F is for Farmers, Firefighters, Fishermen, Footballers and Other Functionaries

Right, now I've really got to photograph the other two bags, as it won't be over 'till they sing, and Rack Toy Month is fast approaching, with plenty to amuse and entertain, or at least add to the whole! In the meantime, the last of the previous photo-sesh' is the civilian stuff, and there some interesting stuff in there, so let's 'ave a luke!

 

Sportsmen, with a large Charbens footballer, from the paint-your-own set we looked at here;

 

https://smallscaleworld.blogspot.com/2022/10/t-is-for-two-paint-your-own-catalogue.html

 

Another of the cake-decoration (and other sets) footballers, the less common cricket fielder from Gem/Culpitt, and while he may only be uncommon to me, when you get the sets of three, they rarely have this chap so I think it's an accurate identifier.

 

Another of the cereal premium imports for Canada, playing ice-hockey, and one of the Ajax baseball figures, but a late unpainted one, which may have been issued by somebody else? We looked at the painted ones here;

 

https://smallscaleworld.blogspot.com/2019/08/i-is-for-its-not-rounders-and-its-not.html

 

And, where did that seven years go?!

 

The smaller components of a firefighter set, probably a rack toy, and the probably chunky vehicles are missing, but it's another sample, another box ticked. I like the no fires sign, with a large FIRE underneath, glad they had time to get that up, to warn people entering the smoke-filled area, past the fire engines and sooty-faced, sweaty guys, in heavy overalls!

 

Two very useful Airfix motorcyclists, I have many more bikes than riders, so these were a must when I saw them, along with a soft PVC sidecar rider, of the racing variety, who may be from a small die-cast, maybe by one of the smaller makers? It's not the Britains one, and I don't think it's Budgie either, but might be a copy?

 

Circus, a clown bendy, and another part- (or most-) clown from Kinder, along with a second example of the strange, flatish, but solid, stylised, possibly die-cast, or harder base/whitemetal like spelter or pewter, ringmaster.

 

The fact that two have turned-up now, years apart, without any other recognisable elements of a circus set, suggests some kind of token, freebie, mascot or corporate thing? Anyone know?

 

Three additions to the Japanese celluloid/styrene trinket side-collection, which, as it consists mostly of teeny wagons and carts, equally diminutive 'brown water navy' vessels, or the larger blow-moulds, makes these a nice addition, being a selection of rural occupations, a fisherman and two woodmen.

 

The one that was missing! We have looked at these several times now, Brian Berke and Chris Smith have both helped with images or sample, on those visits, and possibly even shown us a Tresco original, and while I may now find there is one among mine, loose, this boxed one will start the full overview, one day, as there's about a dozen in the stash now, while we've seen more than twelve, so we can do full comparisons?

 

Farm stuff, the larger ones are modern/current, owe a lot to Elastolin and are a growing sample. I thought the blue chap was from a set of semi-flat animals we have looked at here;

 

https://smallscaleworld.blogspot.com/2018/11/q-is-for-question-time-animal-flats.html

 

But he's not, he's a much heavier sculpt, with a thicker base, and might be an early board-game piece, from the metal to plastic switch-over, but aping the flats of earlier gaming pieces?

 

While the other two are metal, and might be Charbens, a tractor diver, who's quite common, and a slightly different figure with half-crossed legs, who might be operating a reaper-binder, a job I have done, for my sins, and bloody hard it is too, with several leavers to mind, adjusting height and angle of cutting bed, while keeping another eye on the knotter, and a third on the contra-rotating packing belts! And you have to keep checking the sheaves you're leaving behind!!

 

But he might just be a chauffeur!

 

We've had loads of these from Adrian Little and Chris in recent years, and I already had a large sample (some 60-plus bags), but they all differ, and will need a huge sort-out one day, trying to tie them into known sets, either from the collection, or from catalogues (Holly, Blue Box), or from the hundreds of images I've downloaded over the years, of sets online.

 

Likewise! But Small-scale.

Two Crescent lead to the right, and a metal dog, complete, but refuseing to stand-up!

 

Road/construction workers and race crew/garage attendants are another subsection with literally hundreds of unknowns, from 60-plus-years of vehicle toys with figural accessories, and there tends to be a wider verity, than in the much-copied multi-generation farm stuff, which has few pose variants (it's all in the size, base type or plastic colour), so I'm looking forward to sorting these and ID'ing as much as possible.

