L is for Lots of London Loot - Jan. Through Feb. 1 of 2

There were several occasions in the first two months of the year which caused me to meet Peter Evans, in London or at shows, and obtain 'stuff'; quality stuff! Some of it may have already been seen, because - as I keep boring you with - it all got a bit mixed-up! The rest should be in the next two posts, then there's a show plunder, a Charity lot and some new stuff, and we should be up-to-date on the recent layers added to the stash?!!

 

If you've followed the Blog for some time, you'll know I like these little Japaneses civilian, rustic wagon subjects, and I have a fair few of the creamy-beige ones in celluloid now, but these are probably styrene, the horses and cowboy (complete with six-gun) are blow-moulds, while the main wagon body would seem to be a crude'ish, probably hand-pumped, injection moulding - lovely!

 

A handful of small-scale Marx or Marx-alike, being three of the Disneykin 'Babes in Toyaland' soldiers, I always get an urge to write Babes in the Wood (A British pantomime) there, I wonder if I've ever let any through here, in the past? Only the trumpeter is complete, but all useful spares. Three Wild West from the Miniature Masterpieces, a Stromboli from the Disneykins series 2, and two of the soft plastic editions from Euro-bubble-gum/ice cream premiums.

 

Three of the Hong Kong copies of Crescent's Mexicans, I have a fair few of these now, but most are in pretty leery colours, pink, purple or mauve plastic, this trio is - by comparison - quite conservative, in their plastic colours!

 

A handful of Hong Kong cows, I've probably got them all, but these will be swapped-in as the paint on all of them is about as good as it gets, and while I do have some clean stuff in the stash, most of the farm and zoo have come in, in tatty'ish or played-with mixed-lots, and are rarely this minty!

 

Back to Marx with a full set of the hard styrene, six-inch Romans, a bit of work needed on two and one's a duplicate, so I shot him with two Vikings also in the lot, we've seen both (Roman and Vikings) before here.

 

And while the vexillarius only needs a spot of glue (after the remnants of previous glueings has been chipped away), the spearman will need a new shaft to the same diameter, his hand drilled-out and a spearhead transplant!

 

Nice sample of Merit service-personal, from three sets, with the emphasis on the RAF, a hollow-cast sailor (Britains?), and a pair of rather well-painted, home-cast copies of the Gemodels cake decoration Naval Cadets.

 

Metal bits, the hollow-cast Lifeguard is a nice addition, as he will provide a side-by-side comparison with Timpo's later plastic version. The standing guardsman is unusual, I don't think he's one of the BR Moulds moulds, nor the usual ex-Schreiber home-casting subjects, but he's something similar; very toy-like?

 

Mounted might be Britains cheapo ('B'?) range, while the gold chap will be a penny-novelty, but they also came in sets, and the two semi-flat Highlanders would appear to have some age, like 1900-1930's maybe, and probably German in origin, but I'm no expert on this early lead stuff?

 

Ancients and medieval, including some sub-Giant stuff, a copy of the EKO copy of Airfix's first version 8th Army, along with a Britains Robin Hood clone, crying out for a repaint, and a modern novelty infant-toy!

 

A couple more for that sample we saw in a previous donation from Peter, both equally clean I think, the Indian may be a shunt from more than one donor, but as the base colour has leached into the foot, that pairing is right?

 

And a bunch of post-Giant small scale foot Westerners, these are the ones we've seen in blue in a carded set, with compartments Spacemen, Guards and Airfix WWII piracies, although I have them in other colours, they are mostly Britains Swoppet copies, with a Crescent Indian.

 

I love this pair, at first glance, more Hong Kong rack-toy 'zoo' animals, but in fact these are both either unique sculpts, or copies of less common originals, unknown to me? But neither of them is marked, so they may BE that esoteric minor-make, unknown to me?

 

They only 'look' Hong Kong, and at some point in the past appear to have been given a wash of water-based, pale-suede/sand, over the factory paint (not the mane), which has subsequently been removed or worn-off, making identification even harder? But they are lovely figures, especially the rather playful cub, swatting a butterfly or something!

 

This is also tangibly interesting, it's clearly not that old (30-odd years at most), being marked China, but it's a nice sculpt, well-formed in that dense PVC, favoured by some makers in the 1960/70's, which I mentioned the other day, and it has a makers mark - WS, with CE mark? There's a 'Wigglytuff'pencil-top on evilBay with the same mark, so this maybe a Pokémon, not a Pterosaur?

 

Nice Dalmatian (Schleich), reasonable Giraffe (AAA), both modern, both soft PVC-substitutes and a Kinder (I think) trash-panda, in a hard 'propylene or similar, who shakes his head when you wiggle his tail!

 

Space, the Giant sub-copies I call version II, and an interestingly poor sample of them, clearly late production they are heat-shrunk dwarves, some in a adarker than normal gun-metal finish, some in a brighter chrome-effect.

 

Vehicular elements, including a Kleeware GS-body 1-ton Humber truck, a sea-vixen from Airfix's Ark Royal, who will join the ones we saw the other day from Chris, with the storage sample, and we’ll do something with them one day, before they move on. The bigger gun is a common touristy thing, removed (like most) from a key-ring, while the smaller is a war-gamer's whitemetal ship's gun.

 

More bits from those micro-wagon kits, again we've seen some others recently here, and they will all go together until I have enough bits to complete one or two, as always it's the little axle-studs which are missing! A Lego motorcycle, from the early years of the 'Legoland' line, and a Wardie/Mastermodels baggage trolley.

 

Wargaming stuff, in various scales, there was a heap of this in a big bag, which was a separate purchase from the executor of Mike's estate, and which hasn't been photographed as it requires a big sort-out, but these are a few bits someone like reader Gisby might enjoy peering at?

 

I think it's mostly Minifigs, (Miniature Figurines) and the latter, not terribly 'collectable' ones, but still worth the box-ticking, some Shogun-era Japanese, verses various ancients and a few 10/15mm chaps, and bits of a siege engine for the spares box!

 

These are a bit smarter I think, possibly Hinton Hunt or Alberken (?) on the left, in the upper shot, two more modern chaps on the right (Platoon 20?), and all HH or early Minifigs (ACW) in the lower shot, but I'm open to info' on all of them.

 

Many thanks to Peter again, and a thought for the Late Mikael Hyde, from whom some of the above probably wended its way to me and the Blog. Lots more equally interesting stuff to come, in part two of this lot!