Le is for Noel, Figurines, and Max - Lemax!

I've tried, I've really tried, to stay away from poured resin, Christmas Village stuff. A fruitless task, as various donators, have, as Loyal Readers will've noticed, over the years, given me several of the things, while others have snuck in from mixed evilBay or Charity shop lots, so I crumbled completely this year and bought two Lemax figurines . . . Then another one! In my defence, they were much cheaper than the others on the pegs, and were clearly dated as old stock.

 

It was the Bavarian barmaid with six foaming Steins that did it for me, and with an equally cheap snowman, it just sort of happened while I wasn't paying attention, and suddenly, they were mine! She's dated 2014, the snowman's date is a little odder, and a little older, at 1099! Clearly, snowmen were a Norman practice, brought to these shores by William and his wicked Barons!

 

I went back a couple of weeks later, and this Lemax 'Mrs. Miggins' and her mince-pies (I think we're actually looking at Mrs. Clause!) had appeared on the hook where the Dirndl girl had been, a while earlier, and also older stock (2019), I thought she had to join the existing pair! For those not familiar with these, if they still look expensive to you, the surrounding others were starting at £4.99 and £5.99!

T is for Third-Party Theory?

Following on from the previous post this one is of interest, if only for further muddying the waters of Hong Kong's contribution to toy production in the 1960's and '70's, and illustrates how impossible it is to ever fully know the whole history of that former colonies activities, and therefore proof of an eternal hole in the history of toys . . . or novelties!

 

A quick reminder of the latest recruit to the stash, courtesy of Chris Smith, and I'm only reproducing it as - not collaged - it's easier to see that the polystyrene figure has been glued to a polystyrene sheet, so effectively it had to be cut out, or rather I suspect it was broken out, deliberately or in an accident is a moot point, but an accident would have more likely broken him off at the skate.

 

I suspect he was glued to something, probably with his lady friend, which would have looked like this . . . 

. . . pair of ne'er-do-well's from Toytown! These are more often encountered as stand-alone figurines, but were, I think, sold as cake decorations, but I'm not sure, and they are one of three sets of Noddy characters I know of in 'our scales', the other two being the smaller set of polystyrene figures from Marx and the Kellogg's from Crescent polyethylene cereal premiums.

 

You sometimes find these described as Marx too, and they may be, I don't know what licence relationship Swansea had with the Estate of Enid Blyton, but it would have been a Marx UK 'thing'. This set has about eight or ten characters, while the smaller one may extend to ten or twelve (we've seen one or two here, but there's better samples of both in the collection, against a future post or two). I've also seen them credited to Codeg I think?

But here they have been glued to a Happy Birthday decorated plastic plinth, and by whom and where may never be known. However, they are almost certainly a third party, buying-in the figures and the plinths, and marrying them together, with added paper stickers, to create more attractive pieces, which looks more substantial, and can therefore be priced at a higher rate than the cost of the components, when sold separately!

These were on feeBay a couple of years ago, and seem to suggest that the third party, or one of them (?), might have been based in the UK, because the Tom figure is clearly the Gemodels original in soft polyethylene, but if Culpitt were behind these novelty decorations, they could have sent UK produce to Hong Kong to have the work done, again - we'll probably never know?

But here we have artificial foliage, UK and HK figures in two polymers, and a wire/brush-fir in a wooden barrel, all added to the same plinths and given paper labels, one Birthday themed, the other a Christmas piece, neither requiring any creativity on the part of the cake-maker, just plonk the vignette on the icing!

And then I found these, adding to the chapter on KT, with an all-Irish line-up of novelties, where, again, the right-hand Leprechaun has been glued to a thermometer! On a similar base to the above, and obviously from the tourist trade, I have no idea whether these were from the Republic or Ulster, if one, I'd favour the former, but I dare say they were seen/available for purchase on both sides of the boarder?

