill Webb (Sep 14, 2015)

I join the, “Lionel trains were always there, just a part of growing up.”

I never remember receiving one for Christmas and expect it was in December, 1948 (born 2/26/48) but if Santa got it earlier or later, I don't know. And I do not remember asking.


That seems a bit strange now but then again, it just always was. I remember accessories, turnouts, cattle car, culvert loader, trestle set, etc later.

My friends had trains and it was just part of growing up.

What a wonderful gift, memories, a lifelong interest, and something that Paula and I share today. And it was Lionel, absolutely no question, a habit that I did not break until two years ago when I could no longer pretend that Big Orange was remotely the same.

That removed more of the magic than I care to admit.


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## santafe158 (Jul 14, 2010)

My first set was brought home by my dad during the Christmas season of 1997 when I was just shy of three years old. I'm unsure of whether or not it was a Christmas gift, but I suppose it was close enough to the holiday that it was. My second set, the Lionel Santa Fe El Capitan passenger set was definitely a very well received Christmas gift about 10 years later.


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## DonR (Oct 18, 2012)

Absolutely, the first train was a Sears special
Marx 027 electric with 2 turnouts. $10.98 The pages of that Sears Christmas catalog were dog eared as I pored
over the train pages for weeks...I wanted it so bad. 
But it was December 1941, and
the radio news was talking about the military needing
all of the steel. I fretted that there would be
no train as a result. But, sure enough, come
Christmas Eve, there it was. And I was the happiest
11 y/o in town. 

There's been American Flyer S gauge, Mostly Atlas
N Scale in the 60s, and a lot of DCC HO in the years since.

Don


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## empire builder (Apr 12, 2014)

1957 I received a lionel 623 black sante fe diesel switcher with a brown caboose santa could not afford more cars but had a good 8 foot oval track with a silver bridge a short tunnel and a flashing crossbuck signal. I was in lionel train heaven until I went to run it well santa somehow lost the other wire from transformer to track connector so there it sat silently for 2 days as Christmas was on a Saturday and we all know back in the 1950's stores were closed for holidays and for sundays.
my mother felt so bad about it as it was the main gift santa brought me that year.

anyone here remember a wire that if electric put to it it would actually smoke from the heat generated from current flow I cannot remember that wires name but it had an unusual color of cloth insulation around it.
at least the following Monday we went to the then lionel hobby shop downtown and all was up and running yes younger folks we actually had to go downtown to shop.

I had actually wanted the lionel F-3 set with all silver passenger cars I still can see them in my mind as if it were that era again.

do you folks remember the smell of the transformers when new after they were heated up funny how the little things sticks in ones mind many years after the fact!


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## Stoshu (Jun 20, 2015)

_The one Christmas I almost had a heart attack. There it was, just the boiler poking out from around the tree... It was just a Sears starter set from Lionel, but what memories. I still have it... thanks to this thread I may get it out tonight....
_


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## SantaFeJim (Sep 8, 2015)

Yes. Christmas 1953 a Marx set.


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## WildcatRR (Jul 28, 2013)

Ah the Christmas of 1964 which me and my brother received was the all time greatest in our recorded history of Christmas. My Father received his first ever big Christmas bonus from where he worked. We received the Sears 4' x 8' store floor display layout with a Lionel 2026 freight set and a Marx AllState steam freight on an elevated track on the board. Plasticville buildings, various lionel accessories and a KW transformer to run everything. As a bonus he also picked up the Sears HO slotcar store floor layout. My dad bought these on Christmas Eve night and come Christmas day what a surprise for me and my brother. We stayed in our pj's all day playing with our sets. Truly the greatest Christmas of all time. God bless my Mom and Dad for giving us the greatest Christmas of all time.


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## kstrains (Sep 19, 2015)

Yes, I received this set in 1977. I still have it and it runs.


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## DennyM (Jan 3, 2016)

It was 1963 or 64. It was a 2037 and some rolling stock, track and a type 1015 transformet. I remember seeing that Lionel box under the tree.


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## Chaostrain (Jan 27, 2015)

Nope! My first train was a hand me down from my sisters. They weren't interested.


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## beachhead2 (Oct 31, 2017)

Yep, 2017. From me!


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## AFGP9 (Apr 8, 2015)

Yep my first American Flyer set was set up and running in a figure 8 on the cardboard trestle set that came with that set halfway under the Christmas tree Christmas morning in 1954. 
I still have that set.


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## Guest (Dec 12, 2018)

My first set was an HO Canadian National. It was set up around the Christmas tree on Christmas morning 1972.


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## Traindiesel (Sep 8, 2015)

My Grandfather bought Lionel train sets around the late 1940s. About nine or ten years before I was born. So I always had the 5X9’ layout running during the Christmas holidays while growing up. I still have those sets today. I do remember getting trains for Christmas in different gauges occasionally. 

The biggest regret for my grandfather was trading in a couple American Flyer sets for some new N scale sets. At the time, mid 1960s I believe, Flyer was getting scarce as AC Gilbert closed up.


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## Maxum (Apr 10, 2017)

I remember it well, Christmas 1972. My dad built a 4x8 layout for my brother and I. It had a figure 8 with a loop around it. My set was powered with the Santa Fe FA AA set. My brother got a little steamer. For my next birthday my parents got me a Santa Fe GP9. When I hit my teens and lionel trains weren't cool, I sold everything off. Fast forward to two years ago. I reconnected with the person I'd sold the GP9 to over 35 years earlier and was able to buy the locomotive back.


