Radio Flyer Wagons Keep Rolling Along

It was February 1967, and a little girl named Judy couldn’t have been happier. It was her second birthday and her present was a shiny new red wagon.

Judy’s mom pulled her in that wagon around their suburban Philadelphia neighborhood and later Judy pulled her little brother. Judy used the wagon to haul stuff--dolls, dirt, whatever needed a lift--and the wagon came in handy for other imaginative games she would play.

When Judy grew up and moved from her parents’ home, her wagon went with her. And after her first child was born, Judy Patterson cleaned up the wagon, sat little Courtney inside and pulled her daughter around her Allentown neighborhood like her mother had done a quarter century earlier.

“We like wagons,” said Patterson, whose friend, Courtney’s godfather, bought Courtney a new wagon for her second birthday. “Maybe it was because I had a bumpin’ red wagon when I was little.”

Some things are timeless.

In Oak Park, Ill., a suburb of Chicago, Robert Pasin heads outside many Saturday mornings, pulling his 2-year-old daughter in her large wagon to the nearby farmers’ market. All wood, with inflatable tires and high sides, his wagon is quite different from Patterson’s stamped steel model. But it came from the same company, the one most people think about when they think about toy wagons.

It’s a Radio Flyer.

Pasin, 28, is the president of Radio Flyer, a family-owned company that has made wagons for 80 years. In 1917, Pasin’s grandfather Antonio crafted his first wagon in a one-room shop in Chicago. It was all wood and he named it the Liberty Coaster. Later, Pasin’s father, Mario, became company president.

Last year, Pasin became president. He runs the company with his two brothers.

Radio Flyer is the largest manufacturer of toy wagons in the world, making about 40 models, from a tiny one on a $2.99 key chain to a large wood all-terrain vehicle for $150. In between are the classic stamped steel red wagons and the molded plastic wagons that have become popular in the 1990s.

Pasin won’t provide sales information but believes that 75 percent of families with children in the United States have owned a Radio Flyer wagon at some point. Competitors are few.

Pasin said people seem to think wagons are having a “comeback” when they first have children.

“We’ve always been there,” he tells them. “You were just out of the market.”

Radio Flyer wagons are icons of Americana. They have been featured in movies and commercials that sought to capture the playful spirit of childhood adventure and timeless family values. “Radio Flyer” was the name of a 1992 movie about two brothers who transform their little red wagon into an imaginary means of flight.

In 1914, Antonio Pasin was 16 when he left his family in Italy to come to the United States. Like millions of other immigrants, he was poor, but he had energy and a dream.

Antonio’s family had designed and built fine furniture for generations in Italy. In America, he first built wooden wine cabinets and phonograph cabinets, but soon began crafting wagons. He named his company The Liberty Coaster Co., after the Statue of Liberty.

Pasin could not mass-produce wagons using his own hands, so he looked to the auto industry and, in 1927, began using metal-stamping technology.

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They became, as his slogan said, “For Every Boy. For Every Girl.”

By 1930, Antonio’s company, now named Radio Steel & Manufacturing, was the world’s largest producer of coaster wagons. His wagons had several names, including one that captured the spirit of the times: the Radio Flyer.

He used the name “radio” because radio was the high-tech invention of the time and Antonio was enamored with technology. It didn’t hurt that a fellow Italian was the inventor. The word “Flyer” gave a nod to the wonder of flight.

“He always wanted to ride on the other exciting things of the times,” said Pasin. “I don’t think we can appreciate what a buzzword it was at the time.”

Antonio’s wagon business thrived, even during the Great Depression. In 1933, Antonio built a 45-foot-tall “Coaster Boy” for the Chicago World’s Fair. A showroom featured the latest wagons and offered visitors miniature wagons for a quarter.

In 1934, the Streak-O- Lite, complete with control dials and working headlights, was modeled after the then-popular streamlined Zephyr train.

World War II was the only thing that ever brought Radio Flyer wagon-making to a halt.

After the war, Mario Pasin joined the company, creating new products. For new suburban parents, he developed a line of garden carts and wheelbarrows, and he introduced the Radio Rancher, the first to incorporate high sides for pulling children.

Through the years, Radio Flyer has created many other steel and wood products: artists’ easels, puppet theaters, tiny trikes, sleds--all simple toys that can spark a child’s imagination. The company has a new line of Christmas ornaments.

But its staple has always been wagons and, in 1987, Radio Steel was renamed Radio Flyer, after its most popular product.

Today, up to 8,000 wagons a day are produced in the same west side Chicago factory Antonio built in the 1930s. But many Radio Flyers look very different from Antonio’s.

Among the newest are the Navigator, a plastic wagon with a door, a fat extra-long handle and heavy-duty front casters for tight turns, and the Voyager, also plastic, with a door and a removable vinyl mesh top.

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The best sellers, according to Pasin, are the Trailblazer, a large plastic wagon with removable sides that can be turned into a flatbed; the Town & Country, an all-wood luxury model; and the largest classic steel model.

When making plans to celebrate their 80th anniversary, the brothers looked to their grandfather for inspiration. Remembering the giant “Coaster Boy” from the 1933 World’s Fair, they created the world’s largest wagon, which was a hit of this year’s Toy Fair in New York City.

The wagon is 27 feet long, 13 feet wide and 21 feet tall from the wheels to the top of the handle. Its wheels are 8 feet in diameter. The wagon weighs 15,000 pounds.

“The key was it had to be a totally functional wagon,” said Pasin. “It’s absolutely to scale, nine times the size of the classic.

“I have never seen a Liberty Coaster,” said Pasin. “My grandfather always said, ‘I sell wagons, not collect them.’ ”

So, Radio Flyer is asking Americans to share their favorite little-red-wagon memories as part of a contest. A grand-prize winner will receive an all-expenses-paid trip for four to Walt Disney World. The first runner-up will receive two round-trip airplane tickets to anywhere in the contiguous United States. Other finalists will receive Radio Flyer products.

Pasin’s favorite is a story from a man who wrote to request replacement parts for his wagon.

“The reason he needed them was he and his wife had parked their station wagon in their driveway on a hill and left the back tailgate open. The kid was in the car and put the car in neutral. The station wagon rolled backward down the hill and the wagon rolled out and got wedged under the wheel of the car. It stopped the car, preventing it from going out in the street, and saved the life of the child.

“The wagon was hardly damaged. We gave them the part at no charge.”

To enter the Radio Flyer Memories contest, send an essay of 100 words or fewer or a photo to “Memories Contest,” 625 N. Michigan Ave. No. 2400, Chicago, IL 60611. Entries must by received by Jan. 15.