Everyone has probably stopped at a railroad crossing and waited for the train to go by, but did you really observe the engine and the cars as they passed?

Trains have always been a part of our county's heritage, but in recent years, seem to be thought of as vehicles of the past, their spirit being kept alive only in museums and by historians.

I recently met a man who is keeping this American legacy alive in a “small way.” F. David Bailey of Marcellus was raised on the west side of Syracuse near the Fayette Street rail yards of the Delaware-Lackawanna Railroad, where his parents ran a grocery store and restaurant. The time was circa 1946, and Dave was an impressionable 7-year-old. He remembers railroad workers coming in for lunch and speaking of “places that sounded exotic, like Baldwinsville, Jamesville and Oswego.” He told me that one day the workers asked his parents if they might take him for a train ride.

He was allowed to ride in the cab with the engineer and fireman.

Dave had a model train set, and one of the workers, a switchman, put it on a 4- by 8-foot sheet of plywood for him. His parents later bought him more plywood, trains and track, but there was very little scenery.

When Dave was 21 years old he packed his train sets away, and when he moved to Marcellus 16 years later, he sold them.

Apparently his attraction for railroads didn't go away. Ten years later, he built an enscale layout.

“When my boys became interested in trains, I built an HO gauge railroad for each of them.” Bailey said.

During the holidays, each room in the house had a Christmas tree in it, and he decided to build a train set to run under each tree.

“I built three sets before I stopped,” he said. He then built an O gauge (standard size model) in his attic, complete with scenery.

After retirement, Dave built a 12-by 24-foot set in his basement. He calls it “a work in progress after three years. I don't think it will ever be done.”

It consists of six operating trains, two trolleys, a subway, a repair track with a car for repairmen, bridges over water, a city from the 1950s, residential areas, factories, two stations, tunnels, street lights, and my favorite, the beginning of an amusement park with dodge 'em cars and a shooting gallery, complete with lights and sounds from the past that I know many would remember.

The oldest running stock is about 20 years old, and the oldest piece in the set is a Tin and Marx “Glendale Station,” purchased in the 1950s. All local trains are New York Central and Erie Lackawanna.

Dave earned a bachelor's degree in art illustration from Syracuse University and uses his skill and knowledge to create and layout the scenery.

He also holds a master's degree in costume design and taught at the Kathryn C. Heffernan Elementary School in Marcellus for 28 years, retiring in 1995.

Dave enjoys building “his own wonder” and likes “the feeling of going back to being a kid again when I watch my trains run.”

If you would like to share information with Dave, he's in the book.

If you would like to contact me with your memories or a great story, call me at 567-9989 and we'll “go back” together.

Tom DeFurio is former town supervisor for Sennett