A friend of mine writes:

The following ones I recognized are listed below.

Upper right under Santa: Tin- Wolverine Drummer Boy, circa late 20's early 30's.
Right side: Tin- Structo Steam Shovel, circa 1929
Center: Composition- probably a product of Germany-Clown Roly-Poly some were also made out of tin, circa late 20's
Top center: Pressed Steel- Kingsbury Dump Truck, circa late 20's. Another one can be seen behind some other dolls.
Center left behind Mickey: Tin- Marx Rocket Fighter, circa late 20's up to the early 50's
Lower left: Tin- Street Car, notice the pull string hanging down. Not real sure of the manufacture but my guess would be Wolverine.

Probably the top selling toy of 1934 was the beautiful Shirley Temple Doll seen here in two different sizes (there were 4 or 5 sizes that first year). Made by the Ideal Novelty and Toy Company, Shirley Temple dolls topped the Christmas wish lists of thousands of little Depression-era girls from 1934 until 1939.

One of the amazing things about this doll is how quickly they were created, sculpted, licensed, patented, and manufactured. The concept to do the doll didn't happen until early 1934, so the rights had to be obtained, the unique sculpture (by Bernard Lipfert) created, molds made, fashions designed, advertising created, and production ramped up to have the dolls out by Christmas. As far as I know, the dolls didn't reach the shelves until late Fall 1934, just before the Christmas buying season started. Today toys being promoted for Christmas sales are on the shelves by late summer. Since they are almost all produced in China today, the "hot toys" of each year take a year or 18 months, or even longer, from concept to toy store. It takes many weeks for today's toys to arrive by ship to American and European ports. Hurray for American ingenuity and marketing skills, not to mention the good old-fashioned "made in America" tradition.

I don't think I see anything in the entire display that would need batteries or electricity. A few are wind-up toys and the rest just run on a kid's imagination. What a concept.

The contraption behind Roosevelt is in fact made of Tinkertoys. Although it is sitting on a stack of Newton Aero Circus boxes, the latter toy looked very different when assembled.

The only toy in that entire picture that looks interesting to me is that "Aero Circus" behind the first lady. It looks like a lot of fun for a dollar and change. (I have to say that that Santa Claus is about the seediest version of "the jolly old elf" that I've yet encountered. But there was a Depression on so I guess he fit right in.)

Edit (re post, above): I realized my error only minutes after posting: That the "Aero Circus" had been relegated to the position of being merely a base for the Tinker Toy creation. And, after looking it up on the Internets, I can see why.

According to the Dec. 14, 1934 Evening Star, this photo was taken at Kann's department store at 8th & Penn. NW.

Perhaps this hounds-tooth Scotty planted the seed for their famous real-life Scottie, Fala, several years later.