Sheridan Murphy spent $183 at the Rocky Mountain Toy Train Show on Sunday earning excited smiles from his son and potentially starting a family tradition.
The Highlands Ranch resident bought a 1947 Lionel Trains steam locomotive and coal tender and some lengths of track at the show in the Denver Merchandise Mart.
When Murphy, 38, was a boy in Palo Alto, Calif., he was impressed by the 30-car toy train a neighbor would run every Christmas.
Murphy thought of that train as he selected the first train his son Ryan, 4, would own. “So I thought if I am going to start a tradition like that, I would start with something that has historical value,” Murphy said.
On Sunday, as many as 8,000 people were expected to attend the show, which began Saturday, said Jim Marski, 56, past president of the Rocky Mountain Division Train Collectors Association, the show’s sponsor.
Tables throughout the Merchandise Mart held toy trains as old as a 1927 Buddy “L” Locomotive, manufactured by the Moline Pressed Steel Co., a model designed to be pushed manually. The price was $1,325.
There were T-shirts, coffee cups stamped with pictures of locomotives, and signs, one of which said, “In all things trains, Grandpa rules.”
Many of those who attended were collectors like Marski, who has 400 train cars along with tracks and paraphernalia at his Pine Junction home.
Marski got his first set of trains when he was 6 years old, he said. He still has it. “Every time I run it, it takes me back to being 7 years old and dreaming about the things you dream about with trains. … It evoked travel and faraway places,” he said.
Bob Jackson, 85, of Lakewood was there to sell a few of the 600 trains he has in his collection.
“I have too many. At my age, I need to get rid of some,” he said.
Among the items he was selling was a 1983 model of a Southern Pacific steam engine for $600.
A brand-new set of trains can go for as little as $150 or as much as $2,000, Jackson said.
Abe Melendez, 52, of Longmont came with his grandson, Antonio Fuentes, 5.
“He is a train man,” Melendez said of the boy.
Once a week, Melendez said, he takes Antonio to the library in Longmont, where a toy train set is on display. “He loves going wherever trains are at,” Melendez said.
Tom McGhee: 303-954-1671 or tmcghee@denverpost.com
