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The official e-newsletter of Big Indoor Trains<sup><small>TM</small></sup> and Big Christmas Trains<sup><small>TM</small></sup>.  From the George Barkhausen family, c1923 originally posted on Papa Ted's site.  To see a bigger photo, click on this photo and keep scrolling down. Visit Big Indoor Trains<sup><small>TM</small></sup> primer pageOn30 Display Trains
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Written by Paul D. Race for Big Indoor TrainsTM and Big Christmas TrainsTM



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Trains-N-TownsTM, the Official Newsletter of BIGIndoorTrains.com, BIGChristmasTrains.com, and HalloweenTrains.com

This newsletter is for people who like O scale, O gauge, S scale, and Christmas trains, including people who combine On30 or O gauge trains with collectible villages. It is produced in conjunction with the Big Indoor TrainsTM, Big Christmas TrainsTM, and HalloweenTrains.comTM web sites.
  • If you did not get this Trains-N-TownsTM newsletter through your own e-mail, and you would like to get the newsletters in the future, please join our Trains-N-TownsTM Mailing List

  • On the other hand, if you don't want to receive our e-mail updates, please e-mail me with a "Please Unsubscribe" message (worded any way you wish), and we will graciously remove you from our list.

  • If you would like to subscribe to our free newsletter for garden railroaders (people running big trains outside), please join the Family Garden Trains Mailing List. By the way, you can subscribe to either, both, or neither, and we will just be glad to be of service, no matter what you decide.

  • Finally, if you would like to subscribe to our free newsletter about Christmas traditions, please join our Christmas TimesTM Mailing List.

In this Issue

This is going to be a "quickie," since we're busy and we know you're busy. We are squeezing in a report about the New Boston & Donnels Creek's Christmas-themed open railroad - usually we don't get the report in until December. But this way it might give you a little Christmas train inspiration.

The title photo is a reminder of just how long folks have been putting trains around Christmas trees, and how elaborate the railroads used to be. It is from the late Ted Althof's collection of 1920s-era Christmas-themed photographs. Ted seemed to think that this railroad included a working water feature. To see the rest of the photos from that collection, click the following link:

the Miller brother's automatic Lionel switching railroad. Click to go to article. I include this as a reminder of a much larger, more complex Christmas railroad track plan that has caused modern O-gaugers a certain number of headaches to try to figure out. As far as Ted determined, a cleverly arranged network of automated turnouts allowed the train to transverse the railroad by up to three separate routes in either direction. And there are years I have trouble keeping my trains going on a simple loop. :-)

To see the Miller brother's Automated Switching Lionel railroad, circa 1941, click the following link.

Now for a tip getting your own trains ready for Christmas: If you only have one train, and you're going to set it up in December, test it now. Every year, starting in early December, I get deluged with e-mails from anxious, upset folks whose train set doesn't work when they set it around the tree. There are places to get some trains fixed, of course, but they're usually swamped the whole month of December. Folks don't want to hear that the only way they're going to have a train running around their tree this year is to buy one. But if you wait until the tree's set up to test out your train, you may be in that boat, too.

My longterm subscribers know that I post warnings like this every year; most of the anxious e-mails are from folks I've never heard from before. Some want to know my phone number so I can "walk them through" a repair of their train, as though it isn't my busiest time of the year, too. It may sound like I'm exaggerating, but last year I got so many "please save our family's Christmas" messages, that I didn't get through them all until about St. Patrick's Day, which is a little late to save ANYBODY's Christmas.

By the way, the main reason I took my phone number off the web page was that folks from all over the country were calling me on Christmas Eve wanting me to find them a train, and maybe deliver it to their house in the next thirty minutes like a pizza. If you're on my mailing list, you probably have enough trains already. But if you are looking to order anything specific between now and Christmas, don't wait too long.

Topics discussed in this update include:


Click to go to articleChristmas Train Day, 2015

Yes, I know, this is the "Indoor Trains" newsletter, but there are some nice photos and useful ideas in this article. We had fine weather, lots of friends, lots of kids, lots of trains, Christmas music, and snacks.

Click on the following link to see our report, including some pretty cool photos, if I say so myself.

Our event is over, but there will be two big Large Scale indoor railroads open for viewing in the region, and, come December, a VERY nice outdoor railroad on display in northern Kentucky, Christmas lights, Christmas trains, and all.

Click on the following link to see some remaining opportunities to see big trains running this season:

Don't Wait Too Long to Order Trains

Here's a quick recap of where you can see train reviews in our Buyer's Guides. Starting about Thanksgiving, the remaining trains tend to go fast. Though I'm usually pretty good at guessing which trains will be in high demand every year, the ones that I expect to be slow sellers sometimes sell out first and the ones that I think will sell out first are still around next year. So the moral is, if you have your eye on some specific train, please order it soon to avoid disappointment.

Click to jump to the Lionel PageO Gauge Trains in Railroad Names - If you click on the Amazon link for a Lionel train and it is low or out of stock, be sure to scroll down and see the "Customers Who Viewed This Item Also Viewed" section, in case new trains have been added.

