D is for ♫♪♪♪ Dog Days Are Over! ♫♫♪

Aaannnd . . . we return to the 'probably not Rubinstein' trope of a year ago! Indeed, while I have spent that year diligently (occasionally) searching (checking feeBay), and have seen a few more of the sets covered in those posts last year, I have still not found a single pack, or fragment of packaging linking Rubinstein to these dogs!

But, despite the complete lack of empirical evidence for a connection, people keep insisting they are Rubinstein, just as some persist not only in using 'LP' for LB, when they could just use the donor Lik Be (to retain a modicum of credibility!), or keep calling limbers 'caissons' or vise-versa (despite a long, cogent thread on the subject on Treefrog, or a Blog somewhere), the continued use of DGN ('design') is another one, but it does sort of explain Trump, Brwreakshit and a dozen other pointers to our careering toward the end of Western hegemony, or even full extinction!

I think this is actually the seller's image, and again, full sets, multiple lot-listing, not ex-shop stock, but, like yesterdays HK/Tim Mee set, ex-factory stock or ex-out-painter stock, not that either set was known to be painted, but you know what I mean, somewhere in the UK at least two people, had sackfuls of stuff which some collectors would have you believe - through their false narratives - shouldn't be here!

 

The American names for these are, from the left; Boxer, Pug, Boston Terrier and [Dobermann] Pinscher, but to my eyes the pug looks more like a Bulldog, leaving a Mastiff and Boxer as the white pair?

 

German Shepherd (Alsatian), Pointer (gun dog), Irish [Red] Setter, Beagle and Cocker Spaniel. Again, if they were in-scale, which they are clearly not, the Beagle would be better described as a Foxhound.

Dachshund, Scottie (Scot's Terrier), Toy Poodle, Basset Hound and Chihuahua.

 

Greyhound, Russian Wolfhound (Borzoi), Airedale (Terrier) and Collie.

And while most of these are white plastic, there are a few of the Nabisco silver/gold/copper-bronze ones, as made for Kellogg's and Nabisco (and Peke Freans et al.) as soldiers of all nations (under various titles), by Tatra Plastics, who also did a few white plastic soldiers?

Now, I'm not saying these are by Tatra, I know nothing about them as far as this apparent UK stock goes, they could even be Peak Freans premiums? But I am saying they, like the soldiers have as yet to be presented in Rubenstein packaging, and now we know Rubenstein were just another 1970's rack-toy jobber, they were probably last to this story if they turned-up at all, far better to call the Soldiers 'Kellogg's' (as they issued them in more territories that Nabisco or 'Freans), and the Dogs 'Nabisco' as the only named carrier, until more evidence comes to life.

Personally I suspect Tatra, but they didn't claim them when they were in contact over their 50th anniversary, and while they promised to look in their archive, once they'd had their publicity here, at Small Scale World, they went very quiet, and then, ironically given the number of companies they'd swallowed over the previous few decades, got swallowed!

And as to issuer . . . Nabisco have to be up there with Peak Freans, but ice cream, lucky-bags or Christmas cracker issuers (Tom Smith?) have to be serious considerations, suffice to say someone was clearly planning on issuing them here, even if they didn't.

 

Along with yesterday's these are still available on evilBay.uk, I think. Someone in the 'States has a set of these for over 100-quid on Etsy, while a seller in the UK will let you have them for a tenner! Interestingly Nabisco issued a book on dogs (as National Biscuit co.), and in their Australian territory, a set of cereal premium dog collector-cards, so they were a bit hung-up on dogs!

25-10-2024 - I got my copy of PW196 today, and read with interest the anticipated article on Rubenstein,; and nothing above, nor anything I wrote fourteen months ago needs to be corrected! It's actually quite amusing, only confirming some of my past mutterings, and I'll deal with it fully in a future post!

Pirates is for Crazy Comic Piraten Serie Piratas Bucaneros Filibusteros Corsarios Berberiscos . . . and Then Some!

I didn't know how to tackle this lot, and ended-up with far too many images, some of which I know are other peoples, and which have been left out, although one or two have been kept in. Also, in the end I decided to go with the vague order they seem to have been issued in, but it's not necessarily a true timeline, so bear that in mind.

