C is for Concord, Cloned

We use 'clone' in the hobby as a shorthand for copied, pirated or knocked-off, but given as how a clone is supposed to as good as or hard to tell from the original, it's never better used than for this quite amazing model, which a mate kindly bought for me the other day when I spotted it going cheap, on that there evilBay.

The plain shipping box, and that's you, shipping it home in your car, revealing it's really being aimed at cake decorators, not aimed at retailed-toy customers! And one supposes a bigger stockist/store may have had six or eight in a larger carton? Wilton also ran a mail-order facility through their annual 'yearbook' catalogues.

Recognised it straight-away! And this is possibly Wilton's finest! A millimetre-by-millimetre copy of the Britains model of the Concord Overland Stagecoach model, with only two items seemingly not reproduced, and graphics/stickers switched-out (to use the US expression!) for Overland Stage Express Co., but in the same red & gold livery.

Three smaller bags contain all the little add-ons, a third, out of shot, took the seat seen here with the riders/crew, and even the luggage has been faithfully reproduced, or blatantly stolen, depending on your viewpoint, and a 1970's kid's viewpoint was very different from a Britains executive's!

Some of the colours have been changed, but otherwise, the whole thing is remarkably similar, upon first look you think it must have used the same tools (maybe after they'd been shipped to Hong Kong with everything else circa 1971), but there is a slight drop-off in quality, most noticeable on the horses.

An unusual detail of this copy over the more typical output of Wilton, or the Hong Kong pirates, is that different polymers have been used, as they were on the Britains original, so finer details are in flexible polyethylene, as are the horses.

Clearly marked Wilton on the underside of the base (which I neglected to photograph), one obvious difference is that they've only cloned one of the two horse poses, although the manes are different, so all four are roughly the same, where Britains gave you one each of two quite different horses, in opposite colours.

The other obvious difference/omission is that the passengers weren't cloned, but both crew are faithfully reproduced, even down to the long strip of PVC sheet/strip used for the driver's whip.

While the colours of the coach are matched quite closely, in fact the paler tan for the yellow on the bodywork is almost a better choice, and the crew, loosely followed, the luggage is a little more leery.

And the whole gives a lie to Donald Trump's "Chiiinah stole from us!" crap, actually, the Americans stole from Britains, running-off to Hong Kong and giving it "Here, make us a copy of this, and keep it cheap, we're going to sell it as a cake decoration"!

As a bit of a Brucey Bonus/'Question Time', the seller included these, for free, they weren't listed in the sales-spiel or images. And I'd love to know who made them, presumably a more craft-oriented US maker, possibly two, the wooden barrel and drinking 'spoon' being one, the printed cotton-sacks from another, can anyone help with a name/names? Doll's house accessories? 50lbs of 'Old Mill' sugar and Idaho potatoes!

P is for Polymer Plunder Package - Introduction

Well, so much has happened in the last few weeks, none of it of that much importance, except the meltdown of the United States of America, which is proving as morbidly entertaining as a crash video where real people are being vaporised by large trucks. But suffice to say, plans went south, and things got left on the shelf, and I won't be going for any posting-records this year!

 

But, there is a lot to post when I get the time, and I've had a lot of Dinosaur stuff come in recently, which I tried to clear over Christmas, but didn't really more than take the edge off, and have since added to, as have others, so I'm going to try and have a bit of a push to alternate between Chris Smith's Christmas donation of interesting, weird or quirky stuff to the blog, and dino-posts, for the next few days at least. Then a similar bunch of Peter Evans posts is in the pipeline, possibly interspersed with Toy Fair stuff?

One of the contenders for best thing in the parcel was this novelty, spring-loaded, perambulating dice-shaker, with a green-baize dice table in a UFO canopy, on jumpy feet! I mean, it's too cool for clown school! Less commonly, 'made in Taiwan'.

 

There's a rubber sucker, which may have produced a delayed action, or just be a buffer against rough use? Anyway it works with a flick of the finger, and if I have the time, in the future, I may try glueing the hairline crack in the foot, and resurfacing the sucker with cycle tyre-repair solution and see if it works as a delay/jumper toy.

 

A few wooden items were in the parcel, older and newer animals, a farmer/villager from the 'red cottage' sets and what I suspect is a figure from a  miniature tenpin bowling set, but could be from a wooden Noughts & Crosses (tic-tac-toe?) or solitaire set? A sort of guardsman, that's the storage zone he'll end-up in!

This was nice, I knew of its existence, but still don't know which/what game's it comes from, but it will be a board game, and it will be Triang, Omnia or even Waddington's, designed by Dave Pomeroy, the reason I knew it existed was because . . .

