Nothing gave me more fun and joy as a child than playing in the backyard with my Buddy L trucks.
The early Buddy L trucks were made from heavy pressed steel, which made them feel like real construction equipment shrunk down for a kid. The brand started with the Moline Pressed Steel Company in East Moline, Illinois, founded by Fred Lundahl, whose company originally made automobile and truck parts before moving into toys in the early 1920s.
The name Buddy L came from Lundahl’s son, Arthur, whose nickname was “Buddy.” The story goes that Lundahl made a sturdy toy truck for his son using the same kind of steel his company worked with, and it turned into something much bigger. By 1921, Buddy L trucks were being produced as toys, and they quickly became known for being big, tough, and realistic. Over the decades, the brand changed hands several times. By the 1990s and early 2000s, Buddy L had been sold through different companies, and the original manufacturing era was over.
That is what made them so special. A Buddy L dump truck, fire truck, wrecker, steam shovel, or delivery truck did not just sit on a shelf. You took it outside. You loaded it with dirt, rocks, sticks, sand, and whatever else you could find. You built roads, dug holes, made construction sites, and probably scratched the heck out of the paint without caring one bit.
For a lot of us, Buddy L trucks were not just toys. They were backyard equipment. They had weight, they had metal, they had working parts, and they made you feel like you were running the whole job site. Long before video games gave kids virtual worlds to build, a Buddy L truck, a patch of dirt, and a little imagination were all we needed.
Looking back, that is probably why they are so collectible today. They remind people of a time when toys were built like the real thing, and when a kid could spend an entire afternoon outside with one truck and never be bored.