 

Now firstly, we have two new sculpts to add to the KT listings, which have already enjoyed a bunch of these plinthed ones, mushrooms, a smaller astronaut and the larger Diddyman, but secondly, we can see the Leprechauns here are based with smaller, chunkier bases matching their stature, while the Irish Dancer has the finer steps to her base of the other figurines in the oeuvre?

 

And, in adding a thermometer to the already found pen-holder and pencil sharpeners, it means we may well be looking for sand-timers, letter racks, money-boxes, jewellery stands/music boxes and so on. And it may be that KT were behind the larger copy of their beefeater, even if not named on the HCF set?

 

I've also added the KT tag to a couple of the earlier 'unknown' figure posts, and in doing so, you can see how help from Chris Smith, Brian Wagstaff and Adrian Little has been invaluable in revealing the KT story, with links on the KT posts revealing Brian Berke helped with the old hollow-cast cowboys who also became pencil sharpeners! Many thanks to all of them.

M is for Merched Cymru

Or 'Welsh Ladies' to the occupying English, while - "Formidable infanterie de ligne" to French invaders! And yes, we sort of had that gag before! Really an F is for Follow-up, as these keep coming-in, and of course they do, they were (are?) in one form or another, a standard tourist trope/souvenir, and there will be many around, some commoner than others. 

Indeed, it's one of the big gaps in the hobby's knowledge, these localised figurines/figurals, I do have a couple of Christ The Redeemer's from Rio, a few Virgin Mary's from the Vatican, Italy, Lourdes or wherever, the Tzar Gun from Moscow, and the Russo-Ottoman war gun from Bulgaria (Or Hungary?), but there are hundreds of these sites, statues, famous guns &etc., from all over the world, and the bulk of the touristy 'toys' from them, are missing from the bulk of collectors' collections!

For instance, I know I'm short of Irish Ladies/Irish Dancers, and Leprechauns, although some of the latter are repurposed gnomes, which I do have in the collection, sans the extra green decoration!

So, not strictly to scale; a new keyring, the previously-seen keyring, un-drilled in the hat, but with a hole in her back (for mounting to an egg-timer or something?), the old styrene one we have seen before and the one believed to be Cherilea (or Charbens)? I think someone was questioning it's attribution the other day, so 'believed to be' is the way for me to go!

 

It's funny, I have my critics, many of them, all waiting to pounce on the slightest error (or even just flat omissions), even as they ignore their own, or each-other's howlers, so I've learnt to be as careful as I can be, while still passing as much as I can on, to you, as accurately and comprehensively as possible!

 

The facts here, are that the figure has a base unlike those of other figure production from either Charbens or Cherilea, and as a commission from a tourist whole-seller in Wales, or serving Welsh retailers, could have been made by any one of several dozen other British figure producers, or several hundred, even thousand plastic injectors, not known for their figures. And - so far - I don't think it's turned-up in any of the reissues from either firms' mould-banks.

As I mentioned only the other day, at a point in around 1998, there were 3 injection-moulders within yards of each-other in the commercial belt between Frimley and Camberley, that they have all gone now, is a moot point, they were there, and they were only the ones I knew of, there may have been more - there are three or four still listed on Google Maps, none being the ones I knew back then, and in the 1950/60's there would have been twice as many.

And with those musings in mind, returning to the 'Hong Kong' not her usual keyring self; these items are used not only as key-rings and egg-timers (why I suspect she has a hole in her back), but also as/for attaching to pincushions, barometers/thermometers, note or calendar holders, key-cups, egg-cups, hooks, knife-racks, cruet sets, anything you can think of as maybe being sellable, to people from elsewhere, looking for a small, travel-friendly keepsake or memento of their trip to your neighbourhood, your attraction!

Now, I also think the vinyl one may have been in Chris Smith's last parcel, but in looking at that folder to ID it, I can't find it, so either I shot the pic's for this post (which has been growing in Picasa for a while) and forgot to include it in the plunder-post shots, or I ended up combining it with the key-ring I picked-up in a mixed lot a while ago, while putting-away Chris's stuff, but in any event Chris has sent some, and he definitely sent the reconstituted slate one we also looked-at here, so many thanks for everything he does for the Blog.

