Lionel trains store model trains sets model railroads and train accessories Auction info
Lionel trains store Life-Like For Sale Used Life-Like Cheap Life-Like

Life-Like

NEW N scale R-T-R SAL FA1 FB1 Set  Both Powered

NEW N scale R-T-R SAL FA1 FB1 Set Both Powered

- $59.99 37m
N Scale Life Like B&O 762

N Scale Life Like B&O 762

1 $14.99 46m
NEW GIFT QUALITY N sc R-T-R RDG F-1 A B Both Powrd

NEW GIFT QUALITY N sc R-T-R RDG F-1 A B Both Powrd

- $59.99 50m
NEW N scale R-T-R CONRAIL GP38

NEW N scale R-T-R CONRAIL GP38

- $24.99 1h 25m
N Scale Life Like

N Scale Life Like

5 $18.60 2h 11m
Brand New Life Like N scale Canadian Pacific CP GP9

Brand New Life Like N scale Canadian Pacific CP GP9

7 $56.00 2h 41m
Brand New Life Like N scale Canadian Pacific CP GP9

Brand New Life Like N scale Canadian Pacific CP GP9

11 $55.00 2h 45m
Brand New Life Like N scale Canadian Pacific CP GP9

Brand New Life Like N scale Canadian Pacific CP GP9

5 $53.00 2h 49m
Brand New Life Like N scale Canadian Pacific CP GP9

Brand New Life Like N scale Canadian Pacific CP GP9

4 $53.00 2h 51m
LL N SOUTHERN EMD E6 A B brass flywl SRR #2802 unopened

LL N SOUTHERN EMD E6 A B brass flywl SRR #2802 unopened

1 $39.00 11h 36m
HO Champion CHP 1223 Box Car by Life-Like #122

HO Champion CHP 1223 Box Car by Life-Like #122

- $5.00 14h 36m
Life-Like - N Scale - DMY FB2 Unit - Lehigh Valley 7923

Life-Like - N Scale - DMY FB2 Unit - Lehigh Valley 7923

$39.99 15h 16m
N Life-Like 50' UNION PACIFIC BOX CAR X 3

N Life-Like 50' UNION PACIFIC BOX CAR X 3

1 $9.99 18h 18m
N, CUSTOM WEATHERED,   NIB,  GULF,  TRIPLE DOME TANK, SILVER

N, CUSTOM WEATHERED, NIB, GULF, TRIPLE DOME TANK, SILVER

- $10.99 18h 52m
SPECTRUM * SD45 LOCOMOTIVE - CONRAIL- N Scale DCC READY

SPECTRUM * SD45 LOCOMOTIVE - CONRAIL- N Scale DCC READY

- $44.00 23h 45m
Life Like Crossing Gate NIB

Life Like Crossing Gate NIB

- $8.99 1d 19m
Life Like Crossing Gate NIB

Life Like Crossing Gate NIB

- $8.99 1d 19m
Life Like Crossing Gate NIB

Life Like Crossing Gate NIB

- $8.99 1d 19m
Life Like Crossing Gate NIB

Life Like Crossing Gate NIB

- $8.99 1d 20m
N SCALE Diesel GP38 Burlington Northern (Cascade Green)

N SCALE Diesel GP38 Burlington Northern (Cascade Green)

- $29.90 1d 33m

Lionel news

  • Fascinating facts about the invention of
    Lionel Trains
    by Joshua Lionel Cowen in 1901.

    LIONEL TRAINS AT A GLANCE: Joshua Lionel Cowen was an inventive guy and had always been very interested in trains. In 1901, he fitted a small motor under a model of a railroad flatcar, powered by a battery on 30 inches of track and the Lionel electric train was born. The first Lionel train was designed to attract window-shopping New Yorkers using the power of animated display. Since its humble beginning Lionel has sold more than 50 million train sets and today produces more than 300 miles of track each year. Joshua Lionel Cowen was an inventive guy and had always been very interested in trains. When he was seven, he whittled a miniature locomotive from wood. It exploded, however, when he tried to fit it with a tiny steam engine. Joshua had never forgotten his childhood experiment. In 1901, he fitted a small motor under a model of a railroad flatcar, a battery and 30 inches of track and the Lionel electric train was born. Joshua  was born on Henry St. in Manhattan’s Lower East Side on August 25, 1877. He preferred playing ball, bicycling, hiking and tinkering with mechanical toys to formal education, and soon became fascinated with electricity, its transmission and its storage in batteries. Cowen did so well in school that in 1893 he entered the College of the City of New York. But, he could not adjust to the confines of a formal education. In short order he dropped out, returned, again dropped out, enrolled at Columbia University, and dropped out there to become an apprentice to Henner & Anderson, an early dry cell battery manufacturer. Then he took a job at the Acme Lamp Company in New York as a battery lamp assembler. During his spare time he liked experimenting, one of many mechanically inclined young men who liked to tinker with things. These jobs gave Cowen the experience he needed to launch Lionel. In 1899, he patented a device for igniting photographers’ flash powder by using dry cell batteries to heat a wire fuse. Cowen than parlayed this into a defense contract to equip 24,000 Navy mines with detonators. His ignorance of armament manufacture did not stop him. He used mercuric fulminate, a sensitive and powerful explosive (his supplier’s deliveryman told him, "The company said you should always keep a good deal around. It’s better to be dead than maimed"), and delivered the fuses to the Brooklyn Navy Yard on time by horse-drawn wagon at a gallop. In January 1900, he filed his second patent which improved on the his first design but again failed to give details. On September 5, 1900, Cowen and a colleague from Acme, Harry C. Grant, started a business in lower Manhattan called the Lionel Manufacturing Company, but they had nothing to manufacture. One hot day when Cowen was sitting in his office waiting for a cool breeze he got the idea of an electric fan. He quickly assembled and marketed the electric fan, but the weather soon cooled and so did public interest. Soon after, Cowen was walking through lower Manhattan when he stopped at a toy store window where he saw, among the toys, a push train. He then had the vision of it going around a circle of track without needing attention. This was the vision which started a legend.