Ferdinand Strauss Timber Truck Tin Windup *SOLD*

Ferdinand Strauss Timber Truck Tin Windup for sale

This is new to us; a highly unusual toy!  Yes Strauss, which predated Marx, is an Early American tin maker.  His company pioneered light weight and colorful tin toys at a time when cast iron reigned supreme.

Our truck is used and original with a cab straightening.  It looks like ages ago the cab was pushed down, and it was straightened.  You can see some wrinkles and then a very light overpaint of a couple of chips at the bottom of the bend on the “C” of the cab.

The windup works well, but with such a heavy load, it needs a smooth surface.  Logs remove for play fun.  They may not be original, they are old, but we had seen square logs previously documented.

Toys like this are a great crossover between lithography collectors, truck collectors, and early windup toys.  It is quite large as shown (for tin toys) and is a great treasure.

A brief history of the Ferdinand Strauss Company of New York City, New York:

The Ferdinand Strauss Company was founded in the early 1900’s in New York City, New York by Ferdinand Strauss. Strauss was from the Alsace region of Germany. In the beginning, Strauss imported various toys that he sold from his New York Shop. Strauss specialized in importing tin mechanical toys and produced toys from 1914 to 1927.

During early 1900’s, European toy manufacturers had already perfected color lithography, and were manufacturing many tin toys and pressed steel toys for the North American market. Like most European toy manufacturers, Strauss also manufactured pressed tin toys that had color lithography on them.  Many of the toys also had wind-up or clockwork mechanisms in order to have them move on their own. In 1912 Strauss hired Louis Marx, who later founded the Marx toy Company.

In 1918 Strauss began manufacturing toys on his own instead of importing them. Strauss produced (wind-up) toys for the Abraham & Strauss Department Stores and was a pioneer in the friction tin toy industry. They managed to capture much of the 1920’s mechanical tin toy craze, but Strauss was eventually out manufactured by other toy companies that had similar toys.

The Ferdinand Strauss Company’s eventual fate is unclear, but it appears that the company faded into history by 1927. There is some evidence that the company was absorbed by Louis Marx’s company as there are several items from the Strauss line that seem to have been incorporated in to Marx’s own line.