F is for Further Follow-up - Gay Gem Hawaiian Dancers

We looked at the Britains-copy Hawaiian dancers here, and then there was a quick follow-up here, and I've now found this in the archive, it's not much use without the figures, but from the illustration it would seem to be one of the straight piracies rather than the clip-on skirt versions, and with the tree, probably the ones in the latter images of the above link.

Gay Gem, who often turn-up on evilBay with this kind of stuff, as I say; not much use, but it's in the tag-list now, under 'Hawaiian'. This would have been from the James Chase collection, and as the figures weren't with it, they probably went through the main auction at Christies, while this was in the ephemera-dump/polymer-overspill sale at SAS Auctions a few months later, all back in 2006, I think?

L is for St. Labre Indian Catholic High School

Wikipedia suggests not all is rosy at this establishment, and I could dig deep and make a few more 'eemies' with my usual revisions of history toward a more accurate truth! But this is really only a quick box-ticker, while the eventual A-Z entry should have a better historical sketch.

We've seen some of this issuer's products before, quite recently with the canoe mini-season (thanks Brian) and ages ago with the semi-flat, relief tipi/tee-pee & children, as well as one of these totems, way back at the start of the blog, but here's a few more of the figural/toy figure output - an output which seems to have been quite prolific, due to the attachment of a Cheyenne Indian Museum & Gift Shop to the school, although there was clearly also a mail-away or direct-sales thing as well.

I've had the one on the left for years, and I have no idea how many there are now! Two lines, with the thinner more realistic ones being simple Totem poles, the other two seem more figural (legs and feet) and I wonder if they represent another type of 'totem', maybe dance costumes like the pueblo Indian clay heads, or stylised 'Welcome Poles'?

 

I could Google it for hours, but life's too short!

One of mine is missing its top-cap piece, so it was but a second's work to confirm you could stack these to infinity! I have seen one with black or green I think but the same design with the same three slip-in/slip-over, silhouette elements - 'Thunderbird', owl and wolf or bear? Beaver?.

I'm pretty sure I saw a third design of these too, on eBay at some point, so it looks like both lines ran to at least three variants, possibly more, and the construction of these is slightly more complicated than the straight poles, with no interchangeability. They also look like 3D forms of the designs you find on some of the rugs and blankets woven by Native Americans?

 

Additional to the Native American we saw with the canoes is the lady with papoose, this just plugs in to her back with two studs, and with the boy/chief makes three in the pile now. The figures are hollow polystyrene mouldings, the straight poles are polyethylene, while the 'totems' are a denser, possibly nylon polymer.

C is for Chris's Autumn Parcel - Sports & Civilians

I was going to do sports and civilians as two separate posts, but realised most of them were sports (or pastimes) of one sort or another, and all the seated figures were in one shot which would have made a quick post with two Asian ladies, so they're all here!

Fussbal! There was something about pig's bladder kicking on Faceplant the other day, some Arabs were organising an end-of year kick-about or something, I believe the Argentines were playing dirty again, but still won? Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose!

The three on the right are from board games of one type or another, but the chap on the left is one of those press-button collapse'a'toys (I've ever found a good generic term for them), where all the parts are threaded on wire, cotton button-thread (in this case) or fishing line, and held in tension by a spring in the drum base, so when you press the button, pushing the spring in, the fellow collapses like a 'red shirt' in an alien death ray! All plastic - brilliant thing!

Sorry for the upper shot, by the time I realised it was unusable they had gone to storage, so I used it! They are something we have seen before, in depth twice and in many mixed-posts like this one so you should be familiar with them, and with so many variations in size, colour and base type; something we will return to one day, these are mid-range (30-odd millimeters) and mid-quality.