'THE' Pirate Premiums

 

Appearing around Europe in the early 1970's, there were different configurations of them, with the UK getting a paltry six poses which we have seen before, and other people getting the full twenty.

They first seem to have appeared in Spain (and Portugual?) as Arial soap-powder/detergent premiums, where they are subdivided into five groups of four figures, and next time we visit them - when I bring all mine together - I will shoot them in this order;

 

http://chicledunkin.blogspot.com/search/label/Piratas

 

Full translation of that page;

 

Aunque estas figuras son mas grandes que las Dunkin, para mi es una serie totémica, la recuerdo perfectamente de mi infancia......

 

Although these figures are larger than the Dunkin ones, for me it is a totemic series, I remember it perfectly from my childhood...... 

En realidad son figuras de unos 5 cm, 20 piratas que venían en el detergente Ariel en 1971-1972 mas o menos. 4 colores mates preciosos (para mi los mejores del mundo, los europeos son mas brillantes y en america el plastico demasiado duro...) en plastico blando (lo que hace mas dificil encontrarlas sin defecntos) amarillo, verde, rojo y azul.

In reality they are figures of about 5 cm, 20 pirates that came in the Ariel detergent in 1971-1972 or so. 4 beautiful matte colors (for me the best in the world, the European ones are brighter and in America the plastic is too hard...) in soft plastic (which makes it more difficult to find them without defects) yellow, green, red and blue.

En el paquete recuerdo que venia un dibujo de los piratas agrupados en 5 series de 4, Piratas, Bucaneros, Filibusteros, Corsarios y Berberiscos. Si reunias una serie te daban un premio en metálico y si conseguias los 20 supongo que te darian otro mejor.....

In the package I remember that there was a drawing of the pirates grouped into 5 series of 4, Pirates, Buccaneers, Filibusters, Corsairs and Berbers. If you collected a series they gave you a cash prize and if you got the 20 I guess they would give you a better one.....

Debajo os pongo un scan del trozo de carton donde venian los piratas Dibujados, Aunque no pone el nombre de cada grupo yo si recuerdo cuales eran, El jefe de cada grupo es el primero por la izquierda del dibujo. Como veis, el orden en que los puse segun los recordaba no era el mismo del cartón, pero iba bien encaminado ¿no?

Below I put a scan of the piece of cardboard where the Drawn pirates came. Although it doesn't say the name of each group, I do remember what they were. The leader of each group is the first one on the left of the drawing. As you can see, the order in which I put them as I remembered them was not the same as on the cardboard, but I was on the right track, right?

 

Just a note on the first paragraph, he's not saying Dunkin did these in a smaller size, but that they are bigger than the other Dunkin he collects which are usually around 25/30mm and also tend to come in 20's.

We need some pictures here . . . 

In the UK, Kellogg's issued only six (top left image), with Coco-Crispies and Puffa-Puffa Rice (a Quaker Sugar Puffs knock-off!), and the same colours as the Ariel premiums, there are all four versions of Cascanueces in the bottom-left image. The duplicated olive-green figure and the two white ones are oddments who have come in recently.

 

Cereal Offers do them better justice here

At around the same time Americana bubble-gum were issuing them in Germany (and South Eastern France/Italy?), as Piraten Serie, with these two images from old evilBay auctions showing that in addition to the 'standard' four colours, they also got creamy-white ones

The above three iterations were all manufactured by Tito, a premium maker in Portugal, and most carry the Tito mark somewhere, along with the given name. At some point in the late 1970's the mould-tools migrated to Peru, where the colour range got much better!