 

 . . . I'd come into possession of the original modelling-clay master, from the remnants of the Pomeroy estate. This is actually the picture sent by the seller, but I did pick it up with a bunch of other stuff a few weeks later. The figure's simplified/graphical arm bears something in common with other game playing pieces, including the godfather figures from Parker's Vendetta, and while the significance of that fact is lost on me, there must be a reason?

These were both interesting enough for Chris to recognise and save from the bin, the pirate lady is from the rack-toy sets we saw under the Webb's Supertoy label, but she's shrunk slightly after leaving the tool-cavity, too hot, and is now leaning to one side . . . after the pirates gave her a cut of Dutch courage before walking the plank, hic!

 

The other is a very rare Airfix short-shot, where the polymer hasn't reached all the extremities, the opposite problem, resin (or cavity) too cold! Given how tight the Quality Control was at Airfix, a rare bird indeed, who now looks like some stocking-headed Dr. Who villain army-man!

 

A couple of conversions which Chris passed to the parcel box, the amusing thing here was the glittery headdress on the Indian, made from a Tunnock's tea-cake wrapper!

 

The post office took their rent with these, the missing bits of the Rocco lifeguard had gone, possibly out of a very small hole in the corner of the box, the horse is most of a nice Elastolin 40mm, but may yet prove a useful donor of legs to another, so in the damaged tub he goes, while the larger Indian is from the same set as the two we saw in a PW show report (FFL and another) I think? Where the other arm is a plug-in and the leg inners transcribe a smooth curve?

 

Odds & Sods; the motorcyclist will be from a board game, and while he's missing his head, I have quite a few of these mostly in ones and twos, and he will join them in - hopefully - being a new colourway, they are usually tending to sets of four or six, like their cyclist and racing car brethren.

 

Likewise, the yacht is probably from a similar board game, but rather well-painted it could have some age, late Victorian even, certainly early Edwardian? The dolls' food, while not something I actively seek out, is all fascinating stuff, and they do have their own zones, the two to the left are hard polystyrene, and while not marked could be early Hong Kong production, while the fish-platter looks to be early British, maybe Charbens or Cherilea, or someone smaller like the Taylor's or Barratt's, or even someone like Trojan, Kentoy or maybe early Gem?

The coke bottle will be from crates in a 'big box' delivery truck I suspect, while the metal frying-pan might be older than the cold-setting, modelling-dough 'full English' now being prepared in it?

 

The metal handful included some useful bits, the three smaller painted figures in the rear row are all from small carts or wagons, and thankfully people like Robert Newson have done all the work on them, so one day I'll sit down and have a session ID'ing them all, as I have dozens somewhere! Looks like two dairymen and a generic cheapie wagoner.

The Indian is from any one of many versions of the Schneider home-casting moulds, and the large cockerel might be French, or a copy of the Cherilea one? A homemade pirate of the Matchbox (or Lledo? I can never remember which lot faces which way!) fireman, from the old die-cast, horse-drawn appliance, the two seated figures look familiar and the pair of wargames chaps seem to be sort of Sci-Fi wild-west or Special Forces types?

A broken Skybirds German and some 5mm wargaming figures leaves a broken chauffeur, but he's very interesting as he may be the Timpo lead one which replaced Zang's composition one, although Kay's did similar figures, so for now he goes in the stash as an only/first sample/example.

The regular 'assorted, seated civilians' shot! Of interest this time is the third fireman from the left on the top row, who isn't from the Airfix kit, but one of several others, mostly American brands, and I won't embarrass myself by stating which one I think it might be, I've only seen them in passing. in the catalogue pile - AMT, Monogram, Pyro, Revell, someone like that, I think even Tamiya did a fire engine in the early days!

 

The near-naked green guy is also new to me, and I think he may be a waterskier, possibly from a cheap beach-toy, copying something more substantial, or a kit? And the guys I used to think were Napoleonic wagon-drivers (bottom, yellow) are probably also firefighters from cheap polyethylene vehicles, there is a sub-scale copy too, somewhere.

 

The last shot is the 'cereal premium' shot, even though they're not all cereal giveaways! The fascinating one is the blue baking-soda diver, as he's like the Shreddies 'Freddie Frogman' or the later two Nabisco ones, but they were all masked skin-divers, this chap is in trunks, and suggests a third set/issue?

Another early-learning Mad March Hare, and behind him, some kind of sci-fi mini, possibly a Ben 10 item, I thought I'd posted the watch-figures, but I can't find them, there were small wristwatch type 'bracelets' with clips or compartments which held about six/eight small-scale (20mm'ish) figures, two different assortments, some similar to this yellow-green one, but they had different bases?

