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Cool, great video. Love olden times Lionel.

This is so cool. Never knew that this was made. I am 65 yrs old now and a WW2 history buff. Born too late, I guess. But I did get to throw gravel at the caboose guys as they went by with the windows open when I was young. We even put gravel inside packed snowballs during the winter to remind them to duck year-round.

If I would of got that for Christmas '43, I would of started crying! Santa let me down!

Unrealistic but oddly satisfying. I can see myself many years in the past or a few in the future playing with this.

Great job and great patience! The train actually looks pretty good.

So cool! I think that I saw an unboxed one at York, but I'm not too sure, although there are always a few that are opened up and displayed. It's kind of humorous that they had the wire connecting posts printed on the signal base. I would bet that some woodworking dad could have made one roll a bit better. It was an interesting piece and a smart move on Lionel's part, considering the situation. An excellent video, as always.

So you actually assembled a vintage one? Not a reproduction? Impressive. Very impressive. And here I thought I would be the only person insane enough to do that should the opportunity ever arise.

Interesting and how horrible to not have the real toy trains. The war time was so horrible and many sacrifices were made. Awesome piece of history, but I would have hated these cardboard trains. Basically a marketing idea/campaign to keep Lionels name in the market and relevant during WW II . OUTSTANDING Video on these historic time pieces during Lionel’s History.🔥🔥🔥👍

Thanks for posting, Brian. Great to get some additional information on the Paper Train. Most likely, not many have survived besides the one that were never assembled, such as the ones you have. I have heard that many people struggled with the assembly. Reminds me of some of the Lego items with the so called picture instructions.

Hi Brian, your video was a lot of fun to watch. I have heard about the Lionel paper train but never saw one before. Thanks for posting!

Awesome. I've always known how difficult these things were to assemble that I've never given thought to how they got to consumers. Very cool dealer box. This is the first time I've seen the instructions for the Wartime Freight. I see why these were such a nightmare. Still a unique piece of history. Loved the comparisons to their pre-war counterpart/inspiration.

Excellent video, always super informative, watching from England 🇬🇧👍. Keep up the great work.

The infamous paper train, the kiddos' disappointment and their fathers' nightmares trying to put the $#@! thing together.

Always love your videos -- wow -- I must give you extra plaudits for actually assembling one of these and doing a track test! An amazing story and it's amazing how prescient Lionel's 1943 promotional literature was on the great future for Lionel and thousands of kids that lay just ahead! Bravo!

Really neat , i would like to see one of those !

Thank you, one of your beat videos! I really enjoyed this. 👍🇺🇸

After your teaser was posted I couldn't wait to see the full video! I bet we all wish we had one a $1 Paper Train set in our collection. Thanks for sharing your collection and knowledge.

Thank you again showing me something I have never seen before. After seeing this video if I do see one for auction I’ll keep my money in my wallet. You showed great patience.

Al Cox had this for sale combined with the Lionel "Brute" buddy-l sized olympic bipolar prototype for a cool $1 million for the pair. A buddy of mine wasnt interested in the bridge and got Al to split them up. He didnt tell me what he paid, other than it was "the most anyone had paid for a train." Al had at least 2 gifts, building an amazing collection and making money

Watching some old videos of yours! AWESOME SET! I love it Brian❤️❤️💪

Awesome!!

Looks interesting!

Awesome

I've wanted to get a repro one to build, but haven't found one. I don't want to assemble a rare, unbuilt original kit, nor pay the premium to acquire one. But I still want the experience of getting to build this cool Lionel kit. Hopefully I eventually find one of the repros for a price that satisfies me.

I bought a repo version of the paper train. I never opened it and sold it for a loss later. I was fooled by an ebay description in my early years. Lesson learned!

Holy cow brian. You are a brave and patient man to assemble that paper train. I have heard it is challenging. I hope you can make it roll around the track. Never saw one do that.

Very cool

Awesome 👍👍

When do you sleep? Thanks for all the time and energy you put into making these fantastic videos!

You are right that poor dog is running a hundred miles an hour around the fire hydrant! Too funny along with the confused man buying a paper!!😅

great video ! so why didn't they make it in plastic, maybe as a kit ? they produced other products in plastic , at that time, didn't they ? and that theme could have included a railroad ferry that could pass under the bridge, a small one. anyway nice product indeed. by the way $15 in 1950 = $194.97 in 2024. 3.53% Average Inflation from 1950 to 2024. i would pay that....

Thanks for taking time to share this, its food for the soul.

I really enjoy the onboard with the go pro.

You made that storefront section, is a nice accent. I know you seen Truckerbon Hobby Shop. It's featured in Classic Toy Trains.

I was born in 1958 and this would have made a great Christmas present but 350.00 was not something my mom had....Great layout, looks exciting!

The dog on the fireplug.. O-guage!

Why didn’t you use the original tubular track?

Nice video. Do you own it now (hopefully?) Did MPC or MTH ever reproduce it? A.C.Gilbert?

Amazing to see the original artwork, thanks Brian!

