B is for Best Show on Earth! 12. Military Men

Into the twilight of PW show reports, with the 20th century combat types, and in the end, there were quite a few, with a few AFV's this time, mostly from the donation bags, but various other interesting items including some - shock horror! - metal!

Starting with the ubiquitous parachute toys, and we have an original 'Poopertropper' from Imperial (a US importer/jobber), but I suspect someone over here also carried them as they do turn-up quite often without having to look to eBay for a current import.

 

The two complete with parachutes came from Brian Carrick and the chap with the tangled one will reassemble, I've checked, one of the shroud-lines has come off it's 'hankie corner' and got tangled in with the other three but it shouldn't be a big job to restore him.

I think I picked this up from Steve Vickers, Jon has already ID'd it! So without further ado . . . 

 

. . . the Crescent navy in a pocket set! My title of course, there is no title on the box, although there maybe one in a catalogue? One each of the small scale (approximately 1:72nd) figures seen here lose, years ago, and one of the vessels, as the submarine would also fit the slots, I'm guessing it was a bit of pot-luck or a sneak-peak to see what you were getting, and perhaps a sixpence toy - replacing the previous generation's penny-toys?

 

From the far-eastern shores of Hong Kong came two bagged sets of those Britains Swoppets, but in solid form, two small samples of rack-toy 'Army Men', the left trio being Airfix clones and the right-hand group being rather mashed Marx copies. Six painted Blue Box GI's make-up the numbers in this shot.

 

Closer to home in the upper shot here, with some Sikhs from Cherilea, another blue Crescent 'artilleryman' (as close to Germans as they ever got!), and - by sheer fluke - a fifth pose (the berserker!) to join the four I already have, so only one to find in that relatively uncommon set.

 

Another of 'those' MG Gunners, undecorated (maybe BR Moulds?), a bog-standard Herald Hong Kong officer and a Lilo SMG-gunner I really didn't need, but he seems to have come home with me!

 

The lower image has spread it's net wider with Hong Kong's finest chromium-plated tat from Kwong Wah, cloning a Deetail Japanese MG-gunner, an Effelder East German soldier in camouflage, a Nardi 60mm Alpini, two ceremonials (from Argentina I think?) and another Comansi (a fair few of them have come in recently), with another Argentine figure in white and a small flat from HK in an unusual colour.

More foreigners here (heay, I'm happy to welcome them all, diversity is everything, it would be a boring land if we all carried on like Borsetshire's Archers!), with two of the hard plastic versions of Marx's 45mm figures, a French alpine soldier, another Guilbert and a US 1950's cold-war kit-figure.

 

In front of them are four ceramic WHW figures, two military, one civilian ('Industrious Germany', issued in March 1939) and an undecorated factory blank.

Small scale; the bulk from Trevor, with some from Brian, mostly grist to the mill from Rado/Ri-Toys or similar, but a few oddities and interesting figures are always in the mix with these mixed-lots. Here, that included the WWI French clones in a pale yellow, some Tri-Ang 'Battle Space' marines from Blue Box and three Redbox/Motormax little rubber guys!

 

US comic flats, so-called because they were advertised in US comics, always useful as my boxed-set turned-out to have a mix of several batches, so it will be nice, one day, to fill it with a complete set of the/a matching batch's mouldings!

 

Crescent bunkers providing cover for two rather shot vehicles, the one (Dinky Saracen), ahem . . . 'worked-on' with soft-soldered tubing, the other (Timpo 25lbr.) missing its shield and having melty-tyres! Weird that the tyres melt, rather than the 'styrene gun, but it was an odd [experimental?] foamed polymer?

 

Aircraft; these all have a home in the mini-aircraft zone, and one day there will be a super-sort, reckoning and series of Blog-posts on all of them! Also, a bag of missiles, bombs, drop-tanks and other under-wing/pylon 'stores' and weapons, they too, have a zone!

 

Other AFV's; mostly rack-toy fayre, the two larger lorries remind me that there's some similar ones from Brian Berke in the long queue somewhere, and I think I have shot a set with these two in, so a possible follow-up there, certainly a future post on the more 'infant toy' AFV's.

 

Finaly the Supreme copies of Italeri's WWII Russians, also taking advantage of the Crescent bunkers in one shot! I had a few more come in a few weeks earlier, so hopefully there are a few of the missing poses somewhere, but with two plastic colour/paint finishes available for all 12 figures (only seven above), I still have a ways to go before I have all 24!

Thanks to all for everything last May; Gareth Morgan, Michael Mordant-Smith, Peter Evans, Brian Carrick, Trevor Rudkin, Adrian Little and Andreas Dittmann.