My favorite new Lionel train is the "Albert Hall' set, with the Great Western Railway (UK) locomotive that Lionel "borrowed" for the Hogwarts Express painted in its original green color.

To see the Lionel trains that are painted for PRR, NYC, UP, GWR, and other "real-world" railroads, click the following link:

Click to go to this pageO Gauge Trains in Christmas Colors - This year, Lionel has more trains decorated for Christmas than they have ever offered at one time. Some of the units are already in short supply, though.

Click the following link to see Lionel's Christmas-Themed O gauge offering:

Click to go to this page.On30 Trains in Christmas Colors - Hawthorne Trains used to order specially painted On30 train sets from Bachmann to sell in "collections."

These come one piece at a time, except in some cases you can order a "super saver set" in which the first three "issues" come in the first shipment, and after that, the subsequent pieces come one at a time. To see which collections are still available, click the following link:

Click to jump to this page.On30 Trains in Railroad Names - On30 is a great size for running with holiday villages, and it's a fun scale to model in regardless. Click the link below and scroll down to see the links for those products.

Click to go to this pageLarge Scale Trains in Christmas Colors - These are perfect for big displays in bank lobbies, etc. And they are "jaw-dropping" around the tree.

To see the Large Scale trains that are decorated for Christmas, click the following link:

See Large Scale trains that are kid-friendly.Large Scale Trains for Kids - There are several trains that work as well under the tree or on the bedroom floor as they work outside.

To see Large Scale trains that are designed to be kid-friendly, click the following link:

Click to go to this pageLarge Scale Trains in Railroad Names -

To see the best currently-available recommendations, click the following link:

Click to go to this pageHawthorne Village HO Sports Trains -If you've wanted to start collecting one of these sets and you've been putting it off, you should check now to see if your favorite team is still available. Several teams are not.

To see the sports trains that were available the last time I went through the list, please, click the following link:

Click to go to article.How Much is My Collectible Worth?

Nearly every time I publish my FamilyGardenTrains.com newsletter, a certain fellow e-mails me and asks me how much I would give him to buy his LGB set. "I'm not in the market, but what do you have, in case I run into somebody who is?" "Oh, I have three locomotives and a bunch of buildings and a big box of track and switches. What is is worth?" "Why don't you take an inventory, with the product number and condition of each piece and get back to me." "That's too much trouble. I figure I have about $6000 into it. I can let you have everything for $5800."

Doing the math, if he really paid $6000 retail, he could have bought the same stuff for about $3600 mail order, so that's the real value when it was new. Unless there's some individual piece or two that are really valued by collectors (not as common in Large Scale as you would think), it's probably only worth about $1800 used, and that's assuming I can find a buyer for every piece.

If I had a store and wanted to make sure I could make my necessary profit on the whole collection, I could not afford to offer him more than $1200, and $900 would be closer to the mark. Can you see why I DON'T want to get into this business?

On the other hand, a lot of people find themselves in a similar position as my friend through no fault of their own - they're suddenly the involuntary curators of someone else's collection, and often under pressure to get maximum value out of it. This article addresses some of the issues to take into account when you're making those kinds of decisions, or even if you're just trying to figure out what some old family heirloom is really "worth."

To see the article, please click the link below.

To see a related article, "How Do I Sell My Train Collection?" click the following link.

Click to go to article.Free Project Wire from Bad Light Strands

This is a reminder, from a previous newsletter, that non-working light strands are a great source of free project wire.

Click on the following link to see the original article:

Keep in Touch

Each month, we get more interest in this newsletter, in the site, and in the trains and towns we discuss. We welcome your questions as indicators of what we should be working on next (also, we always try to answer reader questions quickly). In addition, if you have any photos, tips, or articles you'd like to share with your fellow hobbyists, please let us know. All of the hobbies we report on grow best when we all learn together.

In the meantime, please accept our very best wishes for a great and holiday season!

Paul Race

BigIndoorTrains.com(tm)
BigChristmasTrains.com(tm)
HalloweenTrains.com(tm)
FamilyGardenTrains.com(tm)

To view the Trains-N-TownsTM newsletter for October, 2015, click on the following link:

http://bigindoortrains.com/trains_n_towns/15_10_newsletter_indoor.htm

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Return to Big Indoor Trains Home page Return to Family Garden Trains Home page Big Indoor Trains Primer Articles: All about setting up and displaying indoor display trains and towns. Garden Railroading Primer Articles: All about getting a Garden Railroad up and running well Garden Train Store: Index to train, track, and other products for Garden RailroadingBig Christmas Trains: Directory of Large Scale and O Scale trains with holiday themes
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Note: Family Garden TrainsTM, Big Christmas TrainsTM, Big Indoor TrainsTM, Big Train StoreTM, and Trains-N-TownsTM are trademarks of Breakthrough CommunicationsTM (www.btcomm.com). All information, data, text, and illustrations on this web site are Copyright (c) 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015 by Paul D. Race. Reuse or republication without prior written permission is specifically forbidden.
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