O is for Only One Casualty . . . so Far!

Moving all your stuff into storage, then having it moved - in situ - on the back of a lorry up a rutted farm track (without your say so) to a new site, and then getting it out of storage, cross-transferring it through two vehicles and piling it in the garage - over seven years, is bound to lead to casualties, and while there is a pile of matchwood to super-glue (not for the first time) in the kits [half-tracks and armoured cars drawer] cabinet, the only real casualty so far has been Edward Ryan's excellent tome;  Paper Soldiers . . .

. . . which got wet in a squall/thunder storm the day of the move, long after I'd given up for the evening, a small trickle of water got into the garage and while all the books in the box were the same way-up (open ends down), this seemed to soak it all up!

Anyway, three whole rolls of kitchen paper and a couple of months to let it dry-out 'un-forced' and it's almost as good as new, a couple of pages are slightly ribbed and one has a water mark, why only one, I don't know! And it's lucky, 'cos the price of a replacement copy on-line is getting as silly as Opie's Big Book of Britains!

The trick was to place each sheet of paper-towel toward the outside/open-side of the book, so that not too much strain was put on the spine (which didn't get wet), this allowed air to circulate, once the whole book was done the weight of it pressed the pages out gently which - I think - is why so few of the pages ribbed, although I turned it every few days so the weight wasn't unequally pressing on one half the whole time.

News, views etc...Lone*Star

I have been lucky to get into contact with an ex-employee of Lone*Star, otherwise known as Die Casting Machine Tools Ltd. (a.k.a. D.C.M.T.), a Mr. Patrick Simmonds and the first thing I must do is thank him for sending me three old catalogues - almost overnight. Pat was originally a pattern-maker in the machine room, working on moulds, but would rise through the company and was there at the end. He has kindly agreed to let me interview him for the blog, and to that end if anybody would like me to put specific questions to him (which he may not be able to answer) let me know in the next few days and I will try to speak to him next week sometime. I will not badger him from now until doomsday, so please get any questions to me by Sunday 5th August. Ask around as well, some of your mates may not follow this blog or have easy access to the internet. You can pose the questions as a comment (click the comments link at the end of this post) or eMail me at the usual address; maverickatlarge@hotmail.com I don't know how much he knows about the early plastic figures, so if you have questions on the die-cast toys, Treble-O Trains, guns or the late vinyl toys, do proffer them.

A is for Almark Publishing - Books and Pamphlets

There is a strange thing happening with reference books these days, too many of them get filled with 'Internet Bubble' falsehoods and urban myths, rumor and plain old poor research, yet are without doubt very well illustrated. If you could only take the images from modern works and marry them to the text of the old standards, you'd have a hell of a library! These are Almark, who along with Bellona (couple of them sneaked into the picture - bottom left), Arms & Armour Press, Osprey and Ian Alan provided most of our needs in the 1970's and early '80's. What's even more useful is that Almark's were very well illustrated as well!