Mercury (toy manufacturer) Marklin, the company was started in 1932, by Attilio Clemente and Antonio Cravero, but its first toy was a gun produced about 1939 (Batazzi et al 1974; Force 1992, 5; History of Mercury 2013; Ralston 2009, 62). The company first began making toy cars just after World War II, so is one of the earliest diecast model makers preceding Corgi and many others and it was the earliest producer in Italy (Richardson 1999, 134). In Italy there was little competition for Mercury through most of the 1950s (Force 1992, 5). Early cars were more Tootsietoy-like with simple cast bodies, wheels
Toy District, Los Angeles these economically stricken areas of Downtown Los Angeles, and the process gave birth to the Toy District, which by 2003 was home to hundreds of resellers of mostly Asian-made toys and other goods, with more than a billion dollars in sales each year. Los Angeles County has emerged as the gateway to most of the toys sold in U.S. retail stores and increasingly abroad. More than five hundred companies make up the toy industry in the county – not only in the Toy District – and they are mainly wholesalers who import dolls, radio-controlled cars and other goods from Pacific