The coach bits and penny-farthing rider will go in a large tub of similar R&L type parts, and every now and again I go through it seeing if enough wheels, tyres, or axles (mostly the very tiny pin-axles!) have been found to complete another one! HK copy of Dinky road worker in an unusual butterscotch plastic, and things we’ve seen before in the top right-hand corner, but all grist to the mill, or colour variations, or whatever!

As always, many, many thanks to Chris for putting this stuff to one side all through the year, and occasionally sending me a cornucopia of stuff to share with you, as I said to him in an eMail the other day, I would eventually, probably, hopefully find all this myself, I love a mixed bag of shite, but it would need three lifetimes, but because people like Chris (and the others) save this stuff for the Blog, we may get to the finish in one lifetime . . . we hope!

L is for Late Show Report - Odds & Sods

Getting towards the end of the plunder posts from May's Toy Solder show in Whitton/Twicker's, and it's the bits and pieces which didn't really belong in any of the other posts, but there's a few interesting things among the detritus, dingbats and doobries!

 

Vehicle parts and hand-tools; these will all go to the spares zone until needed/matched with their owners, although of course I know the searchlight mount is Airfix and the horse furniture is Lone Star. The larger machine-gun is actually a copy of the early Airfix one from the Attack Force APC.

I think the two hands are from a Koala bear stuffed toy, they could be from a similarly described mole, but there was a range of tourist keepsake Koala's back in the 1960's, where the Koala's were stuffed rigid; more like taxidermy, rather than 'cuddly', and I suspect these hands are from one of those? We looked at a similar Kiwi from across the straits, here.

Mostly Christmas cracker charms and similar novelties, probably from the very cheapest crackers, or the mini 'tree decoration' crackers. The blue thing I don't know, the khaki piece - some kind of removable hatch from a vehicle or building, with a couple of larger novelties and an old Toy Show badge.

 

I seem to have a large tub of toy show badges, both my own 'earned attendance' examples and a bagful from Brian Carrick, once, and there's a quandry as to what to do with them as they slowly gather in an ever growing pile, they have the nostalgia of past shows, but no real use?

This was in one of the donation bags, and is interesting for being an obviously early piece of plastic, clearly a dolls house item, and it will need careful paint-stipping, there is a sprung-loaded mechanism, which allows the baby chair to switch between rocker, low chair and high-chair, for meal times and has a built-in potty! It's un-marked, and obviously I don't collect this stuff, but it clearly has some historical value, which is probably why it was given to me?

 

Large, rigid, foamed-rubber (or a similar material) scenics, I think they are modern, possibly Early Learning Centre (ELC) or a similar source, and certainly scaled for the larger figurines, they will nevertheless prove useful as future photo-props or display back-drops.

A few more scenics, there's a whole box of the orange log-cabins somewhere, and a growing post on them in the queue, as they come with or without paint, in two sizes, and from several 'names' as well as many generic sets, we saw them here previously in a Pikit Toys set, I think?

 

Lego bush/shrub, a Hong Kong poplar tree which has been home-painted, a pond in need of a railing, and a railing from something else, a vehicle, I think?

 

In Brian C's bag were these glass-tablet WHW tokens, not military, they consist of two from a set of landmark buildings, and a pair of runes, from that set. Ironic, as, being runes they are of interest to lexicographers and etymologists, but, they - the runic symbols - were, by the time of the set, being bowdlerized to provide iconography for the Nazi party and it's war-machine, with various civil and paramilitary unit formation signs, logotypes and SS divisional/unit flashes being based upon the old Nordic runes!

 

Both sets seem to come in many colours of glass, and a couple of variations of paint/layout/final decoration, so we can assume several glassworks were involved, either over time, as separate//repeat issues, or just in providing the hundred's of thousands, or millions, necessary for such a promotion.

These - from Trevor - must be from those mini tree-crackers, they are officially the smallest-scale item in the collection now, I believe, and while I have obviously, and absent-mindedly, placed Admiralty Arch upside down (I initially thought it was a crude 'White Tower' I think!), the icons of London's skyline are pretty clear, with St. Paul's Cathedral, The clock-tower for Big Ben and Tower Bridge being included in a set of otherwise unknown number.

Obverse and reverse of the Lone Star horse furniture from the articulated draft-house we saw here, with my earlier (brown plastic), damaged, collar compared to the new, complete one, and the non-seating saddle for cart/wagon/implement poles.

Many thanks again to Adrian Little, Barney Brown, Brian Carrick, Chris Smith, Michael Mordant-Smith, Paul Stadinger, Peter Evans and Trevor Rudkin, for contributions to this year's plunder-pile.