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## papa3rail (Oct 8, 2016)

Yes Christmas 1962 my Mom bought an American flyer set for me my sister and my pops, you can probably guess which kid logged the most time with that gift it was my Pops.


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## Booly15 (Aug 16, 2017)

yup, 1966, my mom saved up S&H greenstamps, (for those under 50 ask someone) and got me a scout set, while I do not have that one it did light the fire that has never left me.


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## Pebo (Sep 27, 2015)

PatKn said:


> My first train set was given to me on Christmas 1957. I was 5 years old. It was a Lionel Super-O Berkshire freight set with a ZW Transformer.



Pat......I remember going over your house and seeing that set....I seem to remember that you had a 497 coal loader...am I correct?

My 1st set was when I was 5 in 1958. Brought by Santa, Christmas 58.









Peter


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## PatKn (Jul 14, 2015)

Beautiful set Peter. Yes I own the coal loader. That was a later addition to the railroad. I always got another addition to the train set every Christmas. Those were good times. 

Sent from my SM-G955U using Tapatalk


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## Patrick1544 (Apr 27, 2013)

Yes. Lionel set for Christmas. Probably 1955 or 57. Then every Christmas after that, Dad would add more cars and some operating accessories to the collection. Miss those times in my life.


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## BWA (Jun 16, 2012)

Christmas of 56, it was three rail, but, not Lionel, nor, even O gauge.....

It was British made Hornby Dublo…..00 Scale, running on HO gauge track...…

And, I still have all of it, and, it still runs great....

Here's a video for proof. Have added a lot to it over recent years, but, all the original track/switches are in this layout (plus more), two of the original locomotives, and, most of the rolling stock are from the first couple of Christmases...…


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## Thephile (Oct 31, 2014)

Yes it did, back in 1949, that is me in the picture playing Mr. enginer.


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## Thephile (Oct 31, 2014)

Very Cool


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## Lehigh74 (Sep 25, 2015)

My first set was a Christmas gift in the mid 50s. I don’t remember it though as I was only a few years old. I only know about it because of photos with me, my brother, the Lionel trains and a Christmas tree.

Thirty years later, my wife got me my first set that was actually all mine. A Lionel DC steamer, a few cars and an O27 oval. That little oval has morphed into my 20 X 20 attic layout.


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## D&J Railroad (Oct 4, 2013)

Yep, 1955, a Lionel 027 work train. 
Got it taken away for a while shortly after that when I nailed the track down on the ping pong table.


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## lend33 (Jan 19, 2017)

*1966/67 Lionel O-27*

My uncle bought me when I was 5 or 6. Don't know the name or model. It was a steam engine with tender, A Lehigh Valley Hopper. The coolest thing for me was the box car and the roof would open and launch a helicopter from it. Also was an addition to my dads pre-war Lionel set all metal! Baby Ruth Boxcar, Shell Tanker, M & Stl caboose.

Then I would go visit my other uncle who had a permanent layout in the cellar. A 4X8 Lionel Oval running all beer boxcars. 

Then the main event was the uncle who bought e my train set wife's father who work for the Erie-Lackawanna Had this huge bi-level train layout in the living room. 

Great memories.Would not be Christmas for me without a train layout running


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## ed&bingo (Sep 20, 2015)

Christmas 1938. i was 8 years old, a 224E set with a 164 log loader, 165 magnet crane, 98 coal elevator & a 93 water tower. it was all set up on a table with grass, & trees. Track & 022 switches. We had a live in maid & chauffeur. The chauffeur also did all the painting and house repairs. He set up the RR. My father was making $25,000 a year in 1938. We lived in New Rochelle, NY . He commuted to NY City on the NH RR. Just a little history if anyone is interested.


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## beachhead2 (Oct 31, 2017)

I _am _interested. That's cool, Ed.


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## Pebo (Sep 27, 2015)

PatKn said:


> Beautiful set Peter. Yes I own the coal loader. That was a later addition to the railroad. I always got another addition to the train set every Christmas. Those were good times.
> 
> Sent from my SM-G955U using Tapatalk


Pat.....another thing I remember from that time is how huge I thought your 736 was.......and then today, how small a 736 seems when we compare it to the scale-sized steamers that we run!

Peter


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## LVR_Firebird (Oct 29, 2018)

My first Lionel train was technically a gift from my wife in 2006. I say technically because I went to hobby shop and bought it but it counted as one of my gifts 

I had some HO trains when I was younger but ever since I have gotten the Lionel, I haven't looked back. I got the bug and bought a bunch of stuff on eBay


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## PatKn (Jul 14, 2015)

Pebo said:


> Pat.....another thing I remember from that time is how huge I thought your 736 was.......and then today, how small a 736 seems when we compare it to the scale-sized steamers that we run!
> 
> Peter


Very true, Peter. Put that 736 next to a scale berk and it looks tiny but in the 50s and 60s it was a big engine. 

Sent from my SM-G955U using Tapatalk


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## icolectto (Nov 28, 2012)

*Christmas Gift*

Yes, in 1951 my Grandmother gave me a Lionel 2026 set. That was the beginning. That set is running today in a place of honor. It now has several friends for company ! ! ! !


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