Ives

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Ives Corp. history

Bridgeport, Connecticut, 1868 - 1932.
Founder Edward R. Ives originally made baskets and hot air toys. Ives joined partner Cornelius Blakeslee, a brother-in-law. Ives moved to Bridgeport in 1870 and by the 1880s, they were leaders in superb clockwork toys designed by Jerome Secor, Nathan Warner, and Arthur Hotchkiss. Ives also acted as jobber for other toy manufactures' toys. The firm filed for bankruptcy in 1929, another victim of the Depression. Lionel took over the company at that time, and the name Ives and Blakeslee remained until 1931.

The Ives Corporation was the first real American manufacturer of toy trains. In the mid-19th century, most toy trains were non-motorized toys that children pulled along on the floor. Ives developed the first mechanical clockwork locomotive, an innovation that gave its wind-up trains the excitement of self-propelled motion. That was in the 1870s, too. They were also safer than the toy locomotives with real steam engines being made by European manufacturers. Ives' clockwork cast iron trains were competitive but lacked the sparkle of tin litho car bodies and so they were soon producing tin litho trains as well. Some of them incorporated automatic air whistles and smoking stacks (courtesy of a lit cigarette). Eventually, a whole line of tin litho trolleys, train stations and platforms, bridges, signals and buildings would be added. The glass dome stations were the most elegant, but all of the tin litho buildings are highly prized today in good condition or better.