Stuart History

The Stuart Manufacturing Company was founded by Samuel W. Levinson in Cincinnati, Ohio. An old city directory lists the location at 9 E. Third Street from approximately 1948 to 1954. The company was making a series of children's night lights at 215 W. Fourth Street when Dexter Balterman bought into the company. Levinson stayed on to help Balterman run Stuart. The name Stuart was chosen because Mr. Levinson liked the sound of it. Stuart produced miniature Western figures, accessories and horses from 1953 to approximately 1969. The Stuart promotional slogan was "Stuart quality is first quality".

C.F. Block and Associates, in Chicago, created a 1953 Roy Rogers Ranch set premium for Post Cereal (See Cereal Premium). Block offered the premium figures, horses and tack to Stuart, which could be marketed when the premium expired in 1954. Stuart added their own complimentary line and marketed them in different colors and sets. The Roy Rogers figures were marketed as character figures, in sets such as TV Cowboys, Texas TV Rancher and Home on the Range. Within a year or two Stuart was marketing the toys at the N.Y. Toy Fair.


(Above) Dexter Balterman, left, and salesman holding a science set at
the N.Y. Toy Fair. (Right) An On the Trail Stuart Western toy set.

In 1958 Samuel Levinson retired from Stuart when increased Western toy sales relocated Stuart and it's owner, Dexter Balterman, to 337 Fifth Street. Levinson stayed at the 215 Fourth Street address to start another company - The Anchor Buggy and Carriage Company, a name Levinson had gotten permission to use in 1935, to make exact miniature Anchor model carriages and horses (see Anchor History).

The Stuart Manufacturing Company also sold quality science sets, a wonder wheel designer (spirograph), bazooka, spin-a-plates (circus style), Jr. gearshift, changeabout doll houses and a Stuart's prize animal farm. The Stuart logo changed in the 1960s from the diamond shape to an asteric with "A Stuart Toy" inside. Dexter Balterman said that packaging the Western toys had to be done by hand.

By 1965 Western heroes disappeared from television and Stuart once again changed direction. Stuart moved to 1455 Dalton Street. Dexter Balterman retired from the company around 1969, selling Stuart to plant manager, Phillip D. Gossard. By then the company was already specializing in customized packaging. Today Stuart still makes customized packaging in Cincinnati.

According to Phillip D. Gossard, the Stuart Western molds were destroyed, which makes collecting and preserving these toys and their history even more important. Today they are collected and loved again by many who played with them as children.

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Many thanks to Andrew Balterman, who saved a lot of Stuart information from being thrown away, providing copies and pointing me in the right direction during Stuart research. Acknowledgements to the (late) Dexter and Alice Balterman, Steve Bluhm, Joseph Levinson, Phillip D. and Phillip G. Gossard, Clarence and John Block and the Cincinnati Historical Museum. Without their help, preserving this history would have been impossible. Many thanks to the Stuart collectors and toy dealers who provided amazing photos and information that filled in more pieces of the puzzle. - Lizabeth West