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Lot of two Bay Window Cabeese - SP

Lot of two Bay Window Cabeese - SP

 1 $0.99 9h 50m
N Walthers THRALL 5 UNIT DOUBLE STACK CAR SANTA FE

N Walthers THRALL 5 UNIT DOUBLE STACK CAR SANTA FE

10 $41.00 12h 53m
N Walthers THRALL DOUBLE STACK CAR TTX w CONTAINERS

N Walthers THRALL DOUBLE STACK CAR TTX w CONTAINERS

2 $1.75 12h 58m
N - Walthers; C&O#2759 Steam 2-8-4 locomotive 920-90051

N - Walthers; C&O#2759 Steam 2-8-4 locomotive 920-90051

 5 $81.00 13h 50m
Walthers N Scale SP 45? Logging Flat Car

Walthers N Scale SP 45? Logging Flat Car

 2 $1.04 13h 50m
N MTL Great Western Short Reefer, Great Shape

N MTL Great Western Short Reefer, Great Shape

 - $9.99 14h 54m
N Walthers PD Covered Hopper Trinity Demo 932-8157

N Walthers PD Covered Hopper Trinity Demo 932-8157

 $14.99 15h 1m
N Walthers 50' Smoothside Box Car 2pk 932-28957

N Walthers 50' Smoothside Box Car 2pk 932-28957

 $19.99 15h 1m
N SCALE 1 160 R190 UNDECORATED WHITE TRACTOR 2 PACK

N SCALE 1 160 R190 UNDECORATED WHITE TRACTOR 2 PACK

 - $8.00 15h 12m
N SCALE 1 87 IH R-190 UNDECORATED RED CAB VAN

N SCALE 1 87 IH R-190 UNDECORATED RED CAB VAN

- $8.00 15h 13m
Walthers North Island Refinery N Scale Kit 933-3219

Walthers North Island Refinery N Scale Kit 933-3219

 7 $14.49 16h 35m
N - DOUBLE TRACK CUT STONE TRUSS BRIDGE ABUTMENT-RESIN

N - DOUBLE TRACK CUT STONE TRUSS BRIDGE ABUTMENT-RESIN

 $9.95 16h 43m
N Scale Stand-Alone Well Cars Old TTX Scheme 4-unit set

N Scale Stand-Alone Well Cars Old TTX Scheme 4-unit set

 - $25.99 17h 22m
N Scale Five-Unit Articulated Stack Well Car TTX #72403

N Scale Five-Unit Articulated Stack Well Car TTX #72403

 - $29.99 17h 23m
N Scale Cornerstone Blast Furnace:Item No.3249

N Scale Cornerstone Blast Furnace:Item No.3249

 - $69.99 17h 23m
N Scale Cornerstone Western Flood Loader:Item No.3247

N Scale Cornerstone Western Flood Loader:Item No.3247

 - $22.99 17h 23m
N Scale Cornerstone Series Coke Ovens & Quencher #3806

N Scale Cornerstone Series Coke Ovens & Quencher #3806

 - $52.99 17h 24m
N SCALE Proto EMD GP38-2 Louisville & Nashville #6022

N SCALE Proto EMD GP38-2 Louisville & Nashville #6022

 - $44.00 19h 16m
N SCALE Proto EMD GP38-2 Norfolk Southern #5385

N SCALE Proto EMD GP38-2 Norfolk Southern #5385

 - $65.00 19h 18m
Walthers Cornerstone #3808 N Scale State Line Farm Supp

Walthers Cornerstone #3808 N Scale State Line Farm Supp

 $19.99 20h 2m

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.