Ives Treasure Chest

I don't have any info on it but I agree it is a neat idea! I wonder what the dimensions of the box is closed?

It was shown on page 2 of the Ives 1930 catalog and was offered for "O" Gauge and 2¼" Gauge. They did NOT come with a train.

Here's another view of one:

http://www.ivestrains.org/CD/w.../tchest/tchest_1.htm

Ron M

I have a vauge memory of seeing a similar set in some ones house at least 60 years ago.

I wasn't impressed at the time because I had (still do) my Marx which looked more realistic.

Be nice to have now.

Al

It could be a compact version of track plans and layouts published in consumer catalogs. By 1930 the Great Depression was gripping the nation and everyone was tightening their belts.

It could also be a version of trains in suitcases that served as salesmen's samples.

Can't resist posting a photo of my Ives treasure, an MTH Tinplate Traditions set.

ReadingFan, is that Standard gauge or O gauge?  Nice train either way.

John.

   We at the IVES Train Society have had many discussions about why Lionel closed the Bridgeport factory and without all the technicalities, here is the best explanation in my opinion. Dispelling rumors taken as gospel in the train collecting world is hard, but i consider myself well schooled in IVES with knowledge the village elders didnt have back when so....

  Lionel began to outsell IVES in 1924. This was due mainly to Lionel's aggressive and cut throat marketing practices. They often attacked IVES construction techniques saying that if you dropped an IVES loco it would shatter as it was Iron and a Lionel steel loco was indestructible. So well, it wouldnt mangle itself into a ball of bent tin??? By then IVES locos were steel bodies on iron frames and were drastically more detailed and well made than Lionel's offerings anyway. (I am biased !!!) Harry IVES, then the president, always just shook his head at this and wouldn't stoop as low to attack Lionel back. The product should speak for itself. 

  In 1926 IVES retooled most of their line to try and retake the market share lost 2 years prior. This required a tremendous cash outlay. The reshaping of the line continued for the next few years, ultimately reaching a climax in 1928 with the 1134 steam loco. This loco was extremely expensive to develop and manufacture. I cannot remember the exact number but the cost of tooling was staggering in 1928 dollars. IVES had gone into significant debt with creditors to make these changes. Hoping to keep the hounds at bay until the investments paid off. 

  A few months into 1928 the creditor who printed the catalogs sued. Due to Ct. law at the time it required all the creditors to join and IVES filed for bankruptcy. Management petitioned for a private sale of the company whose orders for the year would easily have paid off the debts. The courts refused (the reason is lost to history), and the firm went to auction. A silent representative i believe named Merkel bought the company for a pitiful sum on behalf of Lionel, AF, and Hafner. Due to the bankruptcy hearings, the new owner owned basically the name and inventory. They had to rent the factory, tooling, and other materials needed for production from the creditors. This was probably not foreseen. 

  During 1928 the new trio of owners most likely sent some representatives to IVES with the mission to start trying to regain profits. Most of the expensive to produce IVES designs left over from before the re-tooling were discontinued. The obselete designs were replaced with pieces from the AF or Lionel line. An example would be that wide gauge freights now used American Flyer bodies, and the small IVES boxcabs now wore Lionel 8 cabs. It was late in 1929 that Lionel bought out AF and Hafner's interests. Most likely due to the fact the firm was not able to gain a significant profit with all the overhead required to keep the factory open. 

  When the 1930 catalog was released they AF products were gone everywhere but in the Circus Sets, replaced by Lionel bodied pieces. It is likely the Bridgeport factory was closed sometime in 1931 and all production was now undertaken in the Lionel facilities in NJ. 

  The 1694E and cars as well as the standard gauge big brother were strictly Lionel designs. IVES had nothing to do with them. So to say Lionel looked down on them is absurd, they made it!!! 

  The utimate decision to close IVES was probably due to nothing more than money. Joshua Cohen was a shrewd businessman with an entourage of attorneys and accountants checking and rechecking everything. With Lionel it all boiled down to cabbage. With the costs of keeping the factory going looming above any profits made by the firm in the 1928-30 period, and the growing chasm of the depression, Lionel probably saw no light at the end of the tunnel. 

  As to why the name was continued, who knows, maybe something in the legal documents dictated the name remain in use for X years. 

