N Scale From 1960s Sears Christmas Wish Books

Hardcoaler Apr 15, 2021

  1. Hardcoaler

    Hardcoaler TrainBoard Member

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    When my daughter was young, I gave her my Matchbox and Corgi cars to play with. Within minutes, she made car families with them using the larger Corgi cars as parents and the Matchbox cars as kids.

    It might bother new age thinkers, but girls and boys see things differently.
     
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  2. Shortround

    Shortround TrainBoard Member

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    They sure do. But I only had two daughters and three nieces close to same age.
    They did love my model cars. I didn't have trains then.
    When I did get into trains they were in there early teens and didn't like that I was in charge of the toys. :rolleyes:
     
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  3. NorsemanJack

    NorsemanJack TrainBoard Member

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    Okay. Show of hands. Who else here has extremely fond memories of the Lionel catalogs back in the day? My first as a kid was the 1966, which was kind of a strange last hurrah for Lionel. It had a ton of 6464 box cars and the sad remains of the F3's. Of course, the cars were all plastic trucks. I have extremely fond memories of studying that catalog for hours on end, hoping to one day have some of those things. A few years later my dad bought a bunch of used stuff from a guy in the next town. It included 1951 and 1952 ATSF F3 2343 outfits along with most of the classic operating accessories (log loader, operating milk car, cattle car, etc.). They were well worn when we got them and I put at least another five years of use on them. I sold the remnants many years ago.

    That said, and to the point of this thread, I have accumulated a small collection of classic Lionel catalogs from back then. I believe that I currently have 1950, 1952, 1954 - 1960, 1962 and 1966. Like the Sears catalog, it's fun to pull those out and just enjoy the classic marketing and traveling back to simpler times.
     
  4. Rip Track

    Rip Track TrainBoard Member

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    My dad managed to buy a Minitrix set for a steal, on clearance, at a local department store called "China Town" (Later known as Van Leunens). It came with a Burlington Northern U30C. Although I'm in HO now, I still have it, sands the box and original track.
     
    Last edited: Apr 17, 2021
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  5. Hardcoaler

    Hardcoaler TrainBoard Member

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    I have the ‘59 and ‘60 catalogs, but they’re battered and dog eared after a thousand readings as a kid. They were my oldest brother’s and became mine when he lost interest in trains as a teen. I have a ‘66 too, enjoyed until 1968 when I got my first N Scale set.
     
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  6. Shortround

    Shortround TrainBoard Member

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    I got into model trains after the army and in a small machine shop. '73-'79. A co-worker introduced me to O gauge Lionel along with some of his moneyed friends. They had a simple layout that was hardly used. They just bought big Lionel engines and brass. There plan was to turn them into more money. So then I left trains for about 12 years and moving out to the country.
     
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  7. BoxcabE50

    BoxcabE50 HOn30 & N Scales Staff Member TrainBoard Supporter

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    Me!!! (y):D
     
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  8. Hardcoaler

    Hardcoaler TrainBoard Member

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    One of the many things that impresses me about our hobby is that it's of interest to all kinds of people. Boundaries of education, income, ethnicity, age and even gender fade away at train shows and here on TrainBoard. To me, it shares a lot with the automotive hobby in this regard, where the guy who drives to a Saturday morning "show and shine" car show to display his high dollar super car earns the same interest as the man who's slowly rebuilding his common car with is own tools and abilities. Similarly, I really enjoy seeing what everyone is up to on TrainBoard, small projects to large.

    Perhaps we'd have a better world with less division if more people had hobbies. :)
     
  9. brokemoto

    brokemoto TrainBoard Member

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    I never knew that Revell sold an FA in NYCS lightning stripes or SP Daylight. I doubt that I ever have seen either. SP did not have FAs, but NYCS did.
     
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  10. Mo-Pac

    Mo-Pac TrainBoard Member

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    So, I am just wondering if this was the transistor radio that Van Morrison used to gun down the old man with?


    Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
     
  11. r_i_straw

    r_i_straw Mostly N Scale Staff Member

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    As I recall, the Lone Star snap track had similar oversized ties and spacing. I did not care, as long as my trains would stay on the track at warp speed.
    nscale.jpg
     
  12. Doug Gosha

    Doug Gosha TrainBoard Member

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    In spite of the blurriness of the photo foreground, I can tell that's a Treble-O-Lectric switch, there. One of my layouts is built entirely of Treble-O-Lectric track! I also spot the TOL UP boxcar in the train in your picture.