BB is for Monkey Buisness!

Blue Boxes from Blue Box! Someone (a friend) drew my attention to these a few years ago, and while they were outside my budget I grabbed a few shots of the two sets at the time.

They mostly seem to be the standard zoo/jungle animals, as carried in a variety of sets/lines by both Blue Box and Redbox at various times. Of minor interest is that the mini-farm set flagged to both Elgee (overprint) and National, between them, also carries Blue Box product, as also carried by Marx.

 

However, the gorilla posed carefully with a blob of glue, on the dolls' furniture being used in the left-hand set, seems to be a set-specific sculpt, based on the standard walking on all fours model, but with his arms moved?

Likewise, the elephant-rider here seems to be based on the walking monkey with swivel-arms you find in the Noah's Ark sets of Blue Box, Holly, New Maries and others, where it's usually grey plastic with a more gibbon-like head? I have no idea how many other sets there were in this line, but they are fun!

S is for Small World; Small Scale World!

I just discovered - through Faceplant (it has its uses) - that an old school-friend of mine is a miniaturist, working by hand in various scales, predominantly 1:12, and she both works to commission and has a catalogue of one-offs, ready for sale;

Magic Minis and Welsh Miniatures

Beautiful Little Things

So if you know any doll's house fans, or are looking for a unique present, give Rosie's website a once-over, you may find just the thing - I thought the Victorian butterfly display in a glass dome was rather exquisite.

V is for Very Small Scale World

Picked this little muck-cart and draft horse up the other day . . .

It's a solid box of a thing with no raves or side bars (smaller than ladders or supports - I've done my homework since we last looked at wagons!) or apparent fixings for them, so more of a wooden 'bucket' for manure or harvesting heavy goods; a Lancashire 'potato cart' perhaps, or something! I was going to compare it to the Britains tumbrel-cart but . . .

. . . it's from the very, very small scale world! Although, it would be just right for 1:300 micro-armour, blocking a crossroads - I know; I always suggest the same scenario, but that's what wagons are for, it's the law; barricades or blocking roads!

I suspect this may be from or by the Minnie Maria people who made that miniature 1:12th doll's house toy Noah's Ark we looked at a few years ago? The depth of the gloss paint being the closest match, I'll tag it as such anyway?

P is for Premiums, Down Under

These have been in Picasa for too long really, not because other things haven't been there for longer and - indeed - are still languishing there (!) but because when Tom Clague sent them to the Blog they are still current or current'ish, but that was over a year ago, so they may now 'only' be collectable!

The less interesting to figure collectors first; these were issued by a supermarket type concern in Australia, I think as part of a promotion, i.e.; if you spent so much you got one for free, rather than as purchases? checks eMails . . . every AU$30, got you a toy!

Blind-bag groceries which the Airfix 'Multipose' Bren-gunner reveals to be in-scale with larger dolls, but which could also be used to 'play shop' . . . presumably Coles shop! And - apart from the blow-moulded bananas - realistic renditions of high-street/household-name brands.

Tom pointed out there was a certain irony to the supermarket giving-away little bits of ephemeral plastic tat, two weeks after they phased-out their plastic carrier-bags, but sadly that's the nature of the world we live in! I have seen more wooden toys this year, even Mattel Hotwheels have a wooden range out at the moment!

These are a little more like it! Also found by Tom in Coles; chino-dino-bods! Blind-bag mini chinosaurs, looking slightly familiar, but it's a while since I had a session on them so I'm not sure if we've had them here under other packaging, but lovely sculpts, with realistic, subdued paint schemes . . . nice!

Scaling comes from the LB-Airfix Saladin armoured car and you can see they are 3 or 4-inches in the main, around 6-inches maximum? Thanks to Tom for sending both and letting us know what's happening 'Down Under'!

F is for Follow-up - Thomas Pets

We looked at the dogs in passing back at Christmas; in fact we looked at the cat too! But some more turned-up, one dog but several cats including two worth a study, so a quick retrurn to the Thomas PVC animals, ostensibly Poplar over here, but one may be Kleeware (or similar) and the shear amount of parcels that have crossed the pond within the hobby over the last 35 years means I can't rule out some even being US-Thomas?

Three together, two in PVC and one in polyethylene (far right), the later being a copy with different detailing, and a smaller size. Of the two PVC ones, the brown is a true colour, the grey has a marbled or flecked element, but it's not obvious, so may be the tail-end of a mould-purge cleared for retail-sale?