Below them we have a rider (from an eraser go-cart/cartie type thing?) in eraser rubber, a wrestler in the style of Kinukiman/M.U.S.C.L.E., but not marked-up as one of them, so probably a gum-ball/capsule-machine knock-off, and, finally, an ice hockey player, similar to the pencil-top/key-ring footballers, but with no sign of a loop having been removed and no hole up his back-passage, more of a stand-alone desk-mascot.

The rear of that cart-rider, I wondered if he was a spaceman (he's quite similar to the Dinky Moon-buggy/Space Chariot crew, but he's more BMX'y with knee-pads and padded thigh-protectors, and I have half a feeling I've seen the cart somewhere, equally you might think pencil-top, but the larger hole is still a tad small, and I suspect locating-lugs on the go-cart?

The upper shot shows three skiers, all cake decorations, all Hong Kong, two polyethylene and one polystyrene (to the left) who's predictably lost his sticks, the first two are copies of the Britains Arctic Explorer, the one to the right a Gemodels skier I think?

The funny thing is I think the Britains 'Arctic' exploration set came out during the hype for an Antarctic expedition, the Commonwealth Trans-Antarctic Expedition (CTAE) of 1955–1958, which my late mother helped with, back here in the UK, and I've found some of the paperwork in her estate, which at some point I'll do something with, nothing exciting; kit lists, typed databases of suppliers, formats of begging-letters, that sort of thing!

Below them are three of the cuckoo-clock/barometer figures, a pair and an odd, with a lovely Bavarian/Tyrolean dancer in Lederhosen. We have looked at the clock-figures before, but we will return to them at some point because several more have come in, and hopefully some will make-up more pairs? In the meantime this is a pretty good line-up!

A couple of these - like the go-carter - were borderline space figures until I looked closer; they all seem to be divers/marine explorers of one type or another, with a deep-sea diver to the left, two undersea vehicle crew to his right and the Nabisco (?) diver, much chewed in front. The chewed one is worth keeping for the colour and the fact that I think I only have the one other - bent legs - pose!

The deep sea diver looks like a pencil top, but the hole is too small again, so I expect he's from a similar novelty to the Nabisco one, which relies on air pressure/water density affecting a air-bubble in the hole, to make him go up and down in a bottle? But what do I know? He might be a nineteen-fifties fish-tank ornament from a weighted wreak or something!

The other yellow plastic chap is from one of the several rack-toy sea 'chariot' or James Bond villain-army type toy vehicles out there, I think/assume!

The 'might be' Hilco cake decoration hunters, from Britains Lilliput above, with two Hong Kong cyclists below, one almost a cracker-toy, but we've seen the packaging here I think, the other from one generation of Britains piracy or another. I picked up another, raising his arms as if crossing the finish-line, the other day, which I'm pretty sure goes with this chap (but they are already ensconced in two different places!), so it's a question of matching them with the right cycles in the future, and blogging them together with the doors and the little articulated one we saw here a while ago!

Seated figures, like paratroopers are standard contents of mixed lots, and highlights this time are the turquoise one (top, middle) who looks to have some age, and the metallic turquoise one below him which is also new to me, I think? Below them is a grey aircraft (?) crewman, in the style of a kit-figure, but possibly factory-painted and therefore from a more commercial toy/pre-built aeroplane model?

Lastly, but anything but leastly; two more of the KT/Shackman et al., figures, we saw these two in images from Brian Wagstaff which are on the 'World Dancers' page (link at the top of the page), so it's really nice to have them here now, a separate image has already been taken and added to the 'Commonwealth additions' folder!

When Brian W sent them I hoped they might be the sign of a larger set of ex-Commonwealth or Van Brode sculpts within the tourist/novelty pencil-sharpener line we've been looking at here, but these are the fourth/fifth to turn-up now, and the feeling is that they are just the pair, as in a 'Pair of Asian Dancers'

With a pair of Americans (Cowboy & Indian), pair of Germans/Tyrolean's (May Day/Dirndl dancers), four British touristy subjects (Policeman, Beefeater, Guardsman and Highland piper), and . . . I'm hopeful a Mountie might turn-up?