 

This is my Peruvian sample as they arrived, they are of mixed parentage however, or might be, so these are the notes I made when they arrived, I've listed them alphabetically for now;

• Arrigon (the only figure marked on the feet)
• Al Epacha (Tito mark on trouser cuff, name down cloak)*
• Barbarrója 'Red Beard'
• Cara Cortada 'Scar Face' (letter 'A' is visible, might be bootleg)
• Cascanueces 'Nutcracker'
• Corsario Azul 'Blue Corsair'
• El Arana 'Spider'
• El Bisco 'Biscuit' (no Tito mark, reversed letter 'F' is visible, might be bootleg)
• El Jorobado 'The Hunchbacked' (no Tito mark, might be bootleg)
• El Manco 'The Lame' [hand not foot]
• El Pecas 'Freckles'
• El Pupas 'The Baby'
• El Tuerto 'One-eye'
• Ivan
• Jack el Negro 'The Black'**
• Morgan (no Tito mark, might be bootleg)
• Mustafa
• Papatalo ('The Unbeaten, Unconquered'?)
• Sebastian
• Taric (no Tito mark, letter 'E' is visible, might be bootleg)

* might be Ali Epacha or Al Iepacha . . . 'The Pasha'?
* *Not apparently a racist epithet, the features being clear and of European or 'everyman' appearance, with long straight hair, so; black-hearted, or up to no good!

 

Check Juan's comment below for more on the origin/meaning of these.

 

A similar grouping but I moved them around and swapped a few colours out to make it a better image, a few months later, then kept both for the post anyway! The quality of these is as good as the Euro-issues, but you can see from the notes, that things are starting to go pear-shaped on the tool, specifically with the text and logo-markings, I now suspect these are all the ex-Tito moulds and not bootlegs, as we are about to look at some bootlegs!

At around the same time, some company in the USA, Rubenstein International Inc. (1977) started shipping these fellows in from Mexico, bags have multiple pose duplicates and what appears to be a limited number of poses, but that remains to be confirmed by multiple samples, and I suspect all 20 poses might eventually turn-up.
 

A limited palette of colours includes red, blue, yellow and white, similar to the Euro-issues, but look at the flash and the overall quality, if there are bootlegs out there, these are they, or someone thrashed the tool to within an inch of its life, between Peru and Mexico!

http://vmminiartemonocromaticos.blogspot.com/2010/07/p.html

This guy seems to have only used eBay images without captions or context, so it's not possible to conclude what any of this means, but interesting colours, and suggestions of other issues somewhere, I particularly like the jade-green set of 20 figures. But you can also see the olive and white ones I've started picking-up, so someone around here had issues of both . . . Bonux, Christmas crackers, Maltese festival treats?

It has to be pointed out that the size and levels of caricature of these pirates, means they would mix quite well with the Antipodean Crazy Pirates we saw here

 

But we finish with darker stuff . . . 

 

I was hoping Giselle over at Mokarex would have something useful for this post, as she still owes me about 40 images under the 10-for-1 rule, but her pirate page is shit, she's nicked the Cereal Offers artwork, but all chopped-up and low-res, while she's photoshopped some eBay Peruvian figures which are not the Kellogg's colours, the page purports to represent! Only two of them are right . . . Thieves are thick, you see, somewhere to the left of the bell-curve!

 

But we end with this piece of hilarity from Kent Specher in the 'States, image used for research purposes, with full acknowledgement, wouldn't want to blame anyone else for this dog's dinner of a complete joke.

 

First;  They didn't make tea, they made chicory-coffee! Ersatzkaffee! Then we find there are too many poses, Linde only carried 14 of the designs! Why is there a Tito/Ola ice-cream premium Roman from the Asterix sets in the middle of the already too-big group, at 'K'? And the colours are all wrong!

Unbelievable, staggering incompetence, make it up as you go along to make up for a lack of research; *sloppy* is - I believe - the term used in Pennsylvania! The truth, had he bothered to look for it, is here;

https://www.lindefiguren.at/fotogalerie-linde/piraten/

 

And I've posted links to that site several times I think; most recently when we looked at the spacemen! Again, I've translated the page for English readers;

14 Piraten gibt es von Linde. Von links nach rechts heißen sie: El Bisco, Patapalo, El Arana, El Pecas, Corsario Azul, Tarik, Mustafa, Jack el Negro, El Jorobado, Morgan, El Tuerto, El Manco, Arrigon und Cara Cortada. Der Name ist am Rücken oder an den Beinen zu lesen, daneben sind die Linde-Piraten natürlich immer geprägt. Die zarte Kennung kann leicht übersehen werden. Am häufigsten ist die Farbe blau.

