D is for Donation - Peter - Historicals and Ceremonials

Always the sub-heading full of interesting things, the three lots here having the emphasis on ancient and medieval figures, the middle lot, of three tranches, have poor colour I'm afraid, I'm struggling with the setting on this strangely expensive (compared to the previous half dozen) camera!

 

An interesting bunch of contemporary medievals, in that Russo-Livonian style, of slightly oriental armour, and copies of other figures on the market, we're looking at them below, so just enjoy the rich colours of these pocket-money rack-toys!

 

Three very clean examples of the vintage 'Romanised' piracies of Crescent's knights in polystyrene, odd, as Crescent also did their own Romans, who were copied - in polyethylene - by another Hong Kong jobber! I've not given it much thought, but the anachronisms would help, if they were repainted as fantasy figures for 54mm role-play gaming!

 

Knackered flat, Hilco-Phoenix Conquistador, Worlds Apart Egyptian from their Horrible Histories experiment, and a home-coloured (felt tip marker-pen, I think!) Crescent Arab, all toy soldiers, all very different styles/treatments!

 

A couple of Pirate types, the one on the left clearly channelling The Pirates of the Caribbean, and specifically the anthropomorphic crew of Davy Jones ship, he's one of the 'other' pair available with a still extant pirate ship, we saw a pair a few years ago, when I got one of the ships, but some ships (presumably half of them!?) come with another pair, and he's one of them, hopefully the other will turn-up in one of these mixed lots one day - I'm not buying another ship! The other figure, in a nutcracker/toybox style, of semi-Napoleonic, will be from a similar ship, but aimed more at infants/younger kids.

 

Copies of Supreme/Strawberry Group/Tiger Hobbies medievals, we looked at them all in a mini-season on Supreme and associated knights a few years ago (2022's Rack Toy Month), and they are what they are, probably coming via Toy Major.

 

Nice group of the 40mm Landsknechts from Elastolin, not sure how 'original' they are, there are signs of home paint, and some of the same 'kit' parts, we saw with the ACW a couple of days ago, but equally some of it is factory-finish, so some home 'enhancement' going on, a bit of mix and match?

 

An eclectic trio here, with a Crescent for Kellogg's tromboneist, a Christmas tree hanger of a nutcracker, who is small enough to remain in the collection, it's funny I had avoided them, but after the giant ones were hidden in plain sight round Fleet, as part of a local business drive a fair few years ago, the Blogging of which resulted in a few posts on the subject and submissions from New York's Brian B, I started to take the odd small one home with me, and while they are in the pile, rather than the tree decorations, I should probably transfer them from the one to the other, but not before we've collected them all up and done a comparison post!

 

A 60mm Cherilea is the third figure, missing a weapon, his shield will make a useful spare, for my larger sample of these quirky figures, who are an odd favourite of mine, I think it's the charm of their toy-like execution.

 

Resin tourist keepsake, plays Harryhausen's Talos, to a bunch of post-Giant finds and a Quaker mounted gladiator! All very much grist-to-the-mill, and the damaged gold figure is interesting for being an apparent mould-purge between the gold and a dark green.

 

Also, probably Toy Major in origin/supply, and also contemporary (on eBay, Amazon and Alibaba), these are the better quality figures, pirated by those in the first shot, and while 'only' rack-toys, if you don't have good samples of them all in a tub somewhere, you've a missing brick in the wall!

 

Atlantic's nominally HO (closer to OO's 1:72nd scale) Romans, with the Infantry (and marines!) on the runners, and a loose sample of the cavalry, which the Romans rarely employed, and when they did, they didn't look anything like these! Very useful as I purchased a number of empty boxes from the estate of a late friend a while ago, and will be able to marry these up!

 

Thanks again to Peter for several useful loads, of our small plastic friends!

D is for Donation - Chris - Wild West

Part two of the recent Wild West donations, this lot courtesy of Chris Smith, and we've a few interesting things to look at, starting with a real find, especially so when you consider how much help Chris has already given on the subject of pencil-sharpeners, both of the Hong Kong based KT, and related West German examples.

 

Aren't they fascinating? Almost mint plastic, but a lot of damage, reflecting their age (probably 1960's, or even 1950's) and material, which is a frangible polystyrene. But we have enough (lower right shot), to get a good idea of them including both arms, which were originally glued on.