    :D

    Doug
     
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  13. r_i_straw

    r_i_straw Mostly N Scale Staff Member

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    There are actually more Treble O cars hiding in the photo. In the shadow on the extreme left is another UP box car and next to it is a rare New Haven box car. A Lone Star flat car with some European kit crate loads is the third car from the far right. I had been replacing the stock trucks with Atlas tucks sporting the new awesome Rapido couplers. The fuzzy caboose off the track in lower left is getting a Santa Fe paint job. Then there are the TOL autos scattered about, Citroëns and Land Rovers I believe. Here is a more recent photo showing the New Haven box car. I have replaced the tucks again with ones having the old hook/loop couplers.

    IMG_0379.JPG
     
  14. Penner

    Penner TrainBoard Member

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    When I was a kid, every year my folks would hand me the Sears Wish Book catalogue and tell me to circle what I wanted for Christmas. I can't be certain, but I'll bet I circled every one of those N-scale sets! ;)

    Of course, I usually circled more than half the stuff for boys in that book. Then after the first go around, they'd always come back and ask me to narrow down my choice to maybe four or five items. LOL

    Thanks for the great memories!
     
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  15. Doug Gosha

    Doug Gosha TrainBoard Member

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    Speaking of which:

    MWs64cat.jpg

    This is Montgomery Ward as Sears didn't sell Treble-O-Lectric but, same thing.

    These days, I have at least one of everything on that page, even a penny. :D

    Doug
     
  16. r_i_straw

    r_i_straw Mostly N Scale Staff Member

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    I wish I still had my two 0-8-0 steam locomotives. I have no idea what ever happened to them. I still have most everything else. The steamers were tender drive with the rubber bands and all. I even converted one of them to have a Rapido coupler. (sigh)
     
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  17. Hardcoaler

    Hardcoaler TrainBoard Member

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    Super great photos and catalog page images Russell and Doug! I'm enjoying this thread a bunch. :)
     
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  18. Doug Gosha

    Doug Gosha TrainBoard Member

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    So am I. Thanks for starting it, Dan.

    BTW, Russell, I see some Atlas track in your picture, too, and I know it was possible to connect the two types together with Atlas joiners. The rail heights weren't exactly the same so the joints weren't perfect but it worked.

    My layout I had in the very early seventies was mostly Treble-O-Lectric track but I did install an Atlas switch in the mainline and had a branch line.

    The only "official" versions of the NH boxcar for the electric series were two orange versions. TOL cars all have black wheels. The red, blue, yellow, and green versions of the car are all Treble-O-Trains series with silver wheels. This series was unpowered. These different color versions are the rarer ones and our British friends are particularly interested in them since they weren't originally sold there.

    An internet friend of mine there traded me two British prototype diesels and many cars for one green NH car back in about 2004 and he thought he might have been insulting me by not offering me more in the trade. I was, of course, thrilled at getting the British prototype stuff as I had none, at that time. I have, since then, acquired another green car at a very reasonable price as I don't think the eBayer knew what he had and it was among several other cars.

    Doug
     
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  19. r_i_straw

    r_i_straw Mostly N Scale Staff Member

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    As I recall, the blue New Haven car was sold for "push" trains as well as a British Rail F unit that I found in a toy story. They came in blister packs on cardboard like many toys do. I later repowered the BR F unit with a Life Like chassis that runs pretty well. I used the old truck frames. One even had a pilot on it. I need to put a decoder in it and run it on an NTRAK layout pulling all my Lone Star cars the next time I go to a train show. :D
    IMG_0380.JPG
     
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  20. r_i_straw

    r_i_straw Mostly N Scale Staff Member

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    I think that photo is from about 1968. I was about to retire my old Treble 0 train board and build a regulation layout. I was accumulating Atlas flex track, snap track, switches and cork for roadbed. I was probably playing around with different track-work. A co-worker of my dad had given me a framed 4 X 6 foot bench made from 1/2 inch plywood with about a half inch of homasote on top of that. It had been an 027 layout he built for his son but he had replaced it with an even larger layout. I wish I had a photo of the layout I built but don't. I did find the plans that I drew up for it. I spent many hours running trains on that old layout.
    [​IMG]
     

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