Christmas = Trains

Every year, we try to get our Christmas tree and decorations up as soon as possible after the American Thanksgiving holiday. It just makes sense to do so, since in the USA this holiday is our only four-day weekend. And because Thanksgiving falls so late in November this year, if we dawdle on decorations, Christmas will be here before we are ready for it.

In our house, decorating for Christmas means at least two, possibly three, train sets. I grew up in a household in which Christmas automatically involved model trains. That tradition grew from a simple train set under the tree to a large, never-finished 4-by-8-foot model train display in our basement, which featured an HO-gauge train set (Märklin) running simultaneously and intertwined with the operation of an O-gauge (Lionel) set. (I still have those two sets, but they’re not worth repairing since there are so many fine model train sets available these days.)

Since I don’t have the patience and room to design and operate a display that large anymore, a few years back, I invested in two end-to-end trolley sets. Your typical model train set runs in a giant loop, which takes a lot of space. But a street trolley, as you know if you have ever ridden on a light rail system (or a subway) runs from one part of a city to another, then reverses itself to run in the opposite direction.

The Christmas trolley I bought is absolutely perfect for my long mantelpiece. You turn it on, and the trolley slips out of a little train shed, and winds it ways across the wide part of our mantle, then tucks into a “tunnel” formed by a painting and some Christmas stocking holders. It’s a tight squeeze, but the trolley is just snug enough to run the length of this tiny space till it reaches the end of the mantel—and back again!

I leave the trolley up year-round, so I don’t have to set it up each year, and drive myself crazy trying to remember which pieces I need to put where. But it does require some tidying each year at Thanksgiving to clean up the tracks and car so it will run optimally for four or five weeks until it goes dormant. The trolley set I have is the (affiliate link) Bachmann Trains Village Streetcar "Christmas" Auto Reversing Set. It’s ON30 scale, but it will run on HO track. The only catch is that you specifically need the auto-reversing track, which sends a signal to the trolley that it’s time to stop and go back. If you want to add curves or bends to your trolley’s run, you need a few pieces of the Bachmann’s curved auto-reversing track.

I have one other trolley set that goes under our Christmas tree. It’s O-scale, and a little weird since it is M&M-themed. (Denise is a a fan of M&M candy art, not necessarily the candy itself.) Once I get that set up and running, I’ll post a video. For now, though, I hope you will enjoy the video of the Bachmann running through its daily duties, ferrying its nonexistent passengers from one end of Christmas to another.

And that reminds me: I have probably given you the impression by now that I am a massive train geek. I’m not. I’m an aspiring train geek. To be a true train geek, I’d have to really know something more about engineering and electrical circuits or I would very quickly blow a ton of money hiring people to help me do what I want to do. These two sets match my ignorance well, and satisfy my annual Christmas train itch. (If you want to get into Christmas trains, you ought to check out the very awesome website, Big Christmas Trains. I am not sure if the site is still updated. It was certainly a labor of love for some devoted train lover, but there is a lot of content on that site and the links still work. So I would start there if you want something for Christmas 2025.

Back to books for a sec: A while back, I wrote a Christmas time travel story about a model train geek named Preston. It’s a sweet story that I’m proud of. Preston gets to build the subway train display that I wish I had the know-how to pull off. He also gets to travel back in time.

Anyway, I should go because I need to build the under-tree village before I can install the second train set. Check out the video and my other Christmas books, why don’t you?

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Here’s the vintage image of a subway tunnel in the Preston book.

My holiday writing amounts to a whopping three books, if anyone’s counting. There are another three sitting on my hard drive waiting to be designed and pubbed. Maybe by next year?

Books 1 and 2 in my ongoing Kris Kringle series are out now. The main title, Sorceress Kringle, is about the time in the 1600s when Santa Claus saved a young New York City. The prequel, The Icemaster of New-York, tells Kris’s backstory, how she was rescued as an orphaned infant and adopted by the nefarious father of winter, Jack Frost.

The Kringle and Frost books are available in ebook, paperback, and hardcover. Preston’s in ebook and paper only. Even at novella-length, it’s too short to mess with a hardcover.

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Thank you for stopping by. I hope you like them all.

Click image to see buying options for Preston the Provider.