Carlisle & Finch is credited as being the inventors of the electric
toy train. Headquartered in Cincinnati, Ohio, they originally made electric motors, then toy
trains, and they also produced nautical equipment (a carbon arc searchlight).
The company was founded in 1894 by two electrical engineers, Robert Finch and Morton
Carlisle. They had purchased a repair shop from GE and renamed it Carlisle & Finch Company.
The company repaired electric motors and rewound armatures. The toy trains were first produced
in 1896 as a way to increase revenue and to utilize the small electric motors that they made.
The trains stood about 5.5
inches tall, were made of metal, were colorful, and were highly detailed, and ran on metal track
with rails that were spaced two inches apart. Initial production of the electric train line
used three rail track, then shortly after, the track was converted to two rail. The earliest
products were brass trollies only, about 7 inches long with 4 wheels and a 2 pole 10 volt electric
motor. Included with the set was a 3 foot diameter circle of track. Priced at $3.50 the set became very popular, and the company wound up producing 3 times the amount of sets as originally planned.
Production was eventually expanded to include an entire line. The first catalogs were issued in
1898. Carlisle & Finch trains were heavy and detailed, and catered to the high end market. Carlisle
& Finch was the first to market complete electric-powered trains and thus were the earliest leader in
US toy train production through 1904. Lionel didn't produce their first electric
train until 1901 and Voltamp came out with theirs in 1903. American Flyer's
first electric train came out in 1918. They were eventually overtaken in the toy train marketplace by Ives.
Two inch gauge 2 rail electric trains require a DC power source. Carlisle & Finch trains were initially powered using wet cell batteries. This approach created challenges
for the hobbyists because these batteries were not commercially available, so they had to assemble the
carbon and zinc strips and mix the chromite wet cell elements themselves, usually employing glass
Ball-type jelly jars. In 1902, Carlisle & Finch introduced dry cell batteries to make running their
trains easier. Later on, they introduced several other clever dynamo and hand cranked mechanisms for
generating the electrical current to run the trains. In those days, few homes had electrical power,
so these methods (batteries, dynamos, etc.) had to be provided. One very clever electric current
generator that Carlisle & Finch introduced actually utilized a water turbine, propelled by a garden hose.
Eventually in 1907, they came out with transformer type devices that utilized household current.
Three other smaller, short-lived U.S. manufacturers, Knapp, Howard,
and Voltamp,
adopted Carlisle & Finch's 2-inch 2 rail track design. However, Carlisle & Finch did not intially make
sectional type track, while the others did. Carlisle & Finch's early approach was to supply long
thin rail strips and slotted wooden ties, so the hobbyist had to assemble his track in much
the same way that real railroaders built their trackage. It was thought that by having
longer sections of track, the electrical current would be stronger throughout the layout.
Carlisle & Finch's offerings were by definition non-standard,
even though they were considered to be the inventors of the electric train.
At the beginning of World War I, the United States Government ordered Carlisle and Finch to cease toy
train production in order to concentrate on producing searchlights for the U.S. Navy and United States
Coast Guard. At the end of the war, the company did not resume toy train production, choosing
instead to concentrate on its profitable searchlight business. Within a decade, it was the
largest producer of military searchlights in the country.
Finch bought out Carlisle's share of the company in 1917. Over the ensuing decades, the company began
producing equipment for civilian use, with its searchlights being used in lighthouses and on
offshore oil rigs. This 100+ year-old company still exists today and continues to produce its
line of searchlights and beacons.
Carlisle & Finch website
