I was born on Christmas Eve 1952. As my father used to tell me he was under the Christmas tree playing with my train set the next morning. It was a beautiful set indeed! Dad had gotten me a Lionel O scale set with a beautiful red and silver Santa Fe diesel locomotive and various cars. That set would be something I played with until a Christmas, when I was in early elementary school, I received an HO train set for Christmas. Dad helped me built a 4 foot by 8 foot scale model railroad and the Lionel was sold off. In a way that changed my perspective on model trains and was the catalyst that lead to my huge, basement filling model railroad that I have today. But, I always regretted that my dad had sold off the Lionel trains. A couple of years ago I was at a train show and found someone selling a pair of those shiny red and silver Santa Fe locomotives. I might not have paid them more than a glance of admiration, but we were well into our Storybook Santa Experience sessions and I wanted these engines for my Santa set. I bought them. Sometime later one of my daughter-in-law’s grandfathers gifted me a Lionel set he had from his childhood. He knew I loved trains and wanted me to have it. When it finally arrived at the house it turned out to be one of those big O scale red and silver Santa Fe diesels with various cars, track and accessories. One evening I unpacked the whole thing, built a loop and put the train on the track. It still worked! After running it for a while I wrapped it all up and packed it back into the box. It was then I notice a message written on the inside flap of the box. That train set had been given to him on Christmas day 1952. I had been running a train given to this grandfather on the same day I received my first Lionel train set. Wow!

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