A is for Alice in Wonderland - II - Novelties

The other figure of 'Mr. Chamberlin' was a bit of a giveaway with his arse-written Hong Kong, but heay; it was a bit of a last minutes thing - which reminds me; apologies from any typo's over the Easter break, but I short of panic-loaded 11 posts over two days last week, while the cat's head was exploding - long story I won't bore you with, but suffice to say I learnt kitchen-paper doesn't soak-up much puss [euwww!] and he's fine now, but thinks the collar is an evil alien; out to get him!

Hong Kong 'Nodding-head' novelty, the difference between this and this morning's Marx figure is no greater than the difference between this morning's Marx figure and the Marx figure below.

Having never seen the movie I can't say for sure which of the three is closest to the movie imagining, or why the other two are so far off, I contemplated one of them being a different character, but they all have the price ticket in the top-hat, so are definitely trying to be the same chap!

A gratuitous shot of his feet, I shot this primarily to show it's unmarked (other that the rump-branding), so not necessarily made for Marx even though it looks like the sort of thing they were commissioning in the British colony, as the next piece [probably] ably demonstrates.

Marked clearly on the Dormouse's rump as being from one of the Hong Kong factories/suppliers; this ramp-walker - with the third distinct 'Hatter today - is in a polystyrene plastic and painted in the style of Marx's other HK stuff. Now the mad one has white hair (would have made a better Chamberlin - just not stuck to a dormouse!), but the nose is closer to the swivel-limbed one we looked at earlier.

Yet; he has a very different countenance overall? I'll look-up some movie stills before publishing (if I remember to read this in 'preview'!) and try and work out which is the more accurate, but I suspect the swivel-limbed figure from this, morning is the best likeness, being controlled by Marx in a US (or the Swansea?) factory, the ramp-walker is next closest having some Marx oversight of the contractor and the nodder -  an inaccurate, rushed HK novelty, not that they aren't all novelties - they are!

I rememebered - Marx swivel IS the closest (but the hair's wrong), the Hong Kong one is next, the Marx walker looks nothing like either of the movie characters, but has the closest hair!

PIOT is for Peace In Our Time

Happy Easter everyone, I thought we'd look at one of the least known corners of our hobby today as I happened to pick these up for less than a tenner in a charity shop the other day (I know, but those old dears have all the reference works out the back you know , and it was less than a tenner, so I did OK), and they are very hard to track down.

Neville Chamberlin's ill-fated trip to Germany in 1938 was rather brushed-over at the time, and all but forgotten in the heady chaos of 1940, and the shoe-in of Churchill to lead us in our 'finest hour' which became the prase-de-jour however, once Hitler had been dealt with and the threat from the East become more obvious, Chamberlain's ringing endorsement of dealing with strongmen was remembered for the first-class naivety it was.

By the early 1950's parents were regularly chiding their unruly children to bed with the threat of "Peace In Our Time with Mr. Hitler's ghost if you don't behave and settle-down quickly", Squaddie's going off to fight Communism in Korea scrawled PIOT on their helmet covers when the QM wasn't looking and then blamed each-other to get off RP's, while on Humberside striking Dockers even had rubber-stamps made-up in the tool-sheds to leave oxide-red PIOT's on mounted policemen's' horse's rumps during the less than peaceful ruckuses' that accompanied their Industrial Action!

So it's unsurprising to find that the nascent plastics industry soon adopted this cultural meme for the production of novelty figures of Mr Chamberlain with the offending letter he had waved all those years ago tucked into his headband.

The above figure (counting out the 'peace'es') has been credited to both Rafael Lipkin and Chad Valley, although - with its resemblance to Britains 'Twizzle Town' circus - I wonder if it was an early, undocumented experiment in polymer from the - then still - hollow-cast experts? The unpainted one (with body on backwards) could be a later issue but is more likely to be an out-painters cast-off, as unpainted he has no distinctive moustache?

Chamberlin was always depicted as a slightly lunatic character with his hair all over the place and the look of a childish simpleton in these novelties and by the time I was born (1964) the phrase was one every school-boy knew, but the cultural overtones had all but disappeared - along with the novelties - and it was just more 'boring' history!

This 'booble head' figure of Chamberlain (looking fruitlessly in the dirt for the lost peace) is in a phenolic or early styrene resin and could be Kleeware, early Airfix or whoever did the crazy-clown circus?

Nice to finally track them down and at less than a tenner - Bargain! Have you ever seen any readers?