There are 14 pirates from Linde. From left to right they are: El Bisco, Patapalo, El Arana, El Pecas, Corsario Azul, Tarik, Mustafa, Jack el Negro, El Jorobado, Morgan, El Tuerto, El Manco, Arrigon and Cara Cortada. The name can be read on the back or on the legs, and of course the Linde Pirates are always embossed next to them. The delicate identifier can be easily overlooked. The most common color is blue.

Wesentlich seltener sind sie in den Farben gelb, grün und rot.

They are much rarer in color yellow, green and red.

20 Piraten wurden von der spanischen Firma TITO produziert. Nur 14 davon gibt es mit Linde-Kennung. Ob es Al Jepacha, Sebastian, Ivan, Cascanjeces, El Pupas und Barbar Roja (siehe Abbildung) auch von Linde und auch in weiß gibt, bezweifle ich. Die Tito-Piraten wurden in Tüten verkauft. Tito produzierte auch die bekannten Dargaud-Figuren. Die Linde-Piraten waren natürlich im Kaffee.

20 pirates were produced by the Spanish company TITO. Only 14 of them are available with Linde identification. I doubt whether Al Jepacha, Sebastian, Ivan, Cascanjeces, El Pupas and Barbar Roja (see picture) are also available from Linde and in white. The Tito Pirates were sold in bags. Tito also produced the well-known Dargaud figures. The Linde Pirates were of course in the coffee.

And the Linde are logo-marked and likely to be slightly different-sized copies (I don't have any, so I don't know for sure), most of their stuff was copied, as Kent would know if he'd read the series of recent articles in a certain magazine I won't mention, by an author I won't mention either, as neither would want to be associated with this in any way, but Kent knows!

 

What Kent has here, what's in the above image, is either Peruvian  product, from the old Tito/Ola/Dunkin (et al.) group of tools (likely, with the Roman present) or Mexican bootlegs, and which, from the state of it, the colours. and the Roman (!!!!!!), is a test-shot or factory sample of some kind, probably off of evilBay, to which, with no knowledge of the subject whatsoever, he added a shit-ton of text with no research or checking of even basic facts with all the available resources!

 

19 pirates! Not Linde's 14, not Ariel's 20, but 19 . . . and a Roman, in a different size! "Look Ma, I gave them all letters!" But he thinks he can come over here and tell me I've got 'Lots wrong'? Staggering arrogance.

And if you're wondering why some of my Rubenstein images are the same as his, it's becasue we took them from the same seller about a year ago!

B is for Beach Buggys [sic]!

When I was a kid I always wondered what '[sic]' or '(sic)' meant after a word or phrase, and while I did ask the odd adult from time to time, I clearly didn't ask the right ones (with 4-billion people to the left of the bell-curve [phrase du jour!], there's a lot of pretty thick adults out there, people; be careful!), and while I kept meaning to look it up, I'd never remember to, when a dictionary was nearby!

Eventually, when I started my Encyclopedia of Military Abbreviations (don't ask, several box-files of shite, all in long-hand, several formats/part-drafts and unlikely to ever be finished, but it probably kept me out of various troubles!), I did finally look it up! I'm sure many of you, too, now know what it means, but for those who don't - from the good old Oxford English;

 

Used in brackets after a copied or quoted word that appears odd or erroneous to show that the word is quoted exactly as it stands in the original, as in a story must hold a child's interest and ‘enrich his [sic] life’ or a hero of antient [sic] Rome.

 

In our case, here, the word should, correctly, be 'Buggies' or 'Buggy's', not the given Buggys. Now I know one or two idiots across the pond will assume I'm having a go, specifically at America/American and that therefore I'm being "racist" (again!), but I'm not, I'm just correcting an incorrection* in the correct manor [sic], because I like a bit of correctness!

*Noun. incorrection f (plural incorrections) a fault, default or impropriety, especially of language. State of what is incorrect. (dated) Character of what goes against courtesy and politeness (Heeheehee! The Rubenstein card is impolite!).

 

Rubenstein's Dune Buggys [sic]; As you can see, they - like ALL Rubenstein sets - have a stock code (3004), and you can find them in single colour sets and multicolour sets, two production tranches or one quirky production run? If anyone knows it will be Kent Sprecher, hopefully he'll tell us, with empirical supporting evidence, in his forthcoming, world-saving, Hugh-beating, article of grand-importance?