 

Can I get away with a second 'likewise'? Emergency personal (Police, Fire and Ambulance), are another genre with many, many variants, and while I have promised to get a firefighters page done, it's rather languishing at the moment, but police and ambulance crew/stretcher cases will need similar treatment!

 

Rail staff and passengers are another area, where stuff keeps appearing, which isn't from the obvious perpetrators, and here it's possibly Hong Kong copies of the Tri-Ang/Hornby dinning-car and driver sets, two flats in lead and a reasonably common Hornby 'Binns Road' era solid.

 

Everything else! The scout, while similar to the two flats above, will be from a board-game, with that coloured base. The small girl/doll seems to be a cake decoration, while the seated lady and gentleman with cigar with be from US model kits of cars, or 'automobiles'! Funny, when I showed the unknown Chauffeur the other year someone else quickly found him and added him to their HQ, they'll have to find these two now!

 

Many thanks to Adrian Little, Brian Carrick, Colin Penn, Isaac, Matt Murphy, Martin Fahie, Michael Mordant-Smith, Paul, Peter Evans and Trevor Rudkin, without their contributions, and those of Chris, Brian, Tony H, John Begg, Gareth, Steve V and others, at other times, these posts wouldn't happen. 

B is for Bags, Barrels, Bases, Bits & Bobs, Boxes, Bullets, a Barrow and a Bell!

Among other things! It's the bits and bobs, the accessories, the spares, the detritus, the orphaned elements of other toys or models, and peripheral/consumable stuff, which, due to the drawer of bits on show's-eve, is greater than some years, and full of things I can get a couple of lines of blurb out of!

 

Firstly; the accessories! These were new in Replicants inventory, and are obviously designed to go with the cart we shall see in a future post, bundles of sticks, which are beyond kindling, or fascines, and may be for tool-handles or walking sticks . . . Proper cargo, anyway! Along with sacks (not bags, but sacks didn't alliterate!) and some useful looking barrels.

 

Amorces, I need'em for ma'forces . . . is one of the most often visited posts on the blog, creeping toward the top twenty posts, and while that traffic is probbaly more about the bombs, with a few other caps, in other posts, caps are worth a better overview one day, in the meantime these have come it to join the master-sample we saw then;

 

https://smallscaleworld.blogspot.com/2020/05/a-is-for-amorces-i-needem-for-mahforces.html

 

And while I well remember both the red and blueish-white rolls, along with the plastic strips and discs, the separate shots had been phased out by our childhood (the bulk of which was spent in the 1970's), and are more of a '50's thing, I think?

 

Bullets and shells, the sets of marbled ones in fives look familier, but I can't remember from which gun/toy the came, while the yellow rocket came with the Dinky Striker (one of the Scorpion Combat Vehicle Reconnaissance, Tracked, or CVR(T) family of FV10*-coded AFV's. My brother had the build-your-own kit of it, and I well remember the missiles, all over the floor

 

There is a zone for these guys, somewhere in storage, and the hope is they will eventually be married-up with their original gun, cannon, catapult, vehicle or whatever! And , with regard to things like the Striker missiles, always nicer to have the originals, than some after-market 'replacement' fakes.

 

Tyres, and a Dinky/Hornby sack-barrow; again always useful to have spares, I've been tasked with finding the wheels for a trolly bus, and I'm as likely to find it in the stash, when I get to it, as I am at a show like Sandown, but you have to look or you never find!

 

Road signs and street furniture; some of these look like they're from infant toys, and beyond the [pretty loose and wide-ranging] remits of the collection, but you never know, all sorts get thrown in rack-toys, as make-weights or space-fillers!

 

Older stuff, and all interesting. The set of cards are the 'mini' size, you get out of Christmas crackers, but  have the Quaker Foods logo, and were issued with Puffed Wheat in 1961, but could be another clue to a close, or 'closer' relationship between Tom Smith and Quaker than that already known? And previously hinted at here, only the other day, with regard to the set of ten ships? There was a set of full sized cards issued with Quaker Oats and Bran more recently. Both on Cereal Offers;

 

https://cerealoffers.com/Quaker_Ltd/quaker_ltd.html

 

There's also a nice stained, bone counter or tiddly-wink, and three card stands from board-games, the ovoid one on the right, I think went with early versions of L'Attack, Dover Patrol and the others in that series. The green wooden one may be a home-made replacement. 

 

A very small, but perfectly formed bell? It is unlikely to be from a Euro-rail kit, that pearlescent green is not a Faller-Kibri-Noch-Vollmer-Wiad (et al) church or chapel colour, yet it's too small to be a decorative Christmassy thing either? Possibly just a cracker charm?

