When we were "playing Santa" on Christmas Eve, 1959, we discovered the engine was missing to our little boy's electric train. How God miraculously provided the engine that night...I tell it in the story.
The missing engine to the train
It was Christmas Eve, 1959, 11:00 pm and the kids were nestled all snug in their beds with visions of Christmas morning dancing in their heads.
My husband and I were gathering the toys out of their hiding places to put under the tree, a baby doll and a doll bed for 4 year old Julie and a dump truck and an electric train for 7 year old Trent.
The electric train was the last thing we took out to set up. Eddie wanted the track to go around the tree, with the old fashioned black Lionel engine pulling the train. We were so excited. Everything was almost ready. Eddie put the track together and then began to pull the cars out of their boxes, setting them on the track.
Suddenly, he panicked, searching frantically through the boxes “Where is the engine? The engine is not here!”
“Are you sure? Where could it be” I exclaimed.
A train without an engine is not a train. This was to be our little boy’s big surprise in the morning. What were we going to do?
I searched the phone book for the number of the department store where I had bought the train. Wolff & Marx was a huge 3-story department store downtown San Antonio. There was no answer of course. I was hoping, but I knew they had been closed for hours. I hung up the phone and looked at my husband, my eyes pleading with him to do something.
He grabbed his coat from the closet, and said, “I am going to go down there and see if I find someone.”
I looked at him sadly, sinking down in the chair, “There won’t be anyone there, honey!”
He left the house bundled up in his coat in the cold December night, and drove through the quiet streets of the city to the department store downtown.
He parked the car by the curb and got out and stood and looked up at the darkened building, three stories high. He walked around the large department store, and when he got to the large glass doors in the front of the building, he peered in and began to bang on the door, desperate, not knowing what he was going to do.
“Please, God, send someone,” he murmured softly.
Suddenly, from inside the store, a night watchman came walking up to the door slowly, shining his flashlight through the glass, unlocked it and asked what was wrong. Eddie told him his problem. He needed an engine for his little boy’s train. His wife had bought it here, and when he opened the box to put the train around the tree tonight, there was no engine!
The old night watchman stared at him for a few minutes as he told his story, then rubbed his head, and said, “Come on in out of the cold, and I will see what I can do. They walked up the stairs to the second floor to the toy department, and the man made a phone call.
Thirty minutes later, a young man drove up to the store, got out and came into the building. He went up to the toy department, and searched until he found the right engine for the train. He handed it to Eddie, and asked, “Is this the engine you need?”
Eddie breathed a sign of relief, and smiled, “Yes, it is. Thank you. I will never forget this. Thank you”. He shook the man’s hand, gripping it hard.
And turning to the night watchman, he grabbed his hand and said, “And thank you for opening the door to a stranger”.
Back at the house, I finished putting out the rest of the kid’s presents, and had been pacing the floor, wondering what was happening.
“Dear God, let someone find the engine!” I prayed. But inside I knew it was hopeless.
It seemed like hours went by. I stood at the window peering through the blinds, when I saw lights of the car come down the street and turn into the driveway. He had been gone a long time. I didn’t know what to expect as I opened the door and ran out on the porch hugging my robe around me as he got out of the car. I knew this trip was futile. That store had been closed for hours. No one was there. We would have to put the train without an engine back in the closet.
“What happened”? I asked fearfully.
He got out of the car, smiling, and handed me the toy engine. I hugged him choking back the tears. We went into the house, and he set the little black engine on the track around the Christmas tree and started it up, as he told me the whole story. The lights of the tree glowed in the room as it began to chug around the tree. We stood there, with our arms around each other, amazed at what had happened. This had been a miracle.
The next morning, Trent and Julie ran in the room, and there was the little black engine going round and round the tree pulling the other cars, tooting and whistling. Their eyes were as big as saucers as they jumped up and down, squealing with delight. Trent ran over and sat down beside the train going around the Christmas tree, his face full of joy. Eddie and I looked at each other and smiled.
We knew there had to be angels watching over us. One of them was the old night watchman who opened the door to a strange man banging on it, and the other was a young department manager who left his family at midnight on Christmas Eve to go find the engine to a little boy’s train, for a father who would not let his little boy be disappointed on Christmas morning.
It was 53 years ago on Christmas Eve. My husband has gone to heaven. But every Christmas Eve, which is tomorrow night, I remember a Chrismtas Even long ago. I believe in Miracles and angels are all around us.
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The missing engine to the train