Six different designs, very much in the style of Rosenhain and Lipmann from Australia, but are not R&L, and are not claimed as such by the R&L experts. R&L did do vehicle sets including the Dragsters which are certainly in the same vein, but where R&L have lots of fine parts (or several per kit - wheel hubs and axles in particular), these are much simpler kits.

Unlike some of the other vehicle sets from Rubenstein which are a softer polyethylene, mine are in a hard 'kit' polystyrene, however the multicolour set may be the opposite, and it might be that they all got issues in both plastic-types/colour-ways, I don't know, but hopefully Kent will tell us everything, about everything, all at once?!

 

I should point out, before some bottom-burping oaf in Pennsylvania hysterically reports "Ah-Haa, they've all got a name he didn't tell us!", that they all have a name and I haven't told you, only because I forgot to write them down before they went to storage, life is too short and it gives us an excuse to return to them another day! Like when I build the other four . . . I was in a hurry, this all happened about a year ago, you know? I can't presage the idiocy of idiots, 24/7/365.

 

R&L did however, supply Aurora with their little kits, at the same approximate time Rubenstein were carrying their Dune Buggys [sic]! Sold as Snap-a-roos, they were the cereal premium sets, as sixes, sold in little boxes, which is how these (and similar domestically produced) sets were also issued in Italy.

But then 'Burns' reports this group of three, apparently simple, small, clip-together kits as being announced in the 1973 Lindberg catalogue (or catalog, not a '[sic]', but an accepted foreign variation of English), which was subsequently never issued. The feeling being that they were supposed to be, or seemed to have a connection with; the eponymous 'Kilroy' of World War II fame.

 

Which, applying TJF's logic must mean there's a Kilroy 'of The World' fame, out there too! And can you hear that scratching noise in the background? That's Sprecher quickly adding a paragraph to his Magnum Opus! He's probably added several in the last seven days.

That they (the Aurora set) never appeared and Rubenstein's wouldn't appear until sometime in or after '77, suggests that the Rubenstein set, was whatever was left after the above three pre-production artworks went through the production process, those driver/Kilroy figures would have required much more complicated (and therefore expensive) tooling for undercuts &etc . . . so there is a possibility they were simplified into this set . . . but I stress, that it's casual musings on the subject, not canon-history or any fact of any kind.

Another candidate for the Aurora no-shows is this similar set from R&L, but again, not these, and again; fine parts, a feature. However, there are similarities in one or two of the main-parts, with both the Lindberg drawings and the Rubenstein set, so who knows; Burns didn't, I don't, Sprecher doesn't, The R&L guys don't and TJF never will!

O is for Olympics!

So, one of my earlier purchases did a get shot before I sent the box up the road, and it raises a point I didn't mention in my 'lots' of 'wrong' history the other day, but it was pretty obvious if you studied the photographs.

It is that with some of the figure sets, the contents are, to say the least, assorted, with duplicates, often the same pose/colour - pointing to a lack of mixing before packing, or an incomplete pose-count.

Note that this set has a set number/order code, most do, but some are on the fronts and some are on the backs, and the reason I listed them alphabetically is that I couldn't find enough images of both sides of the cards to build a decent list, I will, when I get my seven/eight out again, probbaly find them all. If you read anywhere "the card has a stock number which many of the other cards do not have", be sure - you are reading bullshit.

The seven poses I've ended-up with, as stated last time these are the 'Euro' poses, not those issued by Marx, and not those issued in UK Cereal, neither of which have a torch-bearer, so are all just 'athletes' against this set's Olympic figures! I suspect there should be eight?

That's a question mark because I don't know for certain, it could be ten or more, I'm not sure, you see, Kent, Paul, Stadinger, Fuckwits Anonymous . . . if I wrote there were eight [as a fact], and they supplied them to Choco-tag-nuts in brown (because Choco-tag-nuts had them in brown), I'd be making things up as I go along, and I try not to do that kind of shit here!

 

These were offered by DS Plastic in Holland / the Netherlands, and are probably 35/40mm flats/semi-flats, possibly soft polyethylene, and which may well have appeared in De Gruyter lucky/gift/surprise envelopes, and I wonder if anyone has actual examples they could send to the blog . . . or send it to a leading magazine - Plastic Warrior has recently covered all the other athletes?

