Toy Trucks Too

Here, I must digress from trains. As I have mentioned, anything with wheels has always attracted me. When I was a kid I loved toy trucks too. I received several wonderful trucks in my early years. The first one was a yellow Doepke toy road grader. It was exactly like my older brother’s, except his was orange. He had allowed me to play with it occasionally. I was ecstatic to get one of my very own. With my new toy I became quite the civil engineer, creating roads in our back yard with pavement made from dirt and water. After a few days of playing, some paint on my new toy chipped off, and I discovered orange paint under the yellow - it was my brother’s orange road grader! I guess he had out-grown it

My Dad was co-owner of the Marshall-Wells hardware store in Ashland, and sold these big sturdy toy trucks. I would go with him when the store was closed. He would let me play with those wonderful toys. He must have seen how much I loved them because over the next several years I was gifted a Smith-Miller dump truck, an All American Cargo Liner tractor trailer, a Doepke earth mover, and a Nylint Michigan bucket crane. My backyard road empire became a marvelous thing! I learned to drive on those mud roads, especially how to back up a trailer.

 Although it was my dad who saw my love for these childhood toys, he must have been unaware of my continued interest in trains and trucks, including the toys, because when I went off to college, he gave them all away to the neighbor kids.

 

As an adult I have searched junk stores and antique shops to find replacements for my lost treasures, and have found most of the trucks and trains. The photos I include her are not the ones I have collected, but pictures from the Web of those trucks in pristine condition.

In recent years my brother has added to my collection by giving me a Structo steam shovel.