Antique Lionel Boxes

[jim22]

Hi,
My Dad has just handed down his Lionel trains to me. They're from about 1950, and have seen a good deal of use by him and me. Many of the boxes are quite beat up. I'm looking for advice on wether I should patch the worst ones up or leave them as they are.

As an example, I have a large box for an automated gateman on which one flap is gone, the top is detached, several sides are ripped, and there is some water damage. This one was so obviously bad that I spent some time carefully taping it back together. But others are not so clearly hopeless.

Are extremely damaged boxes still more valuable without repairs?

Thanks,
Jim

[Anonymous]

I have a bunch of old boxes too. I never repair them. I leave them as is, to stop them from getting any worse, I dont use them anymore. I have stored them away and found new boxes to store my boxed up trains in. As for the value of boxes, I cant really say if the value would go down if you patched them up with tape/glue/etc. I figure it would be the same way with old baseball cards, old newspapers, and antique paintngs etc. Once you do some patch work, the are merely worthless. Once again, I cant say for sure though.

[Anonymous]

Yes, even if the box if badly damaged, it is still more desireable in original, unrepaired condition. The reason collectors prize original boxes is not because they want to use them to store their trains in, but because they are after trains in as original of condition as possible. Don't feel too bad about taping up that one box (it did sound pretty awful), but don't attempt to tape any of the others. There was an article in a recent issue of Classic Toy Trains on how to properly restore large train set boxes. I would recommend checking it out.

[jim22]

Thanks. I had a feeling that might be true. I'll look for the article.
Jim