Subject:
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Canada's Largest LEGO Sets
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.loc.ca
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Date:
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Fri, 30 Nov 2012 08:53:24 GMT
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Viewed:
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25548 times
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OK, I'm not referring to the mega-sets of the last dozen years, such as the Taj
Mahal or the Death Star... but to 20th Century Sets.
These sets are so rare, that they are likely unknown to all Canadian (and
American) LEGO collectors.
The sets are the 750 and 7100 Educational Sets of the mid 1960s. These were
Samsonite LEGO sets, and likely produced at the Stratford Ontario and Loveland
Colorado Samsonite plants.
The 7100 set is the largest volume LEGO box of all time (including any of the
mega-sets of today). It is an enormous 3,250 piece wooden box set, that sold
for $100 in the USA (less if you were an institution), likely about $110 in
Canada.
I know of only 1 example of this set anywhere... and the owner lives in
Connecticut USA. There are none of these in the Vault in Billund Denmark. In
fact TLG has no records of this set, which is not really that unusual, since
what Samsonite did in their USA and Canada subsidiaries was often unknown to
Billund.
Here is the very very rare 3,250 piece 7100 set....
http://www.flickr.com/photos/82930629@N08/8231085103/sizes/l/in/photostream/
And until recently, the 750 set was totally unknown, except being mentioned as a
$50 set in mid 1960s Samsonite LEGO retailer reorder catalogs. I finally found
an image from a Canadian 1960s LEGO Junior Designers Club brochure, which
because it lists no Canadian zip code, dates to the 1960s as well. Here is the
club order form, showing the 750 set of unknown parts count (note the similarity
to the larger 7100 set):
http://www.flickr.com/photos/82930629@N08/8232132292/sizes/l/in/photostream/
This 750 set is unknown in any collection, and would command a steep price (as
would another 7100 set). The 750 set likely contains about 1500-1600 parts, and
cost $50 in the USA, and likely $55 in Canada back in the mid 1960s.
Here is a copy of the fall 1965 Samsonite USA Retailer Order form (with the set
numbers as the black numbers within the "Stock Number" area:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/82930629@N08/8232176682/sizes/l/in/photostream/
These same sets were sold in Canada (at a little higher price), and for both
countries, this sheet shows the transition between the early 1960s Town Plan
sets and the later 1960s Samsonite LEGO sets where the set number equals the
parts count (as seen below the heavy black line in the left part of the order
form). I enjoy finding images of old order forms or retailer catalogs... they
provide a snapshot of LEGO at an exact moment in time.
And until I came across that Canadian brochure with that 750 set as a contest
prize... I had never even seen an image of one...
Enjoy!
Gary Istok
P.S. These very rare wooden box sets can be found (with 80+ other LEGO wooden
box sets) in Chapter 15 of my 2,800 page 73 chapter LEGO DVD download (found in
Marketplace here). Only about 10 wooden box sets are found in any online
database).
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Message has 1 Reply:
 | | Re: Canada's Largest LEGO Sets
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| One of the Canadian posters over on Eurobricks (where I posted this as well)... questioned me about a 7100 Educational set in Canada in the late 1970s. In the 1960s and 1970s TLG often reused the set numbers... sometimes 3 times. And from circa (...) (12 years ago, 3-Dec-12, to lugnet.loc.ca)
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