Super O Rules!

Very neat- never knew they made something like this. Always interesting to see unique and unusual stuff like this, I love the way the clear panel allows you to see inside the whistle chambers, and the chrome finish adds a really flashy touch! I thought the chamber was metal until you spun it around and I could see the orange color of the plastic, I guess they didn't feel the need to chrome the back.

As someone who has had the opportunity to get up close to a REAL railroad lift bridge, I found this fascinating. In the late 1980’s ~ early 1990’s, I was the head technician for a small 2 - way radio company; one of our customers was Bay Colony Railroad (recently acquired by the Mass Coastal Railroad), who had the contract for freight service on Cape Cod at the time. Bay Colony had their radio repeater system located in the head house of the Cape - side tower of the Cape Cod Canal railroad bridge, with the antenna atop the head house. Accessing the head house to service the repeater required riding in a tiny 2-person elevator (think getting 2 people in a phone booth!) to get up to the head house. The equipment rack housing the repeater was maybe 20 feet away from the huge 16 - foot diameter cable sheaves that raised & lowered the movable bridge truss section; many times when I was working up there & it was time for a train to cross (the bridge is normally in the raised position to allow for canal maritime traffic), it was fascinating to watch the huge sheaves spool up to lower or raise the bridge. There was a walkway around the perimeter of the head house; going outside to watch a train cross front that height (I think the bridge towers are something like 215 feet high!) was like watching a Z scale model train run between your feet! 😊 One day we came down to do some major overhaul work on the repeater & were surprised to discover that the elevator was out of order; how were we going to access the head house? The solution was the the Army Corps of Engineers (who operates & maintains the bridge) lowered it. In the lowered portion, the bridge is only about 7 feet above the mean water level; fully raised, 135 feet. The party of 6 of us walked out onto the middle of the bridge span with our tools & test equipment; they then RAISED the bridge with us on it! (To me, the most amazing thing was the TOTAL lack of vibration as the span was raised! The movable span of the bridge weighs 2200 tons! 😮The only way we knew we were moving was seeing the water get farther away.). When the bridge was fully raised, we walked up a stairway on one of the diagonal trusses to access the head house! 😊 Getting back to the model world, I can see why the Lionel bridge may have been a bit too complex to market as a toy; but in today’s model railroad market, I could see this being marketed to serious modelers & collectors (especially if Lionel designed it to accommodate S as well as O gauge for us American Flyer operators). 😊

Nicely done show ! I wish you would have briefly compared the 213 to 1991's 12782 lift bridge, which actually DID make it into production. [One for sale right now on eBay is $400.] Also, the modern-day Menards "30-inch Aerial Bridge" which is stationary (doesn't lift at all). [It's current production and sells for about $200.] Unless you lived near a real one of these, or seen one working, it's just another big, expensive accessory that most postwar families likely couldn't have afforded. That $15.95 would be $208. today. [A train kid's priorities: switches, more track, signals, cheaper accessories, bigger engines, a ZW --- all competed for those train $$$.] When I attended the 2000 LCCA Convention in Dearborn, MI, we were lucky enough to go on a river cruise & we sailed right underneath one of these. VERY impressive! 1950 was a very special year for Lionel; they likely had their hands full already with everything else already planned... one other possibility that you didn't mention: maybe there just weren't enough pre-season orders to warrant bringing it to market.

My dad told me a story of a Lionel lift bridge. Back in the early 1970's I'm guessing, my dad and his good friend, Al Cox, made a trip to York. Either at York or a side trip to a warehouse full of post war Lionel stuff. It was then my dad spotted a Lionel lift bridge. Al Cox ended up buying the lift bridge. May dad said it was different than the one in this video. I've been fortunate in my younger childhood to have seen the collections of Al Cox and Dan Olsen. I even remember visiting the McCoy tin plate standard gauge factory. Those were the days.

Would be nice if Lionel today made a run of at least straight super O track.. And 072 curves..but that's asking too much I'm sure

Your super O looks almost new...very nice layout

I started watching your videos from the beginning and this video is so beautiful. I will watch this over and over. Your beautiful layout while listening to the record was great. Thanks again for investing your time in doing these videos. I am watching for a second time and I will definitely watch again.

I used to have a few model trains growing up in the 60s. After watching this, I remember I had the watchmen and the gate that went down on my train set. I always wanted one of the landscape train sets like this one. But it never happened. But these kind of toys are so much better than what you find today. All you find today is something electronic. Takes me back to a much better and simpler time.

The lift bridge could have been used with a simulated waterway. A boat or ship could have passed under the bridge on a belt or tracks. The ship could have been quite engaging. Imagine a car ferry with automobiles and rail cars, it would have been very difficult for all but the most gifted modeler. It would have to have been on a group layout to justify its complexity. In the end, in my opinion the $15.95 price was not reasonable enough to warrant the tooling and other development cost considerations. But, it certainly would draw attention.

If this was produced back then, it would still be very desirable today. Not many would have been sold due to financial & space limitations.