Its Wartime Weekend supports the historic trust that runs the 18-mile scenic line between Pickering and Grosmont and train journeys beyond to Whitby.

From small beginnings in 1992 it now spans three days and attracts thousands of visitors who want to step back in time and experience the railway at war.

The clock goes back to 1943 for the weekend – a date chosen because it explains the presence of US troops in the country and the British forces that were in the area training for the D-Day landings on June 6 1944.

Pickering is the hub of activities but there are special events, displays and demonstrations at all stations along the heritage line. For the first time last year, the Wartime Weekend had steam-hauled services operating between Grosmont and Whitby, as well as National Rail services and they will be repeated again this year.

The weekend begins at 10am on Friday with the railway's learning through history project when children from Pickering's St Joseph's RC Primary School and Pickering Infants School board the train at the town's station dressed as evacuees for a ride to Goathland and back.

They will experience the train journey made by many children from bomb-hit cities to find a safe haven in the countryside. But it is a flag raising ceremony on the platform at Pickering Station on Friday at 11.15am that signals the official start to the weekend.

NYMR General Manager Philip Benham will "hand over" the station to local re-enactor "Colonel" Ivon Baker. By then the town will be buzzing with reenactors, visitors and local residents, many of whom will stay for the whole weekend. On Saturday the Mayor of Pickering, Cllr Mal Danks, will take the salute as a parade of veterans, re-enactors and military vehicles, weaves its way down the Market Place at 11am.

At the station and its car parks over the weekend there will be air raids and Home Guard displays, together with marquees for traders selling everything from military outfits and 1940s revival clothing to music CDs, military books and manuals.

Deliveries by horse-drawn LNER railway wagons, now a thing of the past, will be seen at Grosmont Station together with a flying display by a Tiger Moth aircraft at 2pm on both days, while at Goathland there are military vehicles, a field kitchen, Home Guard activities and American troops, displays and demonstrations.

Levisham Station takes on the guise of Le Visham, in occupied France, for the weekend with the World War IT Axis Re-enactment Society in the role of German paratroopers and the Cafe Allee de Bois serving French fare.

The wartime theme continues to the end of the line at Whitby Station where stalls are planned. The vital part played by the country's railways – and its staff – in moving goods, troops, armaments and people during the war years is remembered at Pickering Station on Sunday morning with a wreath laying ceremony to honour those who lost their lives and later in the day the flag will be lowered to mark the end of another successful Wartime Weekend.