In the 1950s, Louis Marx and Company began producing elaborate plastic playsets.

Marx also was known for his “pioneering use of media licensing in his toys,” Francis Turner said, pointing to early toys based on Disney, “Merry Makers” and comic strip characters.

In 1982 American Plastic Equipment of Florida purchased some of the Marx toy and playset assets from the Chemical Bank of New York. Intellectual rights were acquired in 1988.

Maxine A. Pinsky’s “Greenberg’s Guide to Marx Toys, Volume II” (Greenberg Publishing Co., 1990), contains a history of Marx’s Leaping Lizzie and Old Jalopy.

Louis Marx, the Scarsdale man behind the Marx toy company, was known for top-name toys and charitable donations.

The last gift my wife had for me under our tree this past Christmas took me back in time. The big box she’d carefully wrapped held an original “Fort Apache” ...