Langes Legetoy Toy Lathe: Museum Object and Cultural History

The object in the museum catalogue

This toy lathe was manufactured by the Danish company H. Langes Legetoy around the middle of the 20th century. The lathe is made of a cast metal base that is painted red. The pulley is used to spin the spindle part of the lathe, and the tool rest is able to slide to change the bed length. H. Langes Legetoy produced a variety of toy machine tools including a trip-hammer, grindstone, drill press, shaper, punch press, circular saw, tumbler, lathe, and grinder. These tools would often be arranged on a single board with a line shaft allowing all the machines to be operated simultaneously from a single power source.

The company was formed by four men: Henning H. Langes, Alfred Nielsen, Kaj Christiansen and later E. Leager-Larsen. Langes was the financier and head of sales, Nielsen was the shop foreman, and Christiansen and Leager-Larsen were the toolmakers and designers.

The company began manufacturing out of a factory basement at no.19 Nyrnberggade in Amager (a suburb of Copenhagen) in 1945. Advertisements for H. Langes toys began circulating in the latter part of 1946.

Materials, dates and provenance

• date made: ca 1950
• Object Name: toy, lathe
• Physical Description: white metal (overall material)
• Measurements: overall - from catalog card: 1 3/4 in x 5 1/2 in; 4.445 cm x 13.97 cm
• Measurements: overall: 1 7/8 in x 5 3/8 in x 1 1/8 in; 4.7625 cm x 13.6525 cm x 2.8575 cm
• place made: Denmark: Copenhagen
• ID Number: MC.329080
• catalog number: 329080
• accession number: 278175
• Credit Line: Bequest of the Estate of Greville I. Bathe
• Data Source: National Museum of American History

Sources and reuse

Catalogue descriptions and facts adapted from National Museum of American History through the Smithsonian's official Open Access dataset. This record explicitly marks its metadata CC0 1.0; formatting and selection have been changed.