 

The windmill is a new colour variation of one I already have several of, while the ad-hoc signage is likely to be from a model kit in the 1:35th/32nd bracket, maybe a car kit, or Western wagon, but more likely something military?

 

Mini spanners, I think they are the same size as Meccano, but it's not their design, and their hex-nuts arrived quite late, so a rival like Erector, or a knock-off? Or, having just mentioned the Dinky kits, some kind of build-your own toy, or assemble at home car kits?

 

The clockwork keys are grist to the mill, with two marked Penguin (Frog) on the right.

 

Spares; The spanner is a styrene, novelty one, and is large enough to have been in one of those 'Pick-up-Sticks'/Spillikins sets, with recognisable tools, although they are usually a bit longer/thinner? The Crescent lance is very useful!

 

Farmyard and battlefield accessories.

 

A marble (modern), two balls (one wooden) and a palm tree!

 

Two board-game racing cars which escaped the vehicular post, they are both from mid-20th Century board-games, and I have other examples of both, or very similar beasts, as I recognse both desings, hopeful they are new/missing colours, but that's probably hoping too much!

 

The little packets are, I think, spare felt-tips for marker pens, and, with that square-section, possibly the old pump-action, liquid-filled Edding's I remember from my youth, but they make useful additions to the 'greeblie' zone!

 

Everything else! The two ladders are probably the best bits here, as I'm pretty sure they are both from small die-casts in the Matchbox 1-75 or Hotwheels bracket, but the yacht's sail is also a good find, as is the spaceman's helmet!

All this stuff, if not quickly reunited with its owner, has a tub, box or bag to live in, and the smaller stuff goes in three of those multi-drawer cabinets, the old ones from Argos (or Index?), back when they still came in spot-welded steel cases.

 

Again thanking  Adrian Little, Brian Carrick, Colin Penn, Isaac, Matt Murphy, Martin Fahie, Michael Mordant-Smith, Paul, Peter Evans and Trevor Rudkin for their contributions. 

W is for Wild West Warriors - 2 of 2

I shot these first, of the two post's worth, but they ended-up as the second post for reasons I've already forgotten, half the bagged/carded stuff, and a bit of detritus at the end, but all good stuff!

 

Sorpresa . . . Italian for Sobre, Spanish for surprise! And Natale Luigi (NL) is a new one for the Tag list. I remember ten lira being about half-a-p in 1977, so it's not going to break the bank, not even the piggy-bank, pocket-money being the target of very small 'lucky bags'!

 

Apologies to Peter Burgner, I was chatting to him about this find, which he'd observed at a distance, and I said they were the same figures as the Lucky Clover sets, but they're not. The foot figures are larger, while the mounted are the standard 'Giant' size.

 

Still a useful find. I suspect two sets of mounted are missing from the top of the card, and while you could do without the shop-keepers stickers, they do at least date the thing to the mid/late-1970's, the sort of thing which was sixpence in d-money, and became 5-new-p, briefly, before the oil crisis 'invented' modern inflation! Who remembers when 1st class post was 3p!

 

While we had the Sorpresa/Sobre equivalent in Lucky Bags, at the larger end, here in the UK, these were the equivalent of the smaller ones, cheap polymer stuff, sourced in Hong Kong, or occasionally, especially with tin-plate, Japan.

 

A painted figure, marked Hong Kong, of the same size, against the unmarked bases of the figures in the bags, which came-in the same day. All Britains copies, and these 35mm's were cracker fodder, too.

 

Alkastep; a scruffy card, and a ripped bag, but a sample is better than no sample, and it means we can look at the figures. All marked 'France', on the rear-edge of the deep bases, these are to be found as other premiums I think, or were supplied as such to third parties, without rebranding?

 

Post-Giant wagons, the buggy was branded National and others, the small gun-team a cracker prize, while the larger gun and limber combo' was issued with unmarked copies of Giant's ACW and Napoleonics. The other three are more generic.

 

The Poplar-Quaker Foods-Tudor Rose wild west set, really just looking for colour variations or gap-filers now, they aren't rare, and most mixed lots/donations, or show plunder has a few! They could mostly use a god clean, common with these, that obviously got a lot of play back in the day.

 

Likewise, the Crescent hollow-cast and Bergan/Beton copies, these are two Airfix late type (back right, the Indian has been given black, fabric-tape chaps!), and the rest hard styrenes which may also be Tudor Rose, in the case of the mounted certainly, the foot figures seem to have been carried issued by several unknowns, at some point.