Thanks again to Chris for all these, which leaves us waiting for the 'other figures' post!

F is for Follow-up - Esquimaux Explorers

A quick follow-up to October's post on Kinder Arctic subjects, as I managed to pick up a colour variant on Friday, which we can have a quick shufti at! And re, that previous post's title, it's bloody cold now, they recon minus-7° tonight, which may be balmy for some of the Northern/Continental Loyal Readers, but it's pretty rare in sodding Hampshire!

This one is all a primrose yellow, I could look up the code and value but I think I've made that point, and it'll all be on the A-Z's one day, or at least that's the plan! He comes with an ice-axe and husky dog, rather that the skis-&-sticks of the previous example

T is for Two - Paint Your Own Catalogue Images

These are both 'seen elsewhere's, and it was pure coincidence that I happened to find, or isolate two different 'Pain Your Own' ad's from two different catalogues, which were both branded to classic British plastics manufacturers.

This was from the 1975 Crescent catalogue, and shows the cake-decoration vignette and an incomplete circus set as paint-your-own's or Paint & Play, but I suspect they never made it to the shops? Or if they did it can't have been in large numbers, as pure white or home-painted white versions of either are not something I have found.

There is a large number of the horses from the circus set in white who turn-up, but they are missing their holes (for the acrobat lady) and seem to have been supplied by Crescent for another job? I remember having a debate with the late Dave Scrivener on the subject and neither of us were convinced as to the possible reasons for them!

While the - usually - cake decoration Santa' is always factory-painted (or tatty!) when found, and most unpainted circus figures are in the multi-colours of the Kellogg's iteration, although a few white ones were issued in that promotion, but only in proportion to the red, orange, yellow and two blues?

Note also, the lower 'useful piece' count of the Santa set, compared to the nine-piece (? the weight-lifter and hula-hoop clown seem to have been omitted?) circus set, is bulked out with a couple of standard green 'monkey puzzle' trees.

These - new for 1993 - are from [a] Charbens (the original was bought out and renamed Charpack a decade earleir!) and WERE issued, as I've seen them on feebleBay, or at least I've seen the European Heritage ladies, I think the 'Soccer' footballers were in Plastic Warrior magazine; probably at or around the time of the ad'? As you can see from the hand, these were 3½ or 4" figures and I think they are polystyrene, against the polyethylene of the Crescent sets.

I would add that these Paint & Display sets aren't from a Charbens catalogue, but rather a retail catalogue or flyer (I've lost the reference now, it's around here somewhere, Rainbow or Lion?), so it could well be a Charpack thing (the trays the figures are presented in?), or even a Prindus (Prison Industries) effort, but they wouldn't have had the rights to the Charbens brand mark, however they could have licensed it?

I is for Is It Just Me, or Is It Getting Chilly?

We had two heat-waves here, the first breaking three-year old 'new' records by 3°, a trend which if it continues would render large parts of Europe, Asia and the SE of Britain uninhabitable by humans - in a heat-wave - within about 20 years? But after the second, not so hot but more humid, so equally uncomfortable heat-wave, the weather has gone rapidly downhill, and it's got quite chilly, but then I guess it is October, maybe the summer just lasted too long!

Anyway, seems like a good excuse to get the cold-weather gear out and check it over, these are all Kinder; 1980's/90's, and they are ready for anything the climate throws at them! 20/25mm at the top, 28/30mm compatible in the middle and a decet stab at 54mm with the 'steckfigur' at the bottom, who has lost the backs of his skis, and his boots . . . sniff! The silver blob was off some cartoon thing; long-lost.

I have a blue/white one who has his boots, so if I ever find the missing ski sections I will be able to re-shoot them both in some sort of order? All polyethylene, and with moveable arms/articulated waist, they are a useful addition to Timpo and/or Britains polar explorer/Esquimaux/Inuit sets.

