Last Updated on September 1, 2023 by Dave Farquhar
The Marx Allstate 9816 train set was a midrange train set Sears sold in the mid-late 1960s. It featured a basic plastic steam locomotive and a generous assortment of freight cars. It must have been a tempting value for consumers at the time.
Marx electric train set catalog# 9816
Sears sold a lot of Marx trains over the years under the Allstate brand.
The Marx Allstate 9816 electric train set was a slight step up from the cheaper 4-wheel plastic sets. It consisted of a 25W transformer, 12 pieces of track, a steam engine and tender, a grain hopper, gondola, log car and caboose to make up a six unit train. The cars had 8 wheels with fixed plastic knuckle couplers. The plastic knuckle couplers and inclusion of a low-end engine helped Marx and Sears hit the aggressive price point they wanted.
- 490 steam locomotive 0-4-0, black, with chug-chug unit and headlight
- 961 New York Central tender, 8 wheel, black
- Lehigh Valley hopper, #21913, 8 wheel, blue
- Pennsylvania 347100 gondola, 8 wheel, gray
- Erie log dump car with log load and tray, maroon
- New York Central 18326 8-wheel caboose, red
- #309 25w AC transformer
- 8 o27 curves and 4 O27 straights
Sears offered about a half-page of accessories alongside these sets in its catalogs. So you frequently find these sets with extra track or other add-ons.
I’ve seen people try to sell complete boxed sets sell for around $100. But to get that price, the box needs to be in nice shape, the set needs to be in really nice shape, and have original paperwork.
Marx made the set for two years, 1966 and 1967. The set is in Robert Whitacre’s 1991 Greenberg’s Guide to Marx Trains vol III: Sets.
What the set originally cost
The 9816 steam freight train set sold for $14.77 in the 1966 and 1967 Sears catalogs, which equates to $137 in 2023 dollars. That’s not much more than the 4-wheel plastic sets like the 9725, which Sears sold alongside it. And this was the set kids wanted after they outgrew a 4 wheel plastic set. The 9816 set neatly undercut Lionel’s Scout sets, which by this time didn’t feature automatic couplers either. Lionel gave you a locomotive with forward and reverse. But other than that, the 9816 was a better set overall since it came with an log dump car. So it was a good deal at that price on a U.S.-made train, built in Girard, Pennsylvania.
David Farquhar is a computer security professional, entrepreneur, and author. He started his career as a part-time computer technician in 1994, worked his way up to system administrator by 1997, and has specialized in vulnerability management since 2013. He invests in real estate on the side and his hobbies include O gauge trains, baseball cards, and retro computers and video games. A University of Missouri graduate, he holds CISSP and Security+ certifications. He lives in St. Louis with his family.