This toy train was used in 1963 and 1964 as the subject for several of the earliest publically seen holograms. In late 1963, Emmett Leith and Juris Upatnieks at the University of Michigan’s Willow Run Laboratories demonstrated a method of making high-resolution, three-dimensional images using laser beams. Their success came after years of research by many scientists, so while “Toy Train” was not the first hologram, the quality of the image stunned everyone. In 1970 Leith and Upatnieks donated about a dozen of their early holograms and the toy train to the Smithsonian.
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