N is for Novelty Horses

I've sort of been bumped into posting this before it was as authoritative as I'd hoped it would get, but there was a discussion about them elsewhere the other day, and I want to post the link to this here, to explain/illustrate what I said there!

 

This was in the long queue and has been building for a number of years, Chris Smith also helped with both images and links, he, having already sent a few loose ones, in his donation lots, over the years, and what's missing here today is the smallest sizes, which is how I encountered them first, as a small scale collector years ago, but they are all in storage!

So we'll start with those images from Chris, we've seen the horses before here, and mused on them, their purpose and origin, but this illustrates how useful they are, the figure here is a Starlux confederate officer, and while the horse is more of a pony, you'll ride anything three years into a war which is eating horses!

 

Also, his feet are too far forward of the stirrups, but how many toy solders fit even their invisible stirrups properly, other than Britains and their PVC ones in the better ranges (Eyes Right, Swoppets and the better farm stuff), and those where the hinted stirrup is moulded to the foot!

 

And it's the stirrups I've questioned before here; are they 'Western', Spanish, Mexican? Does anyone recognise them, I assume they are the heavy, shielded ones which are supposed to protect Cowboys and Gauchos' from cattle's horns?

This is one way we now know they were retailed over the years, and each plinth is slightly different, I may have some of the foals, loose, and probably damaged, in another bag of the 'Unknown Horses' zone, but I can't say for sure, I know I don't have any in the bags with the adult horses.

 

Mine, upper shots (busy desktop, just before Halloween a year ago), has lost its foal but the glue-marks are there for one, while the two eBay samples, lower images, are the same hoses pose, and foal, but with the foal positioned differently for both glueings!

Here's another way they seem to have been sold, but one suspects this is a wholesale thing, rather than retail, but it could have been for restocking a counter-top retail dispaly of some kind? The final shot is missing three of the variants, which, if you study the upper shot, you will quickly work out are 3-each of two poses (standing and walking slowly), for 6-each of six colourways.

 

As well as shop stock, this is probably how they were sent-on to whoever was creating the plinthed novelties, or [slightly brittle] key-rings, or however else they were sold? Which is the next remaining question, how and when were they sold?

 

Do you remember encountering them? I'm guessing maybe places like the gift shop at The Alamo might have been a likely venue, mid-1970s? But could you find them in the tourist areas of Hong Kong itself? Other Wild West venues, were they aimed at girls maybe - you know "Collect all twelve types, open Bank Holiday Monday!", that kind of thing? Were there larger multi-animal plinths, or smaller single-adult versions?

 

The evidence of a missing foal on mine, and another colourway.

As I say there are two poses, at least four sizes (the spotted one here is a bit larger than the other three), one of which is definitely missing from this post, but there may be two in the smaller scales for five and two missing?

 

There are more colourways than are to be found in the stock-box above, and the adults are far more common survivors than the foals, the predominance of the standing pose in this post may be accidental, rather than true across the line?

 

They are not particularly rare, although undamaged plinth types are uncommon, and they are a hard polystyrene, both materially and paintwise similar to the LB (Lik Be) fox, or Culpitt 'Funnymals', which could be a clue to the maker for these horses; clearly sold as several types of novelty or tourist keepsake? What can you add?