There's the colour reversed version of this on evilBay at the movement, he's more of a novelty toy, and winter-sports rather than polar explorer or native hunter, but fun, Kinder, polystyrene and possibly a bit earlier, although still 1980's I think?

N is for Nostalgia - Badges!

OK, well, after a seven-day figure-fest, let's have something completely different with a bit of a nostalgia hit to boot, after all if we collect toys we already have an interest in juvenile popular culture!

Another of the magic drawers shot on the way to storage, it's where all the badges that come in with mixed-lots end-up, after the drawing-pins, building blocks, broken chalks & crayons, buttons, Lego, lumps of hairy, brown Plasticine, marbles, Meccano, and other detritus have been removed!

This might . . . I stress MIGHT . . . and only 'might' . . . be the only surviving example of the badges in this Giant Plastics Corp., set (third image down), but it may be from another source altogether! A photo-realistic (because it's a 1:1 photograph, as a print!) army badge, reproduced as a paper sticker. It's actually quite an unusual higher-function/rear echelon logistics/construction unit - ADSEC Wikipedia.

Figurals; A cat stamped from polished sheet steel (stainless), a relief-flat setter, a similar Tyrolean/Bavarian [very-]young couple stealing a kiss, the two dogs came from Bulgaria, while the rabbit is channeling both Miffi and Hello Kitty (or even the new Chi) but is none of those franchise's characters, but rather a generic; possibly a gum-ball machine prize?

Finally the National Children's Homes (NCH) crocodile/alligator in Santa suit is a teeny-tiny example of multiple-shot moulding, a technique akin to over-moulding, but with each colour laid side-by-side, originally; separately, increasingly now; at the same time.

Also figural, this is interesting both for being a motorcycle (speedway memento?) and being marked on the back with the Injection Moulder's logo, whom we last saw selling Thomas cord-pull helicopters here.

This is a lovely little thing, a simple pin-badge in pressed, tin-litho, not sure if the alphabet is Chinese or Japanese but I think the latter, and the equivalent of a 'penny toy'? The sort of thing 1960's or early '70's parents would buy a whole card of, and hand out as 'attendance' prizes to all the kids at a birthday party . . . "I'll be ya' best friend . . . "

Oh, if I had a decent sample of these I'd need a new Blog! Brass, die-cast alloy, plastic, card . . . stars, medallions, shields, name-plates, we all had several of these on our way through childhood, Sheriff, Deputy, Posse, Marshal, Fire Chief, Police, or here (in plastic) 'Special Agent' . . . where would a 20th Century adolescence have been without at least one of these?

I hate this creature with such a vengeance he's got 'air-pellet receptacle' written all over 'im! However, some, many, were taken in by the Disneyfication of the whole planet, so just for them . . .no, I'm not going to clean the little shit!

Look at his dimwittedness, shining, beacon-like from his fizzog, listen to his whining voice (it's there, in your head, right now! "Oooh! helloooo pluuu'tooo!"), wonder at his inordinate earning-potential, imagine my extra Google-traffic - whatever I say about the horrid, mawkishly-sentimental little fu . . . deep breath Hugh, deep breath . . . calm down; go and have a coffee!

At the other end of the badge spectrum from anthropomorphic plastic twats are these, given away by arms manufacturers, to adults, at defence shows! Heavy alloy, base-metal or pewter models of whichever killing-machine they are flogging that day, here we have a faux-gilded 105mm howitzer (presumably from BAE Systems) and an Oerlikon ship-defence auto-cannon.

I may have some more of these somewhere (tanks, helicopters and 'planes), I've had a lot of luck with the Farnborough Airshow over the years; Dad used to get us all-area tickets when the Tiger Moth was on display, while in the 2000's I was working as a chauffeur and a lot of our work was for BAE or their clients, so we were in and out, all day, for the whole gig and got given a lot of stuff.

