Hercules Meets Jack and Jill By Ken Foust

Okay, I admit it; the title sounds like a gladiator film so bad even Steve Reeves wouldn’t touch it. But it’s actually what you get when you put two of the nicest toy trains ever made side by side. In some ways the “HERCULES” and the “JACK and JILL” are quite similar, while in others they’re very different. Either way they’re both charming examples of what American toymakers Milton Bradley and William S. Reed could do with wood and lithographed paper in the late 19th Century.

The two sets have a great deal in common. First, they’re both passenger trains. Second, they’re both big. According to a Bradley catalog, the “HERCULES” makes “when shackled up, a train of about 45 inches.” Reed’s “JACK and JILL” set is only an inch shorter. They’re also well detailed and quite colorful. The wheel arrangement on the engines is identical too. Both have four small pilot wheels near the cowcatcher, four large drivers supporting the boiler and cab, and no trailing truck. In the 1850’s this “4-4-0” wheel arrangement became so popular in this country; it’s still known as the “American” type.

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