Toy Town is the name of a town and industrial park in Mibu Town in the Tochigi Prefecture in the Kanto region of Japan as well as a brand associated with some toys developed in Toy Town in association with Tomy and other Japanese toy manufacturers and sold primarily in the 1970s. In the later 1950s toy companies faced soaring land prices and taxes as well as damage from natural disasters in Eastern Tokyo. Eiichiro Tomiyama, Tomy's founder, formed a cooperative of toymakers interested in starting a toy factory park like Nuremburg in Germany, long known for its toy industry. Factories and a new train station on the Tobu Railway's Utsunomiya Line were opened in the mid 1960s. 25 companies operated out of the park by the later 1960s.
In the 1970s Toy Town produced many toys for both the domestic and export markets. A decade after it opened the industrial park had generated over 10 billion yen worth of production value. Some toys developed in Toy Town in conjunction with Tomy were sold under the Toy Town Tomy name and many toys sold by overseas catalogue department stores like Sears and Montgomery-Wards (that is to say, toys they sold under their own brands) were Toy Town (or Tomy) toys. Toltoys of Australia imported some Toy Town toys down under in the later 1970s (as well as toys from Tomy). Toy Town also released toys associated with some other Japanese brands including exported Comp U Cars by Toy Town Shinsei. In 1970 the Dokkyo Medical University opened with an associated hospital opening in 1974 and the area saw an influx of residents in the late 1970s.
In the 1980s Toy Town's output declined as more manufacturing was moved overseas, with only a few of the factories and warehouses remaining for distribution. Some Toy Town toys were released under the new "TOYBOX" name in the 1980s, with Toybox also reselling some imported board games from Milton-Bradley in Japan. Toybox seemingly licensed some designs to Taiwanese manufacturer Dah Yang Toys when they started in the mid 1980s. The 1990s saw the end of most of what toy production remained in the area. Some Toy Town toys such as the Mountain Railroad series continued to be produced into the 1990s under character licenses, with Tomy last releasing versions of some of the 1970s Tomy Toy Town greats under the Toybox name in the early 2000s. Toy Town itself is currently the home to the Mibu Town Toy Museum and the Bandai Museum, both expansive Japanese toy museums. In 1990 Tomy established the Tomy Industries Company in Toy Town but all of Tomy's regular business in Toy Town ended by 1996. In 2008 Takara Tomy opened a toy store in the area but this closed in 2013.
Several of my favorite Toy Town toys use a similar cog system wherein spinning gears are sticking out of both sides of a running vehicle, engaging with racks and other tracked accessories to spin, lift, climb, or perform other looping or stunt-like actions.
Toy Town toys include...
Year | Set name | Description | Photo |
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1969 |
Mountain Railway お山のシュッポー |
Series of train toys with large inclines and other accessories activated by cogs in the side of the locomotives |
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1970 |
Mountain Train お山の電車 |
Spiraling mountain monorail train sold in small and large sets | Can be seen here |
1971 |
Sky Plane お空のヒコウキ Flippity Flyer |
Initial Japanese version of the Flippity Flyer motorized stunt-plane toys, exported under the Toy Town name |
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1970s |
New Sky Plane ニューお空のヒコウキ New Flippity Flyer Flippity Flyer |
More advanced version of the earlier Flippity Flyer plane toy with a more involved sky "track" stunt show, exported as New Flippity Flyer by Toy Town and as just Flippity Flyer through Sears into the later 1970s |
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1975 |
Double Track
Speed Circuit ふくせんお空のヒコウキ Speed Circuit |
Two-lane motorized downhill racing track, exported as simply Speed Circuit and rereleased many, many times in Japan | Japanese release can be seen here |
1976 |
Aerial Tank Engine 空中きかんしゃ |
Flipping, climbing locomotive toy exported, remade and knocked off many times | Japanese release can be seen here |
1976 | Flying Stunt Loco | Toy Town export of the Aerial Tank Engine flipping, climbing train toy |
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1976 | Chibi Driver | Motorized driving toy with changeable roadway maps |
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later 1970s |
New Speed Circuit New スピード サーキット |
Rereleased downhill racing course with motorized lift |
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1978 |
Adventure Boy Surprise Car 冒険小僧どっきり号 |
Expanded version of the Aerial Tank Engine with additional stunts |
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One of the more expansive series of Toy Town toys was the Mountain Railway or お山のシュッポー Oyama Shuppo series of train sets. The shuppo in the name really refers to a steam locomotive, and early sets focused on steam engines climbing mountains, but later Shinkansen and character trains and flat-type sets were also released. A website covering many, many sets in the series as well as other Toy Town toys can be seen here.
Beginning in the earlier 1980s, many older Toy Town toys were updated or rereleased under the Toybox name. It seems that Tomy continued to be involved in some way with Toybox, with Toybox even having a similar curvy red logo later on. In the later 1980s the Toybox name was also used on some imported toys and games such as some games from Milton-Bradley. Toybox produced a handful of components for some Milton Bradley products like the Playskool Alphabet Roadway, Milton-Bradley owning the Playskool brand at the time. The Toybox brand continued to be used into the early 2000s on licensed descendants of old Toy Town toys.
Toybox toys include...
Year | Set name | Description | Photo |
---|---|---|---|
1982 |
Space Flight Space Ranger 宇宙飛行スペースレンジャー |
Space Shuttle-themed version of the Flying Stunt Loco with flipping, racing shuttle |
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1983 |
Sky Jumbo お空のジャンボ Flippity Flyer |
1980s Toybox rerelease of the New Sky Plane with updated jumbo jet with flashing light |
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1984 |
Working Robot Busy Robot Factory はたらきロボくん ビジーロボット工場 |
Big Loader-type toy that cycles balls up and down a multi-layer course - the chassis is based directly on Big Loader's |
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1985 | City Highway | Toybox designed and Dah Yang Toys-made downhill city highway racing toy | |
1996 | Mountain Railroad Chip and Dale Acorn Rolling Set | Toybox Mickey Mouse-licensed Mountain Railway set with Chip and Dale that loads and transports acorns |
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2002 | Thomas the Tank Engine Mysterious! Transfer Station | Thomas the Tank Engine licensed version of the Toybox mysterious transfer station train toy |
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I have only come across one Toybox or Toy Town catalogue so far, a Toybox one from 1989. If I find more they will be added here.
Year | Catalogue name | Description | Photo |
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1989 |
Kids Box '89 Toybox Catalogue |
1989 Toybox catalogue |
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Some Toy Town toys were so popular that knockoffs from Taiwan and Hong Kong appeared almost as soon as the original imports disappeared. In particular, the novel operation of the circa 1976 空中きかんしゃ Aerial Tank Engine toy has persisted in many forms as the Climbing or Flying Stunt Loco, only some of which were actually produced by Toy Town/Toybox, with others made by overseas bootleggers and sold at gift stores and mall kiosks.
Year | Set name | Description | Photo |
---|---|---|---|
1979 | Mickey Mouse Loop the Loop | One of the earlier Stunt Loco knockoffs, Toybox ended up losing the American patent to the Flying Stunt Loco trying to go after Illco |
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1980s | Flying Stunt Loco | One of many later copies of the Flying Stunt Loco in different colors |