In recent years there has been nothing short of an explosion in interest in Model Trains. Some have said that this is due to baby-boomers who fondly remember their own model trainsets, now buying model train sets for their own children.

There is no denying that this is certainly the case for me. I am a baby boomer myself and I recall spending many happy hours with my brother and father building complex model rail networks. We completely transformed our dining room into what we called our railway room with a huge, elaborate system of tracks and buildings. We managed to keep the track set up in our railway room right up until Christmas when family guests for Christmas dinner meant that my mother insisted that we dismantle the track and return the railway room to its preceding dining room status. I can distinctly recall how disappointed my father was when he was forced to dismantle and box up the train track, locomotives and trackside buildings.

In fact, reflecting on those days, I think it was doing things with my father that was more important to me than the Model railway. My father was never inclined to play any field sports and only ever took an apparently cursory interest in my school work. But when it came to model trains and railways he would suddenly become animated and enthusiastic. The only way to get my father to put his newspaper down and leave his armchair was to suggest we turn on the model railway system. He would happily spend hours showing us how to use various model making tools to build our fantastic railway system.

Model trains can provide a fun and rewarding hobby for anybody, at any age. Model trains should not be confused with toy trains. Good quality model trains are scale models of the real thing that can provide a valuable learning aid, helping young and old to understand the development of rail transport.

It was way back in the 1850s that a German dolls-house accessory manufacture called Marklin introduced the first, boxed train-set. The product was intended to appel to boys, broadening their market. They were also responsible for producig accessories for their train sets including trackside buildings. The company are still in business today.

It was the American company Carlisle Finch who are reputed to have introduced electric trains in 1897, but the Lionel Corporation are responsible for developing electric model trains. Their first Electric train, called the Electric Express, was actually not intended for sale. It was originally intended to be used as a storefront display.

Jump forward to today and you will find many fathers, like myself, who have fond memories of many hours shared with their fathers building and playing with model train sets. These days we go out and buy model train sets for our children but they are really a way for us to revisit the happy times we had as children.