B is for Bearskins, Busbies and Bright, Shiny Helmets!

It's the ceremonials! And the emphasis being very much on the British Guards, but there are others, and among them a couple of really interesting figures, and one diminutive chap who is jostling for best of show!

 

Marx recycling-fodder, better than cannon-fodder, they may still become something useful! But shown for completeness, I used to just show the highlights of donations or show plunder, but these days I've got into the habit of shooting everything, warts an' all! Two Household cavalry, one Mexican and a West Point Cadet, I think, but they've all been in the wars!

 

Likewise, these are all a bit tatty, but I thought the Christmas cracker guard would make a useful officer (absent from the set which is otherwise all musicians), with the simple addition of a pin-sword, after I remove the remains of his colour-pole. The resin home-production attempt (Eyes Right musician?) is an 'only sample', so stays, but who thought gloss-white was a good undercoat?

 

However, front, middle is . . . . 

 

. . . . bloody brilliant! He's obviously a charm-bracelet charm, and 'gold chrome' on base-metal, so a budget piece from Ratner's, F Hinds or H Samuel, but still? He's not the smallest figure in the collection, that record is still held by some of the spacey figures in that little tub from Brian Berke a couple of years ago, but he's the smallest guardsman at about 8mm, or is the one in the Britains' B smaller? Future post, we'll have to check, with our own eyes!

 

And I know I'm writing this with the Polish Hussars and submarine set already blogged, and the Rocco and other treats still to come, but arguably best from show, just because he’s so easy to miss, or to lose, if you have found him, or to forget if you've put him to one side! And he was in the big-bag of HK small-scale stuff from Trevor R.

 

More of the cake-decoration jobbies, I've got so many now, I'm going to have to do something with them, and it may involve making some other instruments from brass-wire, and placing them on a foam-board parade-ground, perhaps with a few road-markings across one corner, if you can picture that!

 

Wot! Metal? At a plastics convention - how very dare they???? I don't know if there's a word for these, other than penny-toys, which several probably were? They are too thick to be semi-flat (or demi-ronde), yet not so fully-round as to not have some sort of flatness, in the title stakes? Possibly Crescent on the far right, otherwise unknown? And they are all solids, possibly some of them are actually a die-cast alloy too?

 

I have a feeling I got one or two of these a couple of PW shows ago, but someone beat me to the majority of the poses, so nice to pick-up a few more. Obviously Hong Kong production, and probably after the Charbens set (actually, they're the Crescent/Kellogg's poses, aren't they, just with angled bases like the Charbens! Have we had this conversation before?), but size-reduced, to a 45/50mm.

 

Germany's finest . . . probably, certainly in the style of other Erzgebirge, but with those trousers, aimed at the Danish tourist market rather than ours? Also, could be a [part] set of mini-skittles, although more likely to be playability makeweights, with a smaller wooden fort?

 

More metal! Jonh Hill & Co's coronation figures, they keep coming in, often with a few Skybirds. And I'll eventually have enough for the whole parade, without having to shell out a small fortune for a boxed set at Wallis & Wallis, or somewhere similar!

 

Four Johnny-foreigners and a Brit' bloke! Starlux marine/sailor is grist to the mill, I have a decent sample of the 25mm's, and a few of these 54mm's, so it's box-ticking the sample, if you know what I mean?

 

The Guardsman, is, I believe, one of the still unknown question-marks in British figure collecting, and while I have one or two, this is the first one with grey bearskin and trousers? Only a thought, but could they be Rocco? They turn-up as rarely as the Karki Infantry, or little mounted figures, are the same size as the combat chaps, and are often as brittle, as most other Rocco?

 

The next figure (centre) is probably Polish, depicting a Russian? But he's about four times lighter than he should be, at that size, if moulded from Nylon-66, the preferred material of choice in that part of the former Soviet Bloc?

 

I think he's not the first I've found, the other is something completely different, (medieval or Wild West), so it would seem at least one of the Polish makers found a way to foam their plastic into something lightweight, yet solid . . . he weighs like he's Papier Mâché.

 

Two French Colonial types to finish, I could spend an hour or two looking them up, but there's a lot of this stuff, building-up, so I'll do proper posts another day! Thanks again to Adrian Little, Brian Carrick, Colin Penn, Isaac, Matt Murphy, Martin Fahie, Michael Mordant-Smith, Paul, Peter Evans and Trevor Rudkin.