 

The cowboys bodies had a weight attached to the end of the unfortunately positioned rod, which kept them attached to the horse (lower left shot, excuse the dirty nail), but swinging back and forth, as they mossied over the range!

 

Two colours of horse, up to six colours of rider parts and/or sharpeners, with grey-green mounting brackets and pink heads, this is an incredible find, a lovely gift and possibly best in parcel. I was so busy sorting and bagging everything I didn't really give thought to 'best in parcel', so there may be more, we're only a third of the way through these posts!

 

Another sample of the figures Brain ID'd as being from 1950/60's Lucky Bags, and amazingly, given how many I have now, there are new colours and poses in this lot, and a complete version of a figure we've previously only seen damaged, so a sample which continues to grow, but shows no signs of being the definitive one yet - I think we're over 30 poses, so far!

 

I was only waxing lyrical about the Texas Indian in silver the other day, and a yellow one turns up! I'm beginning to suspect there was only one each on the mounted, and I may have a cowboy somewhere, in red?

 

The green semi-flat Indian is quite a surprise, I've had loads of these come in over the years, they've been blogged here, and I sort of assume they were a replacement for the brittle ones above in Lucky Bags, but every one I've encountered, has been red, we may even have looked at different shades of red, now green one turns up? Raising the possibility of other colours . . . yellow, blue? Lovely find Chris! [Later - I did have a single yellow one! https://smallscaleworld.blogspot.com/2018/10/u-is-for-unknown-wild-west-flats-3.html]

 

Another Culpitt late type, a damaged Minimodels, those rifle tips are often missing, but the cowboys survive better than the Indians, who are almost always weaponless! The dark green chap is another of the 40mm backwoodsmen who turn-up, out of Hong Kong, and the larger lady is a rather nice, undamaged piece of poured resin, from the tourist trade, I suspect.

 

Atlantic canoe from the Davy Crockett set, I have very little Atlantic in the large scale, as I had it all in the small scale, before the Blog extended the remit of the collection! The other is probably a sports boat from a roof rack or infant-toy play set, marked 1979 Buddy L Corp.

 

Coach and wagon oddments, include three of the teeny ones from mini tree-crackers, a larger 'W.Germany' one missing its horse (orange) and the horse from another (pastel blue), missing its coach, which might be German or from Hong Kong!

 

In the middle is one of those Japanese novelties in Celluloid, missing it's wheels, but all these things have their own place, and bits or parts make wholes, while multiples make better samples, even if they're incomplete!

 

Two 1st version Cherilea 54mm swoppets will make useful spares too, and the red torso may be another, or he may be a Kinder/Italian type, novelty figure part?

 

Being a consummate collector in his own right, and having sent dozens of these parcels to the Blog now, Chris knows to keep the cleaner samples of these many, many, Giant knock-offs separate, so the bag has what looks like a mix of two semi-identified (by me) types, so all I'll have to do is swap a few riders back onto the correct 'other' horse.

 

While the loose stuff is the ones-and-twos, which come in with every mixed lot, and will require more effort/diligence in sorting, but you can see the cracker types in both sizes (mini and 'Lone Star' pirates), a Blue Box wagon horse and other treats.

 

Similar material here, with a possible post-Giant gun team in the four, but it could equally be a wagon (probably the red/green ones) team, while the pair of 'Large Standing' are from the Cracker and other Giant gun copies (sans limbers, the gun is pulled direct!), and the two farm carts were also Cracker prizes I think, I have yet to find them on cards?

 

Finishing this section with a huge tee-pee, I suspect it's from 3- or 4-inch action figures, but it's not much larger than the Britains one, and has some similarities in construction, assuming some poles are missing? But what's particularly interesting is the material, which is a sort of compressed version of the faux-chamois leather, used to dry-off cars when valeting them! But retaining a softness, those 'leathers' don't, but they are soft when you first buy them, and it's the constant wetting and drying which renders them so stiff I think. A very unusual thing, and many thanks again to Chris for all of this.

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

A continuation of the previous post, and as I tend to post these in the order I shoot them, we’re back with the leery pink background first . . .

 

A trio of the really rather exquisite Les Higgins English Civil War figures, gang-up against a Minifigs (?) Royalist! Although he's more of a fancy-pants, so may be a Swiss mercenary!

