when did trains become part of people s living rooms running around the christmas tree? the company started in 1900. a guy by the name of joshua lionel cowan right here in the city invented electric trains so what happened is as christmas went along, people wanted to add animation to the tree. so they took their lionel train set and put it around the bottom of the tree and created animation. it became an american tradition to do that. so now christmas and lionel go together. that makes perfect sense. we have a couple of they re called starter trains. yeah, these are what we call ready to run starter trains. we just saw thomas the tank engine. thomas is so popular. it has its own tv program. so the little kids really love thomashe tank. all right. now this one right here this is polar express. yeah, this is polar express right here. it s going right there. right there with the lighted cars.