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Side Glances was a comic panel created by George Clark in 1928, which ran all the way up to 1985. Clark wrote and drew it up until 1939, when he started working for a different syndicate and continued writing and drawing a similar panel under the title The Neighbors. Side Glances was taken over by William Galbraith Crawford, who always signed his work with his middle name, as we see in this example. Crawford was an illustrator for magazines and movie posters, and had published cartoons in the New Yorker on many occasions, so he was a nice fit for the single panel format. I wasn't able to find much information about him on the Internet, but apparently his work is popular on art auction websites.
As for this particular panel, I think it's safe to say that this boy is going to be getting an electric train for Christmas whether he wants one or not. I've never had kids, but I imagine one of the joys of Christmas is giving them things that either you never had as a kid but wanted, or things that you want now that you can't justify buying for yourself otherwise. The kid might have fun with it, but when they stop having fun then you can take it. Or if they don't like it, you can have it for yourself immediately. It's a win-win situation.