About Me

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No Fixed Abode, Home Counties, United Kingdom
I’m a 60-year-old Aspergic gardening CAD-Monkey. Sardonic, cynical and with the political leanings of a social reformer, I’m also a toy and model figure collector, particularly interested in the history of plastics and plastic toys. Other interests are history, current affairs, modern art, and architecture, gardening and natural history. I love plain chocolate, fireworks and trees, but I don’t hug them, I do hug kittens. I hate ignorance, when it can be avoided, so I hate the 'educational' establishment and pity the millions they’ve failed with teaching-to-test and rote 'learning' and I hate the short-sighted stupidity of the entire ruling/industrial elite, with their planet destroying fascism and added “buy-one-get-one-free”. Likewise, I also have no time for fools and little time for the false crap we're all supposed to pretend we haven't noticed, or the games we're supposed to play. I will 'bite the hand that feeds', to remind it why it feeds.

Thursday, August 8, 2019

T is for Thomas? Taffy? . . . Poplar! (PW8)

Hard to tell, harder to know, the last time we looked at a set of these they were Taffy Toys, but no one (in the 'old guard') seems to know whether Taffy were a Thomas subsidiary or a Poplar sub-brand, given similar generational differences between the PVC and Polyethylene space and pirate figures originally from Thomas, I would veer toward these being Poplar/Taffy, but can't rule out Thomas/Taffy! Or - with no maker on the box - someone else!

12 Shells; 5.5 Inch Artillery Piece; 5.5 Inch Gun Toy; 7 Soldiers; Artillery Gun; Artillery Piece; Assault Troop; Britains Khaki Infantry; Khaki Infantry; Kleeware; Kleeware Boxed Set; Land Rover; Made in England; Mobile Gun; No. 1166; Old Plastic Toys; Polyethylene Toy Soldiers; Poplar Plastic Products; Poplar Plastics; Poplar Playthings; PPP; Small Scale World; smallscaleworld.blogspot.com; Taffy Boxed Set; Taffy Toys; Thomas Boxed Set; Thomas Toys; Troop Carrier; Vintage Plastic Soldiers; Vintage Toy Soldiers;
The box! Seen elsewhere on the Internet recently (in passing) the box artwork and contents/tray have a lot in common with the Taffy set already looked at here at Small Scale World, but as we also saw here; the similarities with Kleeware's SPG and Taffy's Tank, two gun versions and etc . . . mean there was such cross-pollination between these early plastic toy soldier makers (through copying, pirating and mould-share/licensing) it's impossible to fully call.

12 Shells; 5.5 Inch Artillery Piece; 5.5 Inch Gun Toy; 7 Soldiers; Artillery Gun; Artillery Piece; Assault Troop; Britains Khaki Infantry; Khaki Infantry; Kleeware; Kleeware Boxed Set; Land Rover; Made in England; Mobile Gun; No. 1166; Old Plastic Toys; Polyethylene Toy Soldiers; Poplar Plastic Products; Poplar Plastics; Poplar Playthings; PPP; Small Scale World; smallscaleworld.blogspot.com; Taffy Boxed Set; Taffy Toys; Thomas Boxed Set; Thomas Toys; Troop Carrier; Vintage Plastic Soldiers; Vintage Toy Soldiers;
The gun and trailer ('troop carrier') are the same as the known-Taffy version, the Land Rover however (complete with plug-in wing-mirrors) has been previously seen (in civilian colours) as a 'believed to be' Tudor Rose beach-toy - or at least I think it has; I can't find it on the Blog, or on the dongles, but I know I shot it and it's not waiting in Picasa? I probably gave it a Kleeware/Lipkin and co., caveat anywhoos!

Now, I think the SPG (seen previously) appears in the US as Banner, Banner bought some of the rump of Bergan Toys (Beton) and some (or all?) Thomas (US)'s moulds, while over here Tudor Rose bought O M Kleeman, so the fact that all these similar AFV's have so many parents is explainable, if not clear, especially after the various mould-shares are taken into account!

12 Shells; 5.5 Inch Artillery Piece; 5.5 Inch Gun Toy; 7 Soldiers; Artillery Gun; Artillery Piece; Assault Troop; Britains Khaki Infantry; Khaki Infantry; Kleeware; Kleeware Boxed Set; Land Rover; Made in England; Mobile Gun; No. 1166; Old Plastic Toys; Polyethylene Toy Soldiers; Poplar Plastic Products; Poplar Plastics; Poplar Playthings; PPP; Small Scale World; smallscaleworld.blogspot.com; Taffy Boxed Set; Taffy Toys; Thomas Boxed Set; Thomas Toys; Troop Carrier; Vintage Plastic Soldiers; Vintage Toy Soldiers;
The figures, in the set - as seen - the advertised 7th figure is a second officer, one wonders if it might have been meant to be the driver/stretcher bearer or the stretcher case? With neither fitting the Land-Rover in the same way they fit the - more common - Jeep; maybe they were subsequently excluded?

Note also with two light-sources; the plastic colour/shade variation.

12 Shells; 5.5 Inch Artillery Piece; 5.5 Inch Gun Toy; 7 Soldiers; Artillery Gun; Artillery Piece; Assault Troop; Britains Khaki Infantry; Khaki Infantry; Kleeware; Kleeware Boxed Set; Land Rover; Made in England; Mobile Gun; No. 1166; Old Plastic Toys; Polyethylene Toy Soldiers; Poplar Plastic Products; Poplar Plastics; Poplar Playthings; PPP; Small Scale World; smallscaleworld.blogspot.com; Taffy Boxed Set; Taffy Toys; Thomas Boxed Set; Thomas Toys; Troop Carrier; Vintage Plastic Soldiers; Vintage Toy Soldiers;
More shots; the radio-operator is obviously damaged. I did put these on the Khaki Infantry page; after some umming and ahrring, but they don't really belong there, that page is for the direct piracies of the Britains and Timpo sets and their derivatives (mortar crews etc...), while these are cruder copies of Herald's finest, and I don't use 'crude' in the derisory meaning of the word, but to differentiate 'copy' from 'piracy'.

Cheers also to Adrian Little for letting me shoot this interesting set at PlasticWarrior's show in May just-gone.

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