 

Matchbox US policeman and a similar firefighter from Hong Kong/China.

 

Bullyland Cacophonix.

 

Another Marx Moses (we saw a brown one the other day), a . . . Gormiti type thing? And a doctor from a set of infant or early learning toys? These actually come in two sizes, but go back-off to charity every now and again, I think we've ID'd one type here, with a Toy Fair report and the others may be 'Tikes or Mattel or someone  like that?

 

A couple of Hong King divers with the plug-in heads, we've seen small rack-toy sets of these, but it's nice to get a few loose samples for close-ups. The Dinky road menders watchman, a Huskey/Corgi policeman and a couple of other HK pieces.

 

Airfix or Airfix-related, nobody expects the Spanish inquisition!  I think he's meant to be a crusader though, and it's the daft shooting-skyward para' under all that modelling! Finally, my favourite ACW Confederate pose (never available as a Union sculpt), seen here as a home-cast copy!

 

A selection of kit figures, mostly Airfix, but the sailors may be Tamiya or another MTB/Fast Boat kit's crew, and the two air stewardesses could be another maker too?

 

In the background we have two lots of early Airfix HO-OO copies, a small bag of Roco Minitanks with stab-and-hope flesh paint and a near complete set of Matchbox commandos - missing their boat!

 

In the middle-distance is a nice sample of Britians Lilliput, which will help top-up that boxed set we saw here a while ago, and in front of them a few Lone Star 'Afrika Korps' are about to be neutralized by a larger contingent of UN paratroops from the same maker!

 

A nice trio of interesting combat types, with one of the so-called 'Bonnie Bilt' semi-flats to the left, but in the more-local soft polyethylene, a home piracy or minor-make (?) copy of Britains in the centre, and one of the probably Pioneer (for Stonegalleon or Zita?) figures, which could also be Realtoy or someone else!

 

Bits and bobs! Mostly generic fencing or model railway walling, with a Supreme Wild West sign-post (top right) and three pieces of Lik Be (LB)'s farm fencing - bottom left, along with a bag of Airfix Betta Bilda bricks.

 

Various Hong Kong trees/plants, and a fireplace from Merten.

 

 Bellona pup-tents, a Wardie/Mastermodels station bench,

 and a couple of boxes for the spares zone!

 

More spares, including the Mafia 'violin-case', from a (Monogram?) car kit, a ship's yard, solitaire piece, Action Man pistol with broken trigger, Britains musket, plastic toothpick and some runner oddments! Also, an ornate pressed-tin washer of the sort you used to get on toy holsters and gun-belts from the likes of Crescent, Lone Star or Marx.

 

I thought these were stands of some kind, but I think they are dividers for old multi-drawer component storage units, of which I have several types in actual storage, so they may prove very useful going forwards!

 

A mix of mostly pretty generic farm animals, although it's hoped some will be ascribed over time, and while the purple-patch rabbits have a loose association with Blue Box or Tai Sang, it's not concrete at the moment.

 

Likewise, poultry and game, with an errant pair of Crescent-copy lambs!

 

Slightly more substantial in the interest department are these Britains lambs and duck family, better-quality Hong Kong rabbits and a rather nice PVC hen.

 

Modern 'China' farm animals.

 

More nice cows (see previous post), the pair on the left need a bit of digging, while the one on the right has suffered horn-surgery!

 

Two Crescent farm animals, foal and donkey, with what I think is a Britains in the middle, but is it an O-gauge horse (which could even be Hornby?) or a 54mm foal?

 

As well as a large quantity of previously-mentioned pewter/whitemetal war gaming stuff, there was all this Atlantic, mostly loose, and a bunch of flattened boxes, but not a lot could be made into whole sets, and some brittleness will mean a better sort into my similar stocks before it all makes sense!

 

Thanks again to Peter Evans, and another thought for the late Mikael Hyde, the Atlanitc was his, all useful grist to the mill, or bricks in the wall!

B is for Best Show on Earth! 2. Airfix and Related

I had some luck with early Airfix at the show, and there were some related bits, so I shoved them all in one post, except the two early motorcycles which ended-up in a mixed shot in the Civilian Vehicles post!

Two of the Airfix mounted figures after Bergan/Beton, both mounted on soft polyethylene horses (with the correct bent tail and cavity mark), although being a hard polystyrene themselves. The lefthand shot is missing the hunter, who turned up later, hence the rethink on how to do the posts!

