My interest in S-scale trains revived in the early 1980s. There was very little available in hobby shops except in junk bins, but Lionel had some reissues of old Gilbert product that did little but dampen my enthusiasm. Then I noticed an ad in Model Railroader for an American Models FP7--the first F unit I ever saw in our scale! AM had boxcars and gondolas, too, and they had free running wheels with actual springs in the trucks. The quality and variety in even those early stages is what drove me back to 1/64 scale instead of flunking out to the easier HO camp. The AM product line expanded with more locomotives, rolling stock, and track with the help of and eventual split from S Helper Service. SHS and Des Plaines Hobbies' S Scale America brought "brass quality" to plastic models, and Lionel eventually responded with some great locomotives and many embarrassing stumbles--but only after American Models breathed life back into S scale. Maybe Lionel "drives" S scale these days with more frequent product releases and more press, but I prefer the way Ron does business and supports the products he has sold.
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