Growing up in Wenatchee with the Great Northern railroad line running just behind his parents' home, Nick Buell could not stay away from the back fence every time he heard the whistle.

So for his fifth Christmas his parents bought him a windup Marx train set. He had wanted an American Flyer electric, but Mom was concerned about the electric part.

Disappointed by the windup toy, he used that age-old, tried-and-true children's bargaining technique he cried.

The next afternoon Dad bought him the American Flyer with a Pacific class 4-6-2 locomotive.

It was just like the one he now runs. But this one weighs 1,000 pounds and he spent five years building it from scratch.

"I like things mechanical. It's like the darn thing is a living, breathing entity," Buell says.

"There's the monkey motion, the eccentric cranks, the main rod, side rod, valve gear and radius arm. All that stuff that goes back and forth and around on the side of the engine.

"Fascinating."

Buell is one of more than 100 members of the Kitsap Live Steamers club, which runs trains twice a month on about a mile of 7-½-inch-wide track in Port Orchard.

Club President Ken Olsen says, "On Saturdays we carry more passengers than Amtrak out of Seattle."

Alan Berner: aberner@seattletimes.com or 206-464-8133