William Frederick Hafner founded his first toy company in 1901 in Chicago, Il.,
to produce Clockwork toys. In the beginning, his company - the Toy Auto Company - focused on the
production of clockwork automobiles. Hafner's creations reflected the advances in
technology during those years, and clockwork mechanisms became the consistent component in
all the pieces he manufactured. But the company struggled with the production and distribution
of its products. In 1904, the name was changed to the W.F. Hafner Company. Hafner produced clockwork trains
from 1905-07.
Facing mounting financial troubles Hafner entered into a partnership in 1910 with William Coleman,
a Chicago hardware store owner, to start American Flyer. They focused the business
on the production of clockwork trains.
In 1914 Hafner left American Flyer to reform his company and produce lithographed trains. The Hafner
Manufacturing Company was a maker of clockwork-powered 'O' gauge toy trains, based in Chicago,
Illinois, from 1914 to 1951. During its peak periods, Hafner Manufacturing employed as many as 150 people.
The reasons for William Hafner departing American Flyer, a company he helped found, are lost to history.
In the book Greenberg's Guide to American Flyer Prewar 'O' Gauge, author Alan R. Schuweiler cites
three possibilities: Hafner may not have known what position he held in the company, he may have
sought a larger share of the company, and he may have been passed over in favor of his co-founder's
son, William Ogden Coleman, Jr.
While Hafner was able to quickly gain distribution from catalog retailer G. Sommers & Co.,
it never received the widespread distribution of the so-called "Big Four" of
American Flyer, Lionel, Dorfan, and
Ives.
The early Hafner trains bore the Overland Flyer brand and closely resembled competing offerings
from American Flyer. As late as 1917 a car appeared in American Flyer's product line that closely
resembled a Hafner design. This suggests the two companies worked together in their early days,
or that one or both companies copied designs from the other. Since American Flyer was known to
have purchased rolling stock from German competitor Bing, it is
possible that American Flyer also purchased from Hafner, or vice versa.
Unlike its competitors, Hafner survived the Great Depression without making significant
changes to its product line, since it always specialized in inexpensive train sets that
sold for US$3 or less. World War II proved a greater challenge. Since toy production was
prohibited after 1942, toy companies had to adapt. While Lionel and the A. C. Gilbert Company were
able to secure government contracts to manufacture items with military applications, Hafner
lacked the tooling and manufacturing expertise to do the same. Hafner survived by forming a
symbiotic relationship with the Fox Brewing Company. Fox was unable to secure bottlecaps from
any other source, while Hafner was unable to make much else.
William Hafner's son John Hafner took over the company in 1933, but the elder Hafner stayed
involved with the company until his death in 1944. Hafner's son John took over completely in 1944
and ran the company until 1951 when he sold it to All Metal Products Company, the makers of
the Wyandotte brand of toys which shortly went bankrupt in 1956.
In a 1992 interview, John Hafner said he was glad to get out of the business, citing increased difficulty
competing with larger toy manufacturers.
Hafner's new ownership faced the same difficulties, and by 1956 was out of business and in
liquidation. Louis Marx and Company purchased the Hafner tooling, then
shipped it to its subsidiary in Mexico, where it was used to produce inexpensive windup and
battery-powered sets. Many Marx collectors believe Louis Marx's primary motivation for the
purchase was to eliminate a competitor from the marketplace.
The clockwork locomotives and colorful lithographed tinplate rolling stock placed Hafner
at the low end of the market. Unlike most of its competitors, Hafner never created an electric
train. Any Hafner electric trains that exist today were retrofitted with a motor from another
manufacturer. Electrifying Hafner locomotives by outfitting them with surplus Marx electric motors
is a somewhat common practice.
Both Hafner and Marx were known to use "recycled" lithography, a cost-saving practice where
the tinplate from defective print runs was flipped over and printed on the blank side and used.
The result of this is hidden graphics on the interior of cars and accessories. In addition to
re-using its own defective sheets, Hafner would sometimes buy defective sheets from other
companies as scrap and use it. Some Hafner collectors specialize in collecting these variations.
Additionally, some metal products from the mid-20th century such as flashlights have surfaced
with Hafner lithography inside, which indicates that Hafner sold its surplus or unusable print
runs for use in the manufacture of products that would be painted.
