Yonezawa Toys (Y) Tin Lithographed Battery Operated “United States” Ocean Liner Ship Japanese Toy *SOLD*

Yonezawa Toys (Y) Tin Lithographed Battery Operated “United States” Ocean Liner Ship Japanese Toy

Our battery operated “United States” ship, aka Ocean Liner, is a large scale tin from Yonezawa.  The rear lever makes it drive forward and aft, then the rear wheel and be positioned for circles or straight lines.

Length is a very long (for Japanese tin toys) 18 1/2″.

The upper deck tin lithography is in excellent condition and original.

The ship is from the Lonnie Dossett estate, and we believe the red hull bottom is repainted.  Operation works well with a single D cel battery.

Yone, aka Yonezawa is known for their very well executed airplane toys and airships.  Their B-17 lithography and large scale machinery likely transferred to such a detailed toy as this.

A brief history of Yonezawa Toys Co. Ltd. (Y) of Tokyo, Japan:  

Yonezawa Toys (米澤玩具 Yonezawa Gangu) (known also as Yone or simply Y) was founded in the 1950’s in Tokyo. It was one of Japan’s largest and most prodigious post-war toy manufacturers and an early participant in the growing radio control market.  

The company and focused on the production of thousands of different electrically operated and mechanical toys through the early 1970’s. Some were branded not as Yonezawa but as STS. It is unclear as to the origin of the STS label, but it is presumed to be that of an importer. Yonezawa briefly dabbled in radio control in the mid-1980’s with the introduction of the 1/10-scale Wave Hunter buggy, sold in North America as the Monogram Lightning.  

Under Sega’s leadership, Yonezawa Toys was briefly known as Sega-Yonezawa until the Yonezawa branding was dropped entirely in April 1998. Once Sega Sammy Holdings was formed, Sega Toys was reorganized under Sega’s entertainment contents business.  

Since the early 2000’s, Sega Toys markets itself distinctively from the Sega brand, with some occasional collaboration between the two. An example of their collaboration is Sega and Sega Toys producing the UFO Catcher prize games jointly, where Sega manufactures the arcade equipment, while Sega Toys produces the prizes. (From Wikipedia)