Had some friends, who do a lot of antique and flea market sales, over for a couple of days and they brought me an old LIFE Magazine from December 13, 1937. In it there is a great article with photos about the Lionel factory, at that time. Some interesting statistics, too: Like 1937, the biggest year in history for Lionel, ends up with a gross income of $3,500,000. That's an amazing figure, in my mind, considering that the average Lionel set cost about $10 or $12.
This was also the year that the scale Hudson, the 700E, was introduced, which sold for $75, a huge amount in those depression years, more than an average person might earn all week. There are several pages with photos of the factory in operation. In 1937, Lionel was still located in Hillside, NJ at the "old" plant and the photos show a lot of hand assembly and operations. As I recall, they moved to Irvington about 1941
Kind of an "all railroad" issue, because the cover shows a Southern Pacific, GS-1 in the Sacramento shop for major repair and inside is an article about how the RR's are trying to get a 15% increase in freight rates. These were the later days of the "great depression", before WWII had begun, although signs of war had already started. Ads from that time include a bunch of RR ads, as well as a number of 1938 automobile ads.
Paul Fischer