The copy, here seen in front, it could be someone like Kleeware or Tudor Rose, further afield with Merit or Lipkin, or even a late version from Thomas/Poplar/Taffy, they produced PE versions of their pirates and spacemen, after all; but not with such a marked size-difference, while the tail has clearly been re-cut and similar changes are evident in the facial details.

This [blue] one is not a copy, but seems to have been influenced by the old Thomas design, although holding a slightly more regal stance/expression! It too is polyethylene and the same names would have to be in the frame, although - of course - both (PE examples) could be Hong Kong knock-offs, for dolls house sets, although neither is marked.

We saw him pulling a sleigh last time, I have another in a slightly darker brown, here he is!

O is for Other Edibles

We leave the string of bendies - for a while - but stick with edibles for another day with a post that's been over a year in the cooking . . . or should that be fermenting?

We'll start with a whingey-rant or a paean against modernity as exemplified by the Thatcherite-Raganomic free marketers!

On the left is the wrapping from a Terry's Chocolate Orange, circa 1980-something, possibly 1970-something, it matters not; on the right is the current design. The earlier version is making a good attempt at trying to look like a navel-orange with shading toward the bottom (edge of the wrapper) and the little plant-jiggit at the top (centre), while the one on the right is a random stamping from a continuous sheet and resembles one of those awful deep-pile carpet, fire-hazards in 1960's flats.

For a cost saving of nought-point-zero-zero-something per unit, quality is thrown to the wolves; progress may be progress, but it's not necessarily an improvement on what went before, and as such a failure to strive for excellence is a common thread through the modern world, it bodes ill for the future of everything!

Brain Berke sent these Coris Whistle Candy images to the Blog back in the spring, and while it's not of much interest to the toy soldier purists, it is of interest to the wider study of toys, or student of novelty items!

Obviously the pirate attracted Brain, who had one eye on TLAPD, unfortunately, the operative word is treasure, unlike the Choco/Candy Treasure we saw yesterday, this pirate being only atmospheric 'window dressing'!

The treasure actually being a transparent, doll's-house size, cooking pot! The size of the box however suggests that like Christmas cracker gifts or gum-ball capsule prizes; the novelties vary considerably in size, and if you were a young girl, with a doll's house . . . or doll; you'd be as happy with this treasure, as I might with a toy figure, or Captain Scarlet knock-off!

Imported by Hadson (Toko) Trading Co. Ltd., of New York, the whistling Polo-clones are apparently Cola flavoured . . . nom-nom-nomnivore!

The reason this post is titled 'edibles' rather than capsule toys! We saw an empty one in the Christmas novelty-fest a few years ago, now here’s a full one, common in the gutters of Britain's high streets where they skitter down the drains and try to find their way out to the sea, a sea they don't belong in, and damage by their presence!

We had some shelfies of this chap from Brian Berke  a while ago, he then sent a sample to the Blog and these are the constituent parts in close-up; he's in a rigid PVC.

Four views; I used to have a 70's or early 80's Kenner Imperial Stormtrooper, not a rare one, just the 'army-builder' and while I'm not sure if I still have him, or where he is, I think there's a fair chance you could produce a decent cut'n'shut with the Kenner legs and this torso, for a new pose . . . size wise?

Just in case you've never assembled a four-part, action-figure sized, Star Wars, model Stormtrooper Galerie provide clear and easy to follow illustrated instructions! Six to collect. 

I keep trying these plastic BIP (or Bon-Bon Buddies) eggs with their dire candies, in the hope of finding something worth adding to the collection, and keep being disappointed! There are several new ones around at the moment including Paw Patrol and Pepper Pig (all the 'P's!), I buy this shite so you don't have to!

Mentioned in passing yesterday, these Toto's from Turkey used to be a 99p Stores standard, since the Poundland takeover they have appeared sporadically in the new owner's shops, but they also have a Kinder thing going on at the same time. These were actually in Poundworld Plus, and are firmly piggy-backing the Emoji movie!

Eggs do rather lend themselves to Emoji-related graphics! Unlike yesterdays who have the same two-headed (two-emoji'ed?!!) wrapping, these all have a single-Emoji, foil wrapper.

The three toys; not one of which is Emoji-related. I can't work out the cat/bear 'Hello Miffy' thing at all, it has two red sprung-loaded widgets which may be feet, may be a collar, don't move far or with any good reason that I can tell . . . perplexing!

The mini-transformer is fun, a sort of rocket-firing/bin-lorry/Jeep-thing that unfolds into the least convincing wo'manzinger-tron you ever saw! Finally a Thunderbirds knock-off/clone of the Mole, but a cabriolet-mole! Take strong goggles, a titanium helmet and keep your shoulders low in the seat s'my advice to you Mr. Tracy!