 

I had a go anyway;

• 1008 - Action Athletes
• 3006 - Antique Cars
  
• 3002 - Comic Animals
• 1001 - Comic Moon Figures
• 1007 - Comic Pirates
• ???? - Dogs - Mexico
• 1003 - Dolls of the World
• 3004 - Dune Buggys [sic]
  
• 3009 - Historical Transportation
• 3003 - Horse-Drawn Coaches
• 1011 - Robin Hood Figures
• 1022 - Soldiers of World War II
  
• 3001 - Super Motorcycles

Put in numerical order;

• 1001 - Comic Moon Figures
• 1003 - Dolls of the World
  
• 1007 - Comic Pirates
• 1008 - Action Athletes
• 1011 - Robin Hood Figures
• 1022 - Soldiers of World War II
• 3001 - Super Motorcycles
• 3002 - Comic Animals
• 3003 - Horse-Drawn Coaches
• 3004 - Dune Buggys [sic]
• 3006 - Antique Cars
• 3009 - Historical Transportation
• ???? - Dogs - Mexico

So, it's not 'many don't', it's all do! Stadinger was making it up as he went along . . . again! Hahahahaha, fuckin' unbelievable, isn't it? It's fuckin' unbelievable! But they keep doing it, in the desperate hope they may, one day, really catch me out!

The 1xxx's are probably numbered-in with other toys/novelties/playthings, the 3xxx's suggest other Italian/R&L type clip-together kits/funnies may still be to find?

H is for Hahahahahahahahahahaha! Rubenstein is the New Rock & Roll!

They just can't help themselves, can they? I knew exactly what I was doing, and they have proven nothing other than that there are more sets than the 12? I think I suggested as much, when I said . . .

 "which is not to say there aren't more"

. . . but twelve would have been neat, and ten seem commoner! TJF has practically had a real cum orgasm in public over a header-card for what are obviously trashy rack-toy clones! Is it any surprise that an import-export concern carried Hong Kong Stock?

Away from this still limited, but now 13-count toy line, they would have had knock-off torches, sewing sets, key-rings, kitchen gadgets that break the fourth time you use them, plant pots, macramé sets, cruet sets, shit scissors . . . you know what they would have had!

 

Kindly, TJF confirms that the card dates from the 1980's, and was 'closeout', which again takes us away from the 1950/60's cereal premiums, and could be old stock from the 1977 days or something more contemporary . . . pretty-much what I dug-up, and he's certainly done Kent's arguments (if he really has any?) no favours!! Fancy having the card without the figures?

And I'd already confirmed they 'do figures' - I showed them!???? He then says, "So it is likely they did a header card Soldiers of the World" . . . why? Why is it likely? Because they sound the same? Simplistic tosh, the evidence (circumstantial) is they took multicoloured shite from anywhere or anyone except Tatra, the dullard!

He then claims the Tatra are R&L, which even the R&L experts don't! They have the lovely Aussie flats of Diggers. And the grandiose shite in his last paragraph is hilarious, I'd be embarrassed to be caught writing such narcissistic rubbish! Or having it written about me!

What I've said, and I will say it again, is that THERE IS NO EMPIRICAL EVIDENCE that they ever carried the Tatra-for-Kellogg's/Nabisco/Peak Freans et al 'Soldiers/Warriors of the World/All Nations'. Nor any evidence for the link to silver/gold cereal premiums, beyond the hearsay present on Kent's site for years. I have never said they didn't 'do them', just that the evidence isn't there?

Now if Mr Specher is to send empirical evidence in his fantastic forthcoming article, then that query will be put to bed, won't it? And the whole hobby will know a truth, but as The Jabbering Fuck is relying on another card-top altogether, I suspect we'll be waiting a long time for that particular evidential revelation?

Is he going to show us the dogs . . . I haven't found the dogs card yet, either . . . let's hope for his sake they are silver and gold with no signs of the staples being tampered with, because otherwise he'll be adding nothing to what I showed/said the other day? Who bought the Dolls of the World on Tuesday, was that Kent? Oh, he could send those to the magazine, couldn't he?!

