B is for Blue Box

A bit of a teaser of things to come, Blue box had this 'layer' thing going on, the more layers the higher the price bracket, the mega level was a four tier two vehicle wide set, so lets look at one...

This set manages to cover all the bases, copies of Britains Kahki Infantry, Merten Sailors, TriangMinic ships, their own 45mm US Infantry, Crescent 54mm Artillery, Roco Patton, Marx sandbag defence, MPC minis aircraft...someone else's helicopter...Yep, Blue Box really knew how to rip-off a design or two! Four tier sets exist for the civilian range as well, usually with a mix of Matchbox/Corgi/Dinky in the same box!

Similar contents on a carded - probably later - set, the soft plastic figures used here were also issued by late Marx, adding to my contention (in a series for Plastic Warrior magazine's One Inch Warrior off-shoot - see Vol. 10 & 11) that at least one of the Blue Box factories was supplying Marx (the same factory that took over Beeju's production).

These are the piracy's of the Merten Sailors quite enlarged (the originals were HO scale 18/20mm) and are among the less common Blue Box to track down - at least they are loose, in mint sets like these they are easier to find.

Close up of the more common Blue Box items, the lorry is a Bedford RL, they also made a later Bedford MK and both took all manor of body types, this flat bed being the most often encountered, with various plug-in accessories, but there were Ambulance and GS bodies as well. The RL was probably based on the Dinky truck, but the MK is considered to be a Blue Box original.

Note also the artillery shell sprue tucked behind the gun, this turns up on eBay as 'Unknown Toy Gun Bullets' or similar from time to time.

More to come....