When Lionel founder Joshua Lionel Cowen's immigrant family arrived in New York after the Civil War, the railroads were literally America's engines of progress. The "Golden Spike" meeting of the Union Pacific and Central Pacific lines in 1869 unified the continent and signaled the birth of a world power. Cowen was born in 1877, just before Edison's first electric light. He grew up with real trains, amid dizzying change. Around the time he founded Lionel in 1900. Lionel, the 115-year-old company has made sure it stays on the cutting-edge of technology. The Lionel name has always been synonymous with Christmas and a train set under every Christmas tree, For Lionel, the future is indeed bright.