don stewart played the original lionel on the jeffersons.
who played the original lionel on the jeffersons?
don stewart
on "the jeffersons", tolbert played jenny, the daughter of interracial couple tom and helen willis, friends of george and louise jefferson. during the series, jenny became engaged to lionel jefferson, the son of george and louise; they married and had a daughter. tolbert played the role of jenny for the run of the series, from 1975-1985. tolbert was born just one day after mike evans (1949–2006), the original actor who played her boyfriend/husband lionel. they were also both born in north carolina. , tolbert, marla gibbs, jay hammer and damon evans (lionel #2) are the last surviving members of "the jeffersons" main cast.
berlinda tolbert
lionel's efforts to diversify failed to compensate for the public's declining interest in its toy trains. by 1966, lionel's revenue was $28 million, 40 percent from government contracts. meanwhile, lionel's closest competitor also was fading: in january 1967, the parent company of rival american flyer, the a. c. gilbert company, went bankrupt. lionel bought the "american flyer" brand name and product line in may of that year in a $150,000 deal; however, lionel lacked the money to exploit them and filed bankruptcy less than four months later, on august 7, 1967. in 1969, lionel's sales had declined to just over $1 million per year. lionel sold the product die tooling for its struggling train line and leased the rights to the "lionel" brand name to the cereal company general mills. the lionel brand name continues today, owned by lionel, llc, yet many lionel train enthusiasts consider 1969 the end of the "true lionel trains", due to the original lionel corporation divesting itself of toy train production and the changes in design and manufacture, sometimes for the worse, under lionel trains' new owners.
lionel corporation