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Another thread discusses Lionel store displays, but as a kid I remember Marx store displays, and have heard of people,

although I do not now remember who, who had them.  I found in a flea market some years ago a store display for Marx,

but not for trains, but for a later version of a Marx Civil War playset sold by Sears.  I was told the display had come out of

the nearby city's closed Sears store.   It featured the various soldiers and revetments, cannon, etc., stapled to a crudely

painted board, with roads and fields.  It looked like it had been made by the stock boy in the back of the store. I was interested in Marx western town and ranch sets, but not, particularly, in the Civil War set, so I sold it on eBay, and managed to creatively pack it, not easy, and ship it DLH to the buyer, with figures standing up, stapled in place.  It was on a board something like 2X3 feet.  But, I wonder....does anybody on here have an original Marx train store display layout?

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There was an article some years ago in CTT I think, on a 3086 Dealer Display. Also, Tasker had a few of them in his possession. There were a few variations of the display. Base colors varied and the accessories varied. With guidance from Tasker and photo's from that CTT article, I built one years ago. Except for the push buttons I added for the whistle station and the binding posts I mounted on the top, Tasker said I nailed it almost perfectly right down to the color of the splatter paint.

Here is a photo of one of the styles and a video of the one I made.

 

 Steve

 

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I had heard that Tasker Brush had at least one....I assume his have gone on to new

owners....I remember seeing the iconic #333 with gray NYC passenger cars running

on one of these layouts in Sears basement, with Gene Autry's "Rudolph the Rednose

Reindeer" playing in the background.  I also saw another in a sporting goods store that

sold Marx around the holidays, and that was the one place I saw 3/16th cars like the

ATSF stock and L&NE hopper available for separate sale.  I don't remember much about

the displays but think they closely resembled the sample above.

Marx was just a lot more popular in the world I lived in back in the '50s.  We had Marx and we saw it at Western Auto and Sears or JC Penny and everywhere.  Lionel was very upscale - good,  but much more expensive.  I recall a store displauy at, I think, a Western Auto or Kress that looked a lot like that above.  I had something similar under my bed for several years before we built our basement layout.

Originally Posted by CBS072:

Hey!!! That looks just like the layout that I had in the back of my pickup last Saturday. I didn't know I was hauling around a real Marx display.  We should have tied it down in the back of the pickup, good thing it did not blow out.  Great find Mitch.

Thankee!  I kinda suspect the guy didn't know exactly what he had... 

 

And here I was gonna take up the tracks and repaint the board and all.   Good thing a buddy of mine on another forum pointed this thread out to me! 

 

Now to track down a Marx water tower... 

 

Mitch

  I only got to see the end of pw stuff, and MPC on display at Sears till Atari. I remember seeing the plastic MARX in boxes at the early Kreesge's/K-marts, but even there Lionel had the static end cap display, Marx nothing. Finding a buried CV woke me up.

That is a cool little layout. It looks like they could have been sent out easily as "kits". Many things like this are, so a back room genius could have assembled them. Some things never get looked at, or thrown away, or used, just stored, and forgotten in a corner for decades.      

As a young kid growing up in Brooklyn in the 50's, I recall many ma and pa toy stores that sold both Lionel and Marx.   I recall seeing  the train board Louis Marx train display in a toy store that stood on the corner of 86th st. near Bay Parkway. We were of rather modest means back then and since Marx accessories cost about 35% less than Lionel at the time, every Christmas I would find a $2 Marx accessory under the tree which added lighting action and endured heavy use.  Most stores that carried Lionel usually carried Louis Marx toys as well.

Originally Posted by j white:

My Marx layout was based on that track plan as shown in CTT all those years ago. The main difference is that I added a pair of switches between the sidings to make an S reversing loop.

 

Here's a shot of the track plan without all the clutter:

 

 

J White

 

Interesting idea!  But how do you re-reverse once the train's gone through the loop?

 

Mitch

Gents, I am reviving this thread, having been directed to it based on another thread I posted, asking for info about MARX displays.

What sort of variation was there in colors on the base?  The pics above suggest a sort of pale green, but Mitch's looks like a pale beige.

As I noted on the other thread, I am tossing around the idea of either replicating one or doing something in the same style but maybe a little more elaborate.  I'd like to duplicate the color palate insofar as possible.

As for the countertop display:  Wow!  Really keen!  (Sorry, flashback.)

Cardboard with a wooden substructure?

I recently traded a partial store display box set that still had the track, transformer and three plastic cars with a shattered Marx 490.

The box had a flip-top lid, I assume so that the store operator could always have an open box at the top of the stack. The main missing items were a village/roadway mat and a few small accessories I think. Mid 1960s maybe? I dunno.

M. Mitchell Marmel posted:
palallin posted:

Mitch,

Any progress on your restoration?

I have grandiose plans, too grandiose to be practical.  Marx should be, if anything, practical

Not yet.  Weather's been a bit nasty for working in the garage.  Probably later on this spring,  after I recover from some upcoming scheduled surgery.

Mitch 

Mitch,

 

Have you ever done any work on the display layout?

 I've no clue about nationally, but you may have to wait another year for bad weather with the nice weather I've seen so far. Shorts for walking the Puppi at Christmas is a "bit odd" for Michigan 😉.

You know I think that counter display was used behind glass at the local Sears around "72". I don't recall ever seeing Marx stocked there though, just Lionel. I recall I thought it was "stupid" that the cheaper and unstocked trains were behind nice glass and no; as in zero, Lionels were on display. Lionel starter sets up 6-8' high, laid flat, some hanging blister packs of tràck & acc, that display, but drawers full of Lionel cars and locos, but not one sign; you had to "know".  ....Even as a kid this made little business sense to me.)

  Woolworths had the Marx displays....big ones 😁 Likely custom.

Kresge had Marx until more sales shifted to their K-marts. Kresge seldom ran even the Christmas tracks, K-mart usually did; but gave up before Sears.

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