  I like to think IVES went out in a blaze of glory. The 1928-30 period saw some of the finest toy trains ever manufactured leave the Holland Ave factory. To me those pieces have an aura of magic around them, maybe due to their rarity. Ive loved them since i was a tot, not so long ago...

 The company did not have to make cheap toys to survive the depression, or manufacture junky plastic crud in the postwar years. Their last catalog was graced with the National Limited, Skyliner, and Chief. What more could you want?

 As for politically correct IVES terms.

 1928-30 should be called the occupation period, not transition.

 1931-32 is the Bondage period. 

 I wrote this off the top of my head so excuse any small mistakes. It is based on the best available info we have now. My thoughts alone have changed in the last 5 years. Just this past year we learned Hafner was involved in the buyout. If anyone has any definitive paperwork on the subject please let us know. Its so scarce to find info about the particulars of the bankruptcy one has to think someone wanted it that way....

You can email me at willowriverantiques@yahoo.com, or Don Lewis ITS president at dorfan@comcast.net.

Nighthawk, I've done a lot of research on this personally, for family reasons, and I have not come up with anything that contradicts what you have explained here.   I think what you present are the facts as best we know them at this time.   It was a long time ago and not all of it was documented and no one who was there is still around, so there's a lot of reconstruction necessary.   I think the Ives Society has been working at this and has come up with the most reasonable reconstruction of events.   Motives of course are probably near impossible to reconstruct.

I think your account walks the narrow middle line between the Lionel partisans who think Ives was some sideline abberation, and the Ives partisans who think Ives could do no wrong. (The classic example of the latter would be Louis Hertz in his book "Messrs. Ives of Bridgeport" which pretty much paints the Ives as saints and Mr. Cowen as the devil.)  

My personal opinion is that nothing in the train world even comes close to Ives wide gauge, it's in a category all it's own.  But I'll also admit that has a lot to do with my dad and his father, and growing up playing with my dad's Ives set in the 1950's.  Which I still have, and treasure.  As Hertz wrote in another book, "One thing is absolutely certain. Every collector, regardless of his original interests or intentions, sooner or later is going to have to face the matter of Ives trains."

But like everything human, this story is more complex.  The fact is that Ives was the biggest toy maker in America before Lionel even existed.  The game was theirs to lose.  And lose it they did.   Yes, there is general historical agreement that Cowan was pretty ruthless in his marketing techniques.  Yes, the Great Depression intervened.  But the same could be said for Flyer, Lionel's other rival, and it survived into the 1960's.  The responsibility for Ives' demise has to come to rest with Ives management, and it is unlikely that it was entirely the result of them being such kind and generous souls, as painted by Hertz.

I agree that Ives did go out in a blaze of glory.  The 1134, The Black Diamond, Olympian, National Limited, the late pure Ives and - forgive me - "early transition" period IMHO has never been surpassed in terms of the pure grace and beauty of design.  A lot of collectors look for the later trains and accessories that were straight Lionel items relabeled with Ives badges; I have no interest in these.  Let Lionel be Lionel and Ives be Ives: a Lionel 124 station with an Ives brass sign never fooled anybody: by then Ives was gone.

Ives Train Society #I-7038

Did Lionel make a similar box called complete railways?

John. 

I do not have any Ives yet .  So I am not schooled in them.  Are the true Ives products much better than their Lionel counterparts ?  And what would be a good engine to start the Ives bug with ?

Glenn

Can't resist posting a photo of my Ives treasure, an MTH Tinplate Traditions set.

Just picked one of these engines up myself, and cannot wait to get it running on my layout.

I've been able to find some of the smaller New York Central S-Motor locomotives in O Gauge pretty reasonably and in running order for a nice start to the Ives universe.

Since I've started to heavily get into tinplate recently, I'm really starting to like what I'm seeing in Ives.  They are really good, solid trains that seem to run well and built to last a long time!

I stumbled across that a few years ago on  some website that I cannot recall.  I thought it fit to this forum.

Glenn

That is kind of a loaded question that only personal preference can answer.  Kind of like asking are Ford's better than Chevy's?  Is Coke better than Pepsi?

Is Ives better?

Well I like them better...but look at my screen name!

A good place to start would be with the nicest you can afford.  Many of them are very reliable runners that are easily kept alive.  Many parts are also available for repair.