 

At that level of corporate hospitality the stuff is given-away like rain, indeed; umbrellas (full size, posh ones) were another common freebie, leaving me and family possessing a lifetime's supply of them - I recently took half-a-dozen to charity! Once I had a party of Turks visiting Thames Water facilities for a whole week (8-seat V-Klass) and they left all their umbrellas with me and I struggled to give them all away! We (they - the rich and powerful) have killed the planet with this shite!

F is for Follow-up - Novelty Toppers & Sharpeners

Last time we looked at these I titled the post "M is for More to Come . . .", so confident was I that we were only going to scratch the surface, and further predicted a return, and while this isn't perhaps as full as I had visioned that future follow-up, it does widen the field and reveal some new poses . . . although it also clears a few duplicates out of Picasa, so apologies for that!

The first duplicate shot is - I think - the original Shackman set's listing shot, which I'd downloaded before winning the lot we looked at last time! But it reminds us of what we looked at then!

I'd also shot the comparisons and the 'new' policeman several times shoving the images in different folders, only to re-take them for that previous post!

This arrived this morning; I haven't even done the feed-back yet - next thing on the list, it's the man for the lady dancer in the boxed set, no branding, and very different packaging to the stock-box from Shackman, and never/hardly ever been out from the looks of him.

Clearly not a Spanish-anything, he's sort of Tyrolean, but more accurately a Slovakian Folk Dancer (Czech's tend to red or white trousers, while the true Tyrolean's wear short lederhosen or longer, black velvet trousers with high white stockings), not that the blue seems terribly Slovakian, but A) it's a cheap toy, B) it was a very brief Googling, in image results and C) I don't really care, but he's not a Spanish Dancer, whatever the HONG KONG box says!

These were (are?) both still being offered by an Argentine seller on feeBay, and seem to be an earlier iteration, loosely channeling the Disney cartoon of Peter Pan, base is flat (no step/plinth), but sharpener looks to be the same design as the others. L-in-a-triangle brand-mark means nothing to me, yet?

While these chaps are from the 1965 (or '68?) catalogue from Wilton in the 'States, we're looking at a full license here, I think, from Hanna-Barbera Productions, but the same bases as the Peter Pans', and definitely the same sharpener-units, it may be that they were all coming from a smaller factory among the many in HK, who only specialised in these and jobbed to everyone?

A new colour for the sharpener in the Policeman's pale blue, and a new pose in the Native American lady - another Commonwealth knock-off - both from feebleBay.

Returning to the new figure, a bag of what I suspect are wholesaled Christmas cracker inserts and a cat! The inserts include a green plastic copy of the standard die-cast alloy sharpener of our youth, two hexagonal ones, a hippo-outline (or at least I think it's a hippo, it's not terribly clear!), a heart-shape and a round one pretty similar to the one basing many of these figurative novelty sharpeners, but quite modern/current.

The new one is marked Hong Kong on the underside of the sharpener, has an unmarked plinth, and a box code which is in sequence with some of those we saw last time, but not the Wilton or Shackman codes, I guess it depended who the end user was and whether they chose to adopt the manufacturers code, or re-number in line with their own 'in-house' cataloguing system/s.

All of which brings us to three plinth types; flat, flanged single-step or edged double-step, coming with or without a pencil sharpener which itself can or cannot be a separate piece in crackers, gum-balls etc . . . and a selection of subjects from the Wild West, through dancers to civic & ceremonials, some of which are ex-Commonwealth, some based of Commonwealth-Van Brode sculpts and some quite original, with - now - Disney knock-offs and HBP characters . . . what next?

Because we're looking at mostly sharpeners;this is a follow-up to this post and suggests there were two each, cowboys and Indians in the 'West Germany'-marked set of pencil sharpeners utilising the Crescent/Lido poses? There may - of course - be more, but four as two-pairs seems sensible, and only those four keep turning-up? Another evilBay image.