Thanks for resurrecting this thread, RamblerDon, which I find very interesting. Also, thanks Eric and Mike for your contributions, including providing a brief history of Lionel since the Postwar era.
I have lots of Postwar, love the quality of Postwar trains from 1949 through 1955, a few nice Lionel items made in the late 1980s and early 1990s, and a lot of modern, especially MTH Railking, and LC+.
I have nothing from the MPC era, steered away from it thinking, perhaps erroneously, that it was inferior. I will have more of an open mind about it now.
Arnold