Sears, Marx and wishbooks

[Bob Keller]

hat is a go-to website for me when I want to see Christmas trains in their natural habitat – a catalog creating dreams in the minds of Kids!

 

 

[Penny Trains]

Eric Beheim's article "Discovery of a Lifetime" about an elusive Marx tender that came from a Sears set got me curious.  The tender in question is a Nickel Plate Road wedge-type, not to be confused with the "box car body" style NKP tender that came with mechanical sets.

I didn't remember seeing this tender in the 1996 Windmill Press book "The Toy Train Department", edited by Thomas W. Holland which is a collection of the toy train pages from Sears Wishbooks from 1950 to 1969.  So I decided to poke around a bit and I found this website: http://www.wishbookweb.com/the-catalogs/ which has many of them scanned for on-line referencing.

A few notable pages I've found so far:

1. 1937, Pg 23, Marx Sparkling Mountain Climber
2. 1943, Pg 53, Lionel Paper Train
3. 1946, Pg 132, Lionel 221 freight set
4. 1942 Spiegel, Pg 69, Flyer passenger set
5. 1959 FAO Schwarz, Pgs 62-63, AF Defender vs. Lionel Missle Launcher!

With Sears, J.C. Penney, Monkey Ward and others to look through, there's lots to explore and lots of trains to see!