The Very First Short Madison Cars!

In the last few videos, I've been showing my collection of Lionel short madison cars that were part of the MPC era of Lionel that came immediately after the 1969 end of what is considered to be the classic Lionel postwar era.  Well, here's the set that started it all!  In 1973, Lionel/MPC brought out a set consisting of a small Atlantic-type (4-4-2) steam locomotive lettered for the Milwaukee Road, the first three short madison cars ever, along with track and a small transformer and called it the "Milwaukee Special".  The locomotive was really low-end, with a two position E-unit (forward/backward or just forward, no neutral), the Mighty Sound of Steam, pretty wispy smoke, and not much else.  The cars were also low-end, with plastic trucks and body-mounted dummy plastic couplers.  Over the years, more cars were added, to the point where there are a total of eleven (the last, the diner, was issued 15 years after the set so the colors don't quite match but at least it does have operating truck-mounted couplers).  One of the more curious ones is the campaign oberservation car, where they basically took leftover observation cars and made stick-on decorations for them in an attempt to reduce the inventory.  It's selcom that you see the complete set but in this True HD 1080p video, you can see the locomotive hauling all eleven cars.