In the "Road to the National N Scale Convention" thread (from which I thought I wouldn't drift), MK mentioned an upcoming trip to Tokyo and that... Well, I can, because I'm of a certain age. I can personally attest to N Scale model trains being available in many department stores of the past. Okay, so maybe they were more like "Discount Department Stores" but still. The clear leader here was Two Guys, a chain that started in Harrison, New Jersey (its original name was "Two Guys From Harrison") that I swear had more N Scale in stock for their after-Christmas sale than they did before Christmas. One of these days I will write an installment about this for my Irwin's Journal Online website. Suffice to say that there was So Much N Scale sold through Two Guys that I still see it with the price stickers on a regular basis on eBay. There was also Korvette's, another chain that was mostly focused in the New York City area and Long Island. I personally have, or perhaps had, Life-Like freight cars that I purchased there. I also bought a lot of 45's there, but that's another story. Sears sold N Scale train sets at least through its annual "Wish Book." There are archives of these Christmas catalogs out on the Interwebs and you can see for yourself. We didn't live within "driving distance" of a full-line Sears ("driving distance" was a lot less more my parents than for me) so I can't say for certain whether these trains were sold in their brick and mortar stores. What say you... what department stores do you remember?
I can remember when K Mart first opened in Evansville, they had trains. The very first locomotive that I ever purchased was there, a UP E8 in N scale and I wasn't even into model railroading yet. By the time I was into model railroading I can remember lots of department stores selling Life-Like and Tyco. K B Toys had a nice selection of trains also. But then all these stores sold model kits also and sadly those are mostly gone although the local Wal Mart has a few kits. But back to trains, what was nice was while the stores may have been a good starting place, the local hobby shops sold the "good stuff" and the much needed advice to go with them was free. I think both benefited. Thanks for the thread, it is bringing back a lot of good memories! Ralph
The F. W. Woolworth Company had lots of N scale after Christmas for 99 cents a car. Those were the good old days.
Chicago's landmark Marshall Fields department store in the Loop had a very nice model train department on the 4th Floor. As a kid, I received my first N Scale set in 1967 by Arnold Rapido and it was bought there. Gosh how I loved going there at Christmastime. Chicago's Weiboldts department store also carried N Scale.
We had no local stores that sold trains at any time where I grew up, I guess that is why I benefitted waiting until I got older and Kato was making the locomotives for Atlas and also the Blue Box E units........ it only proves my insanity to go any further.......
I remember Toys-R-Us selling LGB and Lionel. I also remember HO at Woolworth’s. When I was a boy in the ’50s many stores sold Lionel during the Christmas season.
Ironically, it was in a local Macy's store that I first saw N scale trains. This would have been around 1966 or 1967. They had AHM/Lima trainsets. I recall a passenger set with European prototype equipment decorated for the New Haven RR. The set included a figure-8 of track and a battery-powered controller. Closer to Christmas, the discount department store Caldor's brought in Arnold Rapido sets. "Santa" delivered one of their freight sets with the Baldwin switcher loco. The following year came an Arnold Rapido passenger set with the revised version of the FP9 loco. After that, a freight set with the metal-bodied Alco FA loco. Not long thereafter, the Child World toy store (not unlike a Toys-R-Us) was carrying Arnold Rapido and Bachmann products under the Parkway brand name. I recall buying a few extra cars for my Arnold Rapido passenger set at an after-Christmas sale. For a short period, FAO Schwarz sold Arnold Rapido trains. However, they ditched them when LGB G scale trains came on the market. They forever lost a customer after that move.
Those were the days when there were trains in several different types of stores. Regular hobby shops, hardware stores, bicycle shops, and, of course, department stores. My aunt worked in the St.Paul Montgomery Ward building - it seemed huge to me as a kid and it actually was - and I remember seeing trains in there even though I was very young but the train obsession had already struck. Wards was the first US distributor for Lone Star Treble-O-Lectric and the St. Paul store was from where mine came. I remember Charlie Vlk (RIP) saying he worked in that store, too. Doug
I remember as a kid back in the early1950's we would take a streetcar to go to Kaufman's Department store in downtown Pittsburgh, PA when they unveiled their Christmas window displays. After Thanksgiving they would cover the windows with blinds and build different Christmas scenes. In one corner of the store they had a Lionel layout set up that occupied two windows, one on Fifth Ave. and the adjoining one on Smithfield St. You had to get there early before the windows were all smeared from whatever oozed from kids' noses that were pressed against the glass. I used to run from one window to the other, much to the chagrin of my parents. Trains running all over the place. For a kid it was absolutely totally awesome. Soon after there came in the mail the annual Lionel Christmas wish catalogue. How many school nights I spent under in bed the covers with that catalogue and a flashlight just looking at all the trains and dreaming that someday I would own all of them- except for that pink locomotive. That was too girly.
Wait! You mean E.J. Korvette's? I used to go there all the time on 34th St. in NYC with my parents. I grew up in Manhattan. I don't remember any trains being sold there. That was in the early 70's. Maybe they no longer sell them by then? Of course, down the block and around the corner there was Polk's Hobby store but that wasn't a department store per se.
It was at either a Woolworth's or a Kresge's five-and-dime where I saw my first (HO) brass loco. I didn't think much of N scale at that time.
[QUOTE="Doug Gosha, post: or do you mean the ones with the big hole in the center? Doug[/QUOTE] As in the infamous "Flying ashtrays"?
Back long ago, a couple of department stores in old downtown Seattle had Christmas layouts (Lionel) in their windows. There were not many hobby shops in that area, at the time. One had a large HO layout in their basement, Another had a small one in N scale. It was about three feet square. That is where my interest in N began. Went there many times during youth, (for the Lionel), but kept seeing the N, as it was in a front window, right by the cash register.
In 1986, LGB produced a limited set for Marshall Fields as seen here. (Not N Scale, but I thought this was pretty cool. Not my set, I don't own one. Lionel made sets for Philadelphia's Wanamaker's Department Store.)
I didn't live in a big city, Green Bay was 30 miles. But there was a F. W. Woolworth 5 & dime. But in about '63 they change the displays and we lost trains for children's cloths and more sewing supplies. Then in '70 they closed. I was our understanding then that it changed to a Walmart in Shawano. Trains only for Christmas. But by then I was living in Milwaukee and they had a lot of Good hobby shops.
Yes, I remember when Sears and JC Penney sold trains along with G.C. Murphy, Kmart (Where my Maternal Grandmother purchased my first N scale train set) and Toys R Us. Here is a photo that will bring back some memories for some of us. I believe there was an article in the HO collector magazine a few year ago about the owner of AHM signing contract with a few "Chain" stores like G.C. Murphy and KMart to sell AHM trains.
Not quite a department store, but Long's Pharmacy way out east of LA somewhere used to have a large train section.
