Marxville and Marx Plastic Buildings
An Introduction to Marx Plastic O/S Scale Items
Forward This article is meant to
- bring together information from a variety of sources
- add additional information to the collector of Marx plastic buildings and accessories, and
- clarify terminology.
All plastic buildings are included here but not all plastic accessories. I have left out electric lampposts and most operating electric railroad signals. Generally, those electric accessories, which have been subsequently produced by K-Line using the old Marx molds, have been included in this work. Also, the word "accessories" has been used in two contexts here. The first is the most obvious: that being anything which is not an engine, piece of rolling stock, track or transformer. This includes: water tanks or towers, crossing gates and signals, buildings, etc. The other contexts pertains to those additional pieces that were included with the building kits (i.e., fences, people, vehicles, etc.).
Since 1919 when Louis Marx formed his corporation: "Louis Marx & Company, Inc." Marx toys have been a popular staple of the American child — and in recent decades — the American adult. By the 1940s Marx had become the world's largest toy manufacturer and the prodigious output of Marx factories located in America, Australia, Brazil, Canada, England, France, Hong Kong, Japan, Mexico, South Africa, and Wales has yet to be adequately cataloged. A very good attempt to catalog and publish Marx trains in book form has been made and is the basis for much of the information that follows. But, there are other disciplines within the greater Marx collecting fraternity. Playset collecting is also a major player and there have been a couple of excellent publications for its devotees that have contained valuable material for this work. The trouble is, to date, playsets are still crying to have really decent books published for them. Still, given the phenomenal Marx production, this is not an easy undertaking and printing costs and lead times for these efforts are considerable.
The Marxville line of plastic railroad buildings was marketed in 1952, '53, and '54. By issuing sets with and without figures and accessories, Marx could offer a variety of retail prices to the public. Of course, those premium sets which included extras, commanded higher prices. The buildings were simplified models requiring assembly and were packaged in thin pressboard boxes. Some had separate instruction sheets while others had the assembly instructions printed on the side or back of the box itself. Early boxes were plain brown card stock with a simple, one color line drawing of the building it contained. Later boxes had three-color art (red, blue, and black).
In general, the very early accessories (i.e., lamps, lights, towers, etc.) came in a neutral-colored, thin yardstick box with exterior blue printing. Later accessory boxes had red exterior printing. The postwar Marx accessories, especially the later plastic accessories of the early 1950s, appeared in larger yellow yardstick cartons with black printing.
Dating some Marx items is very difficult as the relatively few catalogs printed by Marx were not all inclusive. However, it is fairly safe to date the beginning of production with the accessories' inclusion in a major retail chain catalog; i.e., Sears, Montgomery Wards, or J.C. Penny's Christmas catalogs. Still, there are shortcomings here as well. A good example is in the way buildings are presented in the Sears and Montgomery Wards catalogs. The Sears catalogs simply show the building no fences, figures, or other accessories. Does this mean Sears carried none of the premium sets, which included figures and accessories, or was space at a premium in the catalog and only the basic building was shown? The Montgomery Wards catalogs (at least for 1952 53) show all the accessories. Aside from the boxes the buildings came in, the Montgomery Wards catalogs help validate the contents as shown in the Marx catalogs. Non-building accessories continued in production for years and some were included in Marx train sets until Marx's' demise in the 1970s.
According to Greenberg's Guide to Marx Trains Volume II by Eric J. Matzke, "Prewar accessory catalogue numbers were three-digit numbers with an occasional suffix "A" to note a variation. After the war, a zero was placed before the catalog number to designate plastic; then it was changed to a four-digit number and during the Quaker Oats period, the suffix "C" was sometimes added; perhaps indicating the type of packaging."
Greenberg's Guide only lists the accessories for four buildings, the remaining listings simply state: "plastic with accessories". Also, there may be color variations made for the Canadian market with which we are unfamiliar.
Marx vs. K-Line Colors
K-Line produced some buildings in the same color as Marx (Fire House, Supermarket, Barn, L-shaped Ranch House). There is a slight variation in the surface of the plastic. The Marx buildings are shinier and can be compared to a high-gloss finish, whereas the plastic for the K-Line buildings is duller and can be compared to a satin finish. The colors of the K-Line white and green barn are slightly different; the green is darker and the white is brighter than in the Marx. The L-shaped Ranch house has chocolate brown walls vs. dark brown for the Marx and the yellow is a bright banana yellow vs. a yellowish-green for the Marx.
Marx people are a near white or cream soft plastic. The cream color was designated as "ivory" at the Marx factory. K-Line people are hard plastic and molded in several colors (i.e., pink or beige, red, dark blue) with the latest offerings being painted in great detail.
The K-Line fire truck is molded in a similar but more pearlescent gray than the Marx truck. In addition, the details on the K-Line truck are not as crisp as on the Marx truck.
Marx vs. K-Line Markings
Early K-Line buildings were unmarked, but later versions had "K-LINE" under the roofs or inside one of the walls.
K-Line service stations say "K-LINE" on the sign above the front door.
K-Line factories have a blank hard plastic signboard with a separate adhesive sticker that says "K-LINEVILLE.
Miscellaneous
Early K-Line small board fence sections were white, hard plastic and indistinguishable from Marx. They were later changed to soft plastic.
Further Information
Identifying Marx Plastic Buildings by Glenn Raymond
There's a great article on the accessories packaged with Marx buildings by Doug Gilliatt and Glenn Raymond in Volume 2, Issue #1 of the PCA newsletter, The Villager.