Lincoln Logs were invented around 1916, and this ad was from 1924. The inventor was John Lloyd Wright, son of famous architect Frank Lloyd.

The sets were named after US president Abraham Lincoln, who was born in a one-room log cabin.

It may seem quaint in an age of realistic video games, but I like these creativity toys where the ingredients are a pile of physical parts + imagination.

  • calliope@retrolemmy.com
    12·
    24 days ago

    And his father’s architecture designs!

    Lincoln Logs were invented sometime around 1916–1917 when John Lloyd Wright was working in Japan with his father. The mold for the toy was based on the architecture of the Imperial Hotel in Tokyo, designed by the inventor’s father. The foundation of the hotel was designed with interlocking log beams, which made the structure “earthquake-proof” and one of the few buildings to remain standing after the 1923 Great Kanto Earthquake that crumbled Tokyo.

    I actually remember being surprised by how stable Lincoln Log houses were, moving them around as a kid!

    • Bonus@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
      8·
      24 days ago

      They have significant lap joints and mass as to lock into place and those trusses don’t hurt.

      Apparently, John Lloyd Wright was estranged from his father but, FLW cites Tangrams as influential toys in his early development. I think he had been in early progressive kindergarten or similar. Literally a fitting result for his son to come up with something similar yet more three dimensional and architectural.

      I had no idea these went back that far. They were advertised heavily in the 70s. TIL.

      • calliope@retrolemmy.com
        6·
        24 days ago

        I had no idea these went back that far. They were advertised heavily in the 70s.

        I was thinking the same thing! My family had a set in the 80s.

        They also came out a few years after Erector sets, and some of Lincoln Logs’ early popularity was because of the building set boom in the early 1920s!

        • Bonus@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
          2·
          22 days ago

          I guess I kind of associated them with the hippy-dippyness of the 70s a lot, and that was fairly subjective (because we grew up in hippy-dippy shacks in the woods).