Kids Stuff!

[Robert Luland]

Talk about guys that love thier toys. Enjoy, Bob L

http://www.youtube.com/watch_popup?v=6VAuPPufNro

[frichie68]

Nice vid, thanx! ...Too many wheels, though.

[Chuck#1848]

Nice vid, thanx! ...Too many wheels, though.

Any one catch the green one powered with the propane tank? the young boy operating it with the father, It had chrome motorcycle foot pegs for the operators feet

[frichie68]

Ya, definitely not an old-school propane tank!
Missed the pegs.

[t-jacobs]

They run one of those in an old amusement park in north central PA. The park is called Knobels. Every time I go there I take a ride on it. They call it old smokey of course.

[EricOlson]

Great Video, looks like tons of fun. I volunteer at the California State Railroad Museum and we have a small scale locomotive that we run at a big event in Reedley California each year. I haven’t been down to see it run, but I think it still looks pretty good just standing still. The only shot I have of it is when I took my father-in-law down to tour the old shops where I volunteer. Someday I’ll ride it just like the guys on the video. Kids’ stuff indeed!
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[harleytoprock]

Wow, interesting hobby! Where do these trains come from? Did companies make them or are they home made models fabricated by the hobbiests?

[Sargehere]

Wow, interesting hobby! Where do these trains come from? Did companies make them or are they home made models fabicated by the hobbiests?

Most of those guys are machinists, first, and got into "the live steam hobby" as a way to have fun with their skills. Of course, there's a whole sub-culture grown up around them, and some ready-made parts, and I'm sure there are some who couldn't hacksaw the head off a nail and buy everything ready made, but usually, they're crackerjack machinists who are itching to show their skills.

Walt Disney was a famous backyard railroader. The line he built in his back yard in California in the '40s was what eventually led to Disneyland, et. al. Disney himself wasn't a crackerjack machinist, but he employed a few, and he had all the ideas and conveyed them to his employees. Around his head model railroad builder he created "Walt Disney Imagineering," the engineering dept. of Walt Disney Co.

That guy, I forget his name, but it's all on the internet, became "Imagineer Number One," and together, the Imagineers built the rides at Disneyland, and many attractions at the NY Worlds Fair, 1964-65, like audio-animatronic Abraham Lincoln, the Carousel of Progress for GE, and the Highways of Tomorrow for GM, and, of course, "It's a Small World," for Pepsi-Cola. After the fair the rides were taken down and stored in warehouses until he built Walt Disney World (opened in 1971) and most of them have been there, since. Lincoln still hosts "The Hall of Presidents" in the Magic Kingdom.

That's just what grew out of Walt Disney's backyard railroading bug. Of course, in the beginning it was a great way to get a tax write-off for your expensive hobby. He only had to film a couple of scenes used in "The Great Locomotive Chase" about the War Between the States for the "World of Disney" show on TV and it was all a business expense. He even made a TV episode just about his backyard railroad hobby. Smart guy, that Disney.