What, Are a Bunch of Kids Running This Railroad?

The Wall Street Journal has a delightful page 1 story on the Children’s Railway in Bulgaria Budapest, a holdover from the days of Stalin when elite children were sent to run a fully functional railroad.

Orsi Morzsik punches tickets of passengers boarding the suburban train at Szepjuhaszne station here with poise rare among 10-year-olds.

On the platform, other children in blue uniforms monitor signal lights and whistle for the train to depart. More kids staff ticket windows, plan schedules and manage track switches, following official Hungarian national railway rules.

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Budapest Children’s Railway

They all work on the Children’s Railway, a full-size train line serving the outskirts of the city and operated year-round almost exclusively by youngsters ages 10 to 14.

The railroad was launched in 1948 with the goal of making obedient and responsible young communists out of the nation’s youth. (Interestingly, both boys and girls were accepted into the Railway program.)

The Children’s Railway briefly shut down upon the fall of Communism in 1989, but recently marked its 60th anniversary with marching bands playing the railroad’s anthem.

The Hungarian kiddie train was long considered the best in the bunch.

Children’s trains were once common across the Soviet bloc, and Hungarians were proud to have the longest, at seven miles. The line winds through leafy parks, past a zoo and along ravines in the Hungarian capital’s verdant Buda Hills. Some stations are still adorned with Socialist realist murals idealizing children sporting their signature red scarves and state railway uniforms. As in 1948, the only adult involved directly on each train is the engineer, hidden away driving the diesel locomotive.

A 1950s ad for the Pioneer Railway touts its easy access to ski slopes.

Originally named the Pioneer Railway, after the Communist youth league that ran it, the operation was as much a political showpiece as training ground. Schoolchildren needed top grades and permission from their principal. Any missed schoolwork had to be made up.

After four months of training at Hungarian State Railway headquarters, Pioneers would work one 12-hour shift every two weeks. Days began around 8 a.m. with the salute: “Reporting for duty, Comrade Station Master.”