Copyright 2000 t. Sheil & A. Sheil All Rights Reserved
The ins and outs of Winter, trains and trees
The Fall season is boom time for the Toy Industry. It is traditionally the time of Yule shopping sprees. Christmas shopping was and is a big thing. Now that other religions have cast their own line into the Winter holiday season, it's a glory time for toys. The entire industry focuses itself on this season, which is when they make most of their profits.
Of all the toy maker, the ones that go full-goose-Bozo for Yule are the train makers. Trains are traditionally associated with Yule. thus, the time between October 1 and January 1 s make-it or break-it for the toy and model train industry. Every train maker tries to get their best stuff of the year in place for Yule sales. Even toy train makers, who make a splash every time they release a catalogue to collectors, try to clean up at Yule.
How did trains get mixed up with an ancient Northern European festival? After all, Christmas is just a Christianized version of Yule. Hannukah is the Jewish holiday that falls closest to Yule. The real Yule celebrated in English, Norse and German speaking countries goes back to the days before the Vikings. It was a Winter festival that honored the "rebirth" of the Sun. Regional variants abounded. Part of the fest was the "Yule visitor." In some places it was Odin Allfather, come to have a drink and bring sweets for the kids. In others, he was Thor Almighty, while in still others it was Freyja come to give cookies to the good children and take a switch to the bad ones.
Thor and Freyja had something in common: chariots - actually old Norse war carts, as part of their mythical trappings. Moving a miniature cart was considered an act of worship. However, this was largely forgotten by the Middle Ages, except for a few Thorists who secretly kept the old beliefs. (We'll get back to them later.)
For centuries, the Germans retained the Yule tree. It was pretty much forgotten in English-speaking countries, until Germans in America spread the tradition.
Yule, or Christmas, a slightly-Christianized version, became more popular in the 1800s. The old tradition of gifts was expanded, much to the delight of merchants. The Yule Visitor gained new prominence, be he Britain's "Father Christmas" or Germany's "Father Yule" or the American "Santa Klaus." In Norway, he remained Jule Nisse, a sprite who lived in the barn. by 1900, the Yule holiday was a big gift-giving season, and an updated tradition brought gifts to good children and a sack of coal to bad ones. The people of Scranton, Pennsylvania doubtlessly hoped for a large crop of brats in other parts of the country, what with the Lackawanna County coal industries.
The first toy trains were expensive. They were the kind of gift for a special occasion. That would be Christmas. As the toy market became an industry, it learned to focus production on the Yule holiday season. Some promotional materials displayed toy trains among Yule trappings. It caught on, and trains became forever associated with Yule.
After a few decades, a new tradition arose: setting up trains for Yule. The man of the house would bring out his old train set for the holidays. Today, some sets have been through four and even five generations! They are part and parcel of the holiday trappings.
The toy industry revolves around the Yule holidays, and train makers are most dependent on the season. Those outside the industry would be amazed at the process. In the US, companies reveal toys for Yule during the Toy Fair, which is held in New York during the early part of February. Most of the new toys will start hitting the stores by late April or May. Usually, a second wave of toys is shown over the Summer, to augment what is already coming. The actual work toward Yule is full on in July, when companies start buying, selling and making their advertisements. Most distributors have sold off their Yule inventories by the end of October. Closeout sales from distributors start in November and continue into April.
Because folks were getting wise to the system, companies started offering 'limited editions." The idea of the scarcity of items was used to impel quick sales. In toy trains, it has gotten ridiculous.
Some idiot - that's the only word that fits - got the insane idea of making toy trains in Christmas decor. These were meant for store displays, but half-wits buy a few for their children every year. After a week, the Christmas colors lose their charm, thus assuring that the train will lay dormant until the next season. Christmas-decorated trains, along with being the most ludicrous in appearance, are remaindered on store shelves after the holidays. Sold at cost to clear space, they are snapped up by railfans who will repaint them or use them for spare parts. Consider the Christmas train the worst gift of all, what with its odd appearance and limited appeal. It fades with the season.
The Jewish kids used to feel left out at Yule, except for the few whose families accepted a secular version of the holiday. Hannukah's role expanded, and has become a time of gift giving for Jewish children. Of course, it took another act of idiocy to do for Hannukah what was done for Christmas: a Hannukah train! The story goes that this item bombed out. Thus, the same knuckleheadedness which infected Trains for Christmas almost spread to Trains for Hannukah. Both Judaism and Christianity are plagued with the same percentage of half-wits, but since there are fewer Jews there just aren't enough half-wits to support Hannukah trains.
Which brings up another anomaly: kids who get a double-dip because of a loophole in the religionizing of the holiday. Take the case of a little boy and girl whose father is Jewish, their mother is Catholic, and they are the only grandchildren on both sides of the family. Add the fact that both sets of grandparents are real sweethearts. Those kids get double plunder: first Hannukah, then Round 2 with Christmas. While everyone else goes nuts with religious differences, some kids get doubly lucky. (The grandparents like it, too - they get a double dose of holiday dinners with the kids.)
