Structoys (Structo/Coleco)

Structoys was an early Structo product line, not a separate company, and is listed here because the name is encountered on its own. It produced metal building construction toy sets — precursors to Erector-style kits — in the early 20th century, allowing children to build bridges, cranes, and simple structures with nuts and bolts.

This record covers the construction-set side of the Freeport, Illinois business that is better known for pressed-steel trucks — the same operation described in this encyclopedia under Structo Manufacturing, viewed through its building-toy output.

The early Structo product was a metal construction system: perforated strips, plates and girders with nuts and bolts, in the same tradition as Meccano and Erector, sold as builder kits from which a child assembled specific models. Structo's sets were sold in competition with A.C. Gilbert's Erector and never displaced it, which is why the company moved its emphasis to finished vehicles.

The Coleco association in this record reflects later corporate history around the Freeport operation rather than a distinct manufacturing identity, and documentation for the construction-set output is thinner than for the trucks. Where the two records overlap, they describe the same factory.