It isn't just small boys who love playing with toy trains. Thousands of adults throughout the world are enthusiasts too, many with extensive layouts of miniature tracks, signal-boxes, stations and, of course, engines to which they devote hours of their leisure time.
When the famous German toy train company, Marklin, held a Model Railway Exhibition in its home town of Goppingen, near Stuttgart, a few months ago, more than 30,000 people flocked to see it, most of them grown-ups.

Needless-to-say, some of the company's pieces from years gone by are very collectible nowadays and fetch remarkable prices. At a Christie's sale in London last year a rare Marklin 00 Gauge electric locomotive and tender made in 1938 realised nearly £35,000! Such pre-World War Two models are extremely desirable to collectors with legendary locomotives especially so. A rare Marklin model based on the Swiss electric so-called "Crocodile" engine from that era fetched nearly £2,000.

Curiously, the Marklin company was founded by a man with quite a different background. Theodor Marklin was a plumber who made bathroom and kitchen fittings.

Approaching Christmas in 1859, he had the idea of making a few toys, including model trains, to give his business a boost. They went well and he expanded that side of his manufacturing to produce them all year round. When he died in 1866 his wife, Caroline, was confident enough to take over, specialising as he did on extremely well-produced tin-plate models, especially those connected with railways.

The Marklin company and its up-market aims continued to the present day with breaks only during the two major wars. Today, it has a worldwide market. Among its most popular toy trains are some with the world's smallest gauge, Z, only 6mm between the rails.
A Christie's sale of a collection of such Marklin miniatures last year went for a total of over £200,000. It included a rare green SK800 locomotive, together with a station and toy figures of railway staff and passengers, that fetched £2,000.

This month's "Marklin Mania" sale at the famous London auction house on the 18th will offer such rare examples as a 1925 model of Leipzig Railway Station in Germany which still exists. It is expected to fetch around £8,000.
An extremely rare mountain Etat locomotive, produced for the French market, could make the same price.

Marklin aimed at selling in America too, producing toy trains of interest to enthusiasts in that country. A rare model of the famous l930s American locomotive, Commodore Vanderbilt, is valued at around £12,000.

The late TV personality, Hughie Green, was a great model railways enthusiast who owned an extensive track lay-out and trains with which he spent many happy hours playing. He used to recall sadly though how it was lost. He had it with him among his luggage while travelling by air during World War Two when the plane got into difficulties.

"The pilot maintained the plane would have to lose weight to keep airborne," he said. " This meant that among other items much of our luggage had to be thrown out. It broke my heart to see the cases containing my much-loved model trains drop down and disappear into the Atlantic Ocean!"

By Jack Pleasant

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