The small religions have their own take. There are Heathens and Pagans who want a purely religious Yule, and can't figure out how to include Trains. Alas, it is hard for Goddess-worshippers, Odinists and their kind. That is no problem for the small Thorist religion. These folks see trains as a modern form of the old Norse chariot, and indulge themselves by keeping a constant train-run going the whole time the Yule tree is standing. In fact, a small group actually take an annual Yule Season train ride, thinking it somehow honors Thor himself. (Rumor has it they favor a run from a major station in northern New Jersey.) Buddhists, never at a loss, indulge themselves in Yule festivities and trains without hesitation. Confucianists and Taoists are of a similar bent. But nobody matches the Thorists for a pure power show under the Yule tree.
Some folks go overboard. Take the fellow who wanted a "rolling nativity scene." He had shepherds and animals in a gondola, baby Jesus in an ore car, and the three Wise Men standing in the open part of a work caboose. The tackiest "Mary on a half shell" couldn't come close to it for pure schlock.
The newest twist are the Department 56 villages, which have become the tinplate of a new century. These porcelain structures are hauled out and set up with the trains, in Tin Scale format: 1/48 trains, 1/32 people, and buildings ranging from 1/64 to 1/40 in dimensions. Cheaper versions abound, however. Between the gaudy villages and the trains, it looks more like a carnival than a yule village. Collecting kooks have gotten a double dose, for they can collect both toy trains and porcelain houses, all sold as Instant Collectibles. Whoopee!
When pets and small children are involved, trains have to be larger. HO won't cut it, and N scale is destined for destruction. Little hands make short work of everything. When you consider that an N scale locomotive is the size of a mouse, and an HO engine is the size of a rat, you can understand that Kitty's input won't be harmless! Nothing works like a diecast steamer in O or Standard gauge. G gauge can thwart most animals, but diecast is pretty much the "universal cure" to animal antics. Not always......we had a cat who could derail a Lionel S2 Turbine steamer with a swat. And O gauge is not always safe. A large dog of the aggressive nature, such as a Malamute, can easily lift a diesel and shake it into dysfunction.
There's also the fire safety thing. Trains spark...and nothing sparks as much as antique O and Standard gauge! The original Marx locomotives sparked wildly, not to mention their penchant for creating enough ozone to save the ozone layer. Beside these sparklers, the numb and the brainless will arrange cotton "snow", thinking it just fine. But one spark is all it takes. Folks need to consider fire resistant matting along the tracks, and maybe a track that impedes sparks. The tracks with pre-formed roadbed impede most sparks. Nonetheless, sparks will fly and cotton will smolder, so long as there are a few duds amidst the Yuletide train runners.
When it comes to Yuletide preparedness, I showed my own bit of ingenuity. The missus and I had bought HO trains to run under the tree (and miracle of miracles, we ran them for four years before the cats noticed their rat-like dimensions!). Seeing as our cats would doubtlessly wreck a plastic village, compounded by the fact we lived in an apartment with limited storage space, I devised a most ingenious solution: paper kits. Using my computer publishing system, I designed and produced a host of small buildings. If Kitty wrecked one, just print up and assemble a replacement. (And if you want some, you can download them for free from my website!) The problem - it was so much fun that I eventually designed over150 buildings!
However, we all have Yule quirks, and one of mine still causes consternation. As a kid, Mom wouldn't let us run trains under the tree. I had a rather mean streak, and decided to improve the Yule village. My improvement: military invasion. A line of ROCO tanks coursing through the Yule village. The barrel of an M47 protruding ominously around the Santa's Workshop. GI Joe sitting in the tree with his rifle, taking a bead on Frosty the Snowman. Mom didn't appreciate it. When on my own, with my own Yule tree, friends found that my military additions were unsettling. And my wife has come to dislike them. Audrey makes every effort to remove such mischevious additions as soon as they are revealed. She does frequent inspections of the Yule decor, including the train, for any signs of miniature armaments. Nowadays she even checks the open doors of boxcars for recoilless rifles. I remember how she freaked when finding a machine-gun team ensconced in one of her Yule hovels....and the fun of seeing her expression when she discovered that the flat car load had mysteriously transformed from logs to ballistic missiles. This year, it's going to be flat car loads with tanks, half-tracks and air-defense artillery. I have learned that the military incursions have double the shock effect, when the motion of O27 is included. Why do I do it? I do it to shock people! Believe me, the reaction of appalled Yule revelers makes it all worthwhile. Nothing like a freak-out for the holidays......for the cost of a few soldiers, it's the best joke in town.
But fun is fun, and for many of us, there's something about the whirr of a Marx motor, the clank of tinplate and the waft of ozone that makes Yule complete. We love our trains around the holidays, and though many are year-round railfans, there's still something special about Yule. This year, it will be an old tinplate doing the rounds in our house. Hopefully, you will have something equally enjoyable for yourself.
Happy Railroading!