As kids for generations have done, Landon Tennant looks longingly at a streamlined Lionel Santa Fe engine as it chugs around a tiny display with houses, mountains and bridges at TrainLand, a hobby shop on Long Island, New York.
"I think I want to get, like, another one of the locomotives," Tennant said, barely containing his excitement, "because those look pretty cool, like that one."
When you think of Christmas, you might think of model trains around a Christmas tree. And there's a good chance it's a Lionel. The iconic American toy train company is celebrating its 125th anniversary starting this Christmas season and running through 2025.
"Everybody likes Lionel. It's nostalgic," said Ken Bianco, Jr., who's the third-generation owner of TrainLand and TrainWorld, the largest retailer of Lionel Trains in the country. He points towards the model trains.
"This layout here has three different Lionel train sets on it running and kids could operate the remotes over there. You see him pressing the horn?"
His dad, Ken Bianco, Sr., says Christmas has always been their biggest and busiest time of the year, both in person and mail order. In addition to their regular items, Lionel makes "Christmas sets, Christmas engines, Christmas cars, Christmas accessories," he explained. "You can do just a layout of Christmas items. And it's spectacular."
The company began making and selling toy trains in 1900, a time when electricity in homes was new and not yet widespread. Lionel CEO Howard Hitchcock says a young man saw potential in harnessing this new technology.
"It really all started with Joshua Lionel Cowan, who is the founder and for which the company is named," Hitchcock says. "And he was sort of an inventor and a young man, very entrepreneurial and, you know, really was working with electric motors. It was a fairly whiz-bang sort of toy. It was not simple. It was not wind-up. It was purely mechanical."
And technological innovation continues to this day. For years, the company's toy trains have offered realistic train sounds, smoke and digital remotes. And now, you can even operate your Lionel train from your smartphone.
"The young kids today are on their phone 24/7," says Ken Bianco, Sr. "So, Lionel said if they're going to be on their phone, we want them to play with trains on their phones. So, now with the Bluetooth set up Lionel has, they can play with their trains, multiple train sets on the layout.
"And Lionel's largest trains, called O Gauge, appeal not just to kids as toys, but to serious collectors too. Benjamin Laremont, an aerospace engineer in the Atlanta area, has more than 100,000 followers on his Instagram account, Ben's Trains. He got his first Lionel engine when he was 8 years old – and he still has it.
"My roster currently consists of about 47 engines," he said. "I know there's people who have way more than that, but for me, that's where I'm at right now. That's subject to change in the next few weeks!"
Laremont invests in the high end, highly detailed models and makes videos of them running on the tracks in his basement. But he's not beyond a bit of whimsy. For instance, Lionel offers different smelling fluid for steam locomotives, which makes steam puff out of the smokestacks.
"I'm currently running gingerbread smoke fluid and also blueberry smoke fluid," he explained. "But since it's Christmas, I'm heavy on the gingerbread this time of year."
Laremont hopes to purchase a Polar Express toy train set this season – one of the many brands that Lionel licenses.
Ken Bianco, Sr. of TrainLand notes that set is the most popular with customers. "Polar Express, Christmas every year. The other Christmas sets do very well, too, but Polar Express is number one - and it has been for the last 20 years."
Jack Martinek has been collecting for over fifty years, even though his Queens, N.Y. apartment is too small for a permanent layout. But where there's a floor, he says, there's a place to run Lionel trains.
"I bring them out for Christmas time, Fourth of July, Halloween, St. Patrick's Day," Martinek exclaimed, laughing. "I got trees for every holiday!"
And he is planning to buy more trains, maybe one of the new sets Lionel is putting out for its birthday bash – like some new Star Wars themed models.
Copyright 2024 NPR
