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In one of the interviews with Maury Romer, who was the product engineer for Gilbert / American Flyer back in the 40's and 50's (when American Flyer introduced their smoke units), he mentioned that they had their smoke fluid formulated by an outside supplier (I believe it was chemical company) before they first offered the smoking locomotives. Gilbert then just purchased the fluid from this same outside supplier, packaged it, and resold it for use in their locos. Well, one day they got a call from a frantic mother, whose son had just swallowed a bunch of the fluid. Not knowing what was in the fluid or if it was toxic, they placed an urgent call to their supplier to find out what to do. The person they ultimately got a hold of (I believe the head chemist) just laughed and told them to tell the mother that she had nothing to fear. It was just pure mineral oil, and might even do the child some good. Romer said that once they heard that, they stopped buying it at an inflated price from that supplier and started buying it cheaper on the open market in 55 gallon drums. I know you can also put light oil in their smoke units and it burns/smokes well too. An employee (his name escapes me) at the Lionel Corporation, on the side developed the formula for their smoke pills in the late 40's, but never patented it so he could keep it a secret. Shortly thereafter, and after reaching mutually agreeable terms, he quit Lionel and went into business for himself as their sole supplier of those smoke tablets. They sold millions of those tablets, so he did alright for himself (not necessarily enough to become filthy rich, but more than enough to support his family). That anecdote is in either the Ron Hollander book or the Tuohy/McComas series of books on Lionel. Enjoy the hobby! Remember ...where there's smoke, there's Flyer! Greg
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