C is for Cinematic Celebrities and Cartoon Characters

All the other sci-fi/fantasy stuff tends toward the realm of TV and the moving pictures, to which cartoon characters and fairy tales add a few other harder to classify items, and that material is the direction of this post!

 

A lovely 54mm Barbie, who could have gone in the previous post, as an obvious astronaut, but she's better employed kicking this post off. Credited to Mattel Canada, she is probably the same size as the US shelfied one, with a different card, Brian B sent us, a few years ago, and of which I had no clue to the size - see the Barbie Tag.

 

And - of course - a small scale, solid figurine of a much larger articulated doll, this is exactly what Andy Warhol was on about when he famously said "Pop [culture] will eat itself", something you can also see in comics and Graphic Novels now, with endless mash-ups and crashing of characters into each-other's 'universes', in the end it all gets very silly with Star Wars-Angry Bird-Deforms, or, take The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen; on the one hand, a fine, stand-alone, escapist action-movie, on the other hand, utter nonsense and rubbish, which had several authors' spinning in their graves! Internecine naval gazing!

 

Three Power Rangers, these are the Kellogg's premiums I think, and they clearly seem to have only done the two poses, and covered the various Rangers with colour variations! Although the ladies have different heads, so maybe it's just the guys who share a sculpt . . . does it matter? I've got the paragraph!

 

Gulliver's Supergirl premium from Pepsi, on the left, beautifully painted by someone, and while the paint has been chipped a bit over the years, I'll leave it, maybe even touch it up one day? Interestingly, she's the same sculpt as the Res Plastic for Kinder (and PIF Gadget?) one, so some cross-fertilisation or mould-swapping there, I think! I should add that I now believe only the 30mm ones were issued by Kinder, these 54mm's wouldn't fit in the eggs.

 

On the right is a soft PVC-alike Superman figure from NJCroce of bendy toys fame, how they came and went in a couple of toy-seasons?! He's not a bendy, just a slightly wobbly figure, clearly they haven't finished with their DC licence! 

 

Two vast blobs from Argentina, and you can't beat Argentina for 'toy' appeal! I think they may be from Kamen Rider (is that a crude attempt at Kuuga on the left?), but what do I know, very little on that subject, so Atomic-Super-Kaiju-Boy is still in the frame! They are about 120mm and showing that Argentine favourite, lashings of silver paint!

 

Army Ants/Combattini/Terminators, we've seen them before, no black ones this time, but a new colour, bright pink, and the details are on the Tag. But I noticed some seem to be missing separate weapons, and/or have holes for accessories, of which, one, a radio-set, is still attached, so I now have to hope I have some of the missing items in the bits-zone!

 

Pretty sure these are Kinder now, and probably quite recent/contemporary, we saw a Chewbacca from Chris I think, not that long ago, and they seem to be taking from the 'classic' characters.

 

A Disney sucker, we've seen several generic 'monster' characters and a superhero, so I'm guessing some recent playground craze/blind-bag thing which I missed? Along with what I suspect are two Pokémon?

 

Marx Simple Simon in chalky-blue plastic, and an unknown action figure who may be a knock-off of something more obvious like the GI Joe's or that Airfix line . . . I really don't do action figures, unless they are Galloob, or Matchbox, or . . . doh! And is he a diver or a spaceman?

 

Odd gnome to the left and swivel-head alien to the right who was probably a key-ring, or hand-bag/mobile-phone hanger, and I think it glows in the dark, but forgot to check! 

 

Small scale bits include a DFC or similar revolting peasant (and he's rebelling, too, boom-boom!), a couple of Bluebird Zero Hour/Code Zero, a small vinyl shuttle from Star Trek (Playmates?), a Marx 'Kin's cat (Figaro), Christmas cracker angel orchestra figure, and a lovely fully-glazed, ceramic little-baby-Jesus, who might be a French fève?

 

I think these are all Moshlings? But they could be Zomlings, Ugglys pets, Super Zings, Super Things, or even Shopkins/Grossery Gang, I really don't know, and purple eye 'shadow' seems to be a feature of most of them!

 

They are mostly in the Capsule Toy/Blind Bag queue, I started clearing a while ago, and I'll make some sense of them here, just to get the boxes ticked, but there was this bagful, as a part of one of the donations.
 

Again thanking Adrian Little, Brian Carrick, Colin Penn, Isaac, Matt Murphy, Martin Fahie, Michael Mordant-Smith, Paul, Peter Evans and Trevor Rudkin for everything on the day.