 

As a result that image also has two probable Argentine figures a ceremonial type (top right, integral moulding) and a Native American (bottom left, separate rider) along with two other 'styrene riders, one of whom seems to belong with the marked-Ajax horse, the other is from the Magnetic 'Bucking Bronco' novelty act - the third I've picked-up in a few months, typical; isn't it, like buses; you wait ages for one, then three turn-up together!

A mixed bunch of the early 'eight figure set', being, from the left; Airfix Paratrooper, possible pair of BR Moulds Japanese and three of Peter Evans' home-casts. The first having the clear mould-release pin-mark which seems to differentiate the Airfix originals, the two Jap's missing an obvious mark, hence the possibility they are BR and the trio being a sharper, rigid resin to the softer pink one we looked at last year?

 

In the last lot from Chris Smith, I held over a bunch of these from the plunder posts, and I picked up a few more the other day, so a major re-hash/addition to that page will be forthcoming, as are similar changes to the mounted 'Bergan Beton' page where an awful lot have come in recently, in addition to the two above.

This is a fun shot, or at least the upper one is, the lower one is a closer look at the five Gulliver Japanese infantry, one of which is based squarely on an Atlantic 'Sendai' sculpt (Gulliver's go-to for piracies when they weren't copying Reamsa, Comansi or Jecsan!), the other figures being four old Airfix Sculpts.

The upper shot has, in addition, two rather wreaked Airfix originals for a not-very-useful comparison (they've both had their feet mucked-about with), suffice to say the Gulliver are a little smaller, but well sculpted. And in the foreground, a gloss-painted 'Toy Soldier' style home-cast piracy in lead/whitemetal with a wire bipod.

Not Airfix but of the same era, the same rarity value as the 'eight' and the same esoteric range, are two on the left from BR Moulds, a Lifeguard which is almost certainly from the Trojan set (post coming) and an Indian who doesn't seem to conform to any of the known BR mould-tool catalogue descriptions, and has something of the Sacul guards in his plastic colour, but seems to be from hollow-cast, so got included here!

 

These were mixed in with everything else! They go in a big bag which gets sorted into the master-collection/future stock every few years! I actually found a Prussian advancing from the Waterloo sets the other day, trod into someone's lawn, so Airfix 'HO-OO' have become a standard feature of the Anthropocene geological layer, along with crisp packets, chocolate wrappers, drinks bottles & cans, cigarette filters and vehicle parts/metal or rubber fixings!

 

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

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

C is for Canoes - 17 - HO-OO Scaled

A rather limp chapter in this canoe 'season', as I haven't done all the Merten/Noch/Preiser ones for a start, there's at least one metal one, and there are others, but here's a few which I happened upon as I was building these article folders

Atlantic have given us a trapper canoe in the Davy Crockett set and a raft in the Kit Carson set, smaller boxings would have one of each whole runner, sometimes cut into two with a smaller piece (the four - common/duplicate - mouldings beyond the obvious gap) and a larger piece with all that set's unique pieces on. Larger sets could have up to four or six complete runners, they aren’t rare; just over-hyped!

 

Woodland Scenics give us a pair of modern touristy/back-packing boats with obviously young people on a day-out/adventure, pre-painted polystyrene in the manner of the European figures mentioned above, but not painted to the same quality as Preiser or Noch.

 

The little Marx boats from various Miniature Masterpiece sets; silver paint only adds to the decorative nature of these, which were to be parked near the camp (there were no suitable crew/paddling figures), where matching toylike teepees were to be found, some of the other Wild West accessories however were much better, and the same camp would have a really nice little drying rack for an animal skin.

 

My homemade effort, I found it again in the recent moving of stuff, but it got damp in the 2007 flood and needs to be rebuilt, or just replaced! It was an evening's exercise in paper folding or curving; a boat is a dynamic shape, and a waterline model of one has it's own complications! Either side of it are the Thomas/Poplar canoes, painted with gloss brown by someone other than me!

 

Poly Pocket from Bluebird Toys, licenced to Mattel in the 'States, provided another leisure craft for the diminutive little madame to punt about in a flooded powder compact, but hide the seats with stores and paint it up, it's got the lines of a nice Native American boat?