Okay kiddo, have you ever heard of trains? They are big machines that run on tracks and can take people and things from one place to another. A long time ago, in the 1800s, people were really excited about trains and wanted to build more and more of them all over the world.
This excitement led to something called 'railway mania.' This means that people were so excited about trains that they wanted to invest their money in building even more railways. Everyone wanted to get rich quick by investing in a new railway company, thinking they would make lots of money as more people traveled on trains.
Because so many people wanted to invest in railways, there were a lot of new railway companies being formed all over the place. When something is new and everyone wants it, the prices of that thing can get really high. It was like everyone wanted to own a piece of the railway pie.
But the problem was that not all of these railway companies were going to be successful. Some of them would fail and go bankrupt, leaving the investors with no money. People were investing in companies that didn't even have a plan, just because they wanted to be part of the railway mania.
Eventually, the excitement died down and people realized that not all of these new railways were going to be profitable. Many investors lost their money, and some lost everything they had. The railway mania came to a sad end.
So, kiddo, railway mania was a time when lots of people were very excited about the idea of building more and more railways. But they invested their money in lots of new companies, some of which didn't have good plans or were not going to make money. This ultimately led to many investors losing their money and the excitement coming to an end.