And wouldn't we rather an American collector tells us accurately, about an American toy importer, than have to wait for a Brit to come along twenty years later and try to undo some of the falsehoods and myths about cereal premiums! So I - for one - am really looking forwards to his article with a barely contained joy, indeed I think I might have fun going through it with a fine-toothed comb!

Now, don't get me wrong, DO NOT get me wrong, Kent has done some amazing work for the hobby (I don't think TJF has, particularly . . . new production? It's on 15 websites!), both by himself, and in league with others, and I have sung his praises here many times, I have posted about 100-links (?) to his pages over the years, but this day was always coming.

Indeed, I have had private conversations with (closes eyes and counts quietly), one . . . two . . . three . . . at least five/six people off the top of my head, over the last four or five years, some a decade ago, predicting this moment. So they won't have been any more surprised than me to see Standinger's arsegasm, nor even, if they noticed Kent's comments the other day.

He's always been conspicuous by his absence, it was notable how he almost seemed to start commenting on Shite Stuff more after the war started, so his associate membership of the PSTSM was always badge-clear! And he started adjusting his site to reflect things written on my Blog within months of my starting, never crediting, never acknowledging, even as I sent him traffic? Something I've also pointed out to people over the years. None of this latest skirmish is any surprise to those who matter.

So the question was only ever, is he going to avoid eye-contact forever, stay 'neutral', sit on his hands over on the verge? And it was beginning to look like he would, but for reasons known only to him, he lost the plot on Monday and fell off the wagon! And because - as you know - I was up on my high horse (it's almost like somebody else scripted half of this!), I couldn't help him up!

Far from Kent's "You got a lot of the history of Rubenstein International wrong" (I didn't even cover much history) or Stadinger's "....contained a number of mistakes", there was one error - on the status of a non-toy soldier charity-trust thingy! Nothing in Kent's comments on my post, nor in TJF's little turd of a piece . . . piece of a turd, corrects or contradicts anything I reported last Monday.

Still; Kent is going to put us all right, hopefully including his own site, which has always contained questionable details, as fact, on Rubenstien, with his future article, it's gonna' be awsome, let's all big it up - coming soon, the fundamentally stupendous, encyclopedic, vastly better than Hugh's, fuller than a full shit-truck's, history of Rubenstein, the article that will save the hobby!

Worth a re-read, as I knew exactly what was happening, and pulled no punches, while Kent was pretending he didn't, but read his words after seeing the Jabbering Fuck's post and it all makes a sort of gutless sense? And a rare link to the almighty arsehole's Shite Stuff, but given his posting rate recently, he needs the traffic!

Oh fuck!, NOW they've annoyed me . . . 

  . . . talking about traffic; TJF's idiocy has sent an extra 6000-odd viewers my way, and the 5-million clicked over a couple of days early! I was hoping to catch-it on the nines, the zerros or the one, over the weekend! Heay-ho, there's always the 10! If I live that long?

Notice we also clicked-over the 4,500 posts during Rack Toy Month!

See, a big bump! The trouble is Stad's Shite is such thin gruel these days, I only visit it about once a fortnight to see if he's posted, anything, at all! It just so happens, it's often on a Friday! [I can't take screen-caps as jpg's on this pice-of-shit Windows-11 machine, so I have to shoot the screen, and I'd already turned the main lights off, me and Bosey-Boy were snuggled for the night when I found the PSTSM arsholery!]

And don't imagine all that traffic came from him, this will be the word getting round, the Vichy will be there, a cock-wacking monkey lizard or two will be there, a cheque-keeping Spanish author and his fan-boys, Deadleaf and the other one, the AFD will be there, a right-wing antipodean, then there are a couple of facebook groups which have been infested by some of my 'eemies', so the word got around; "There's a fight in the playground, Kent finally got off the fence!" All the people who pretend they've never found the Blog will be there, as they were - like Kent - all along, as they will be - tomorrow!

 

You see, all these guys are to the left of the bell-curve, if you know what I mean, while I'm to the right of it, so if I'm never going to see eye-to-eye with them, I might as well learn to enjoy rebutting their stuff!

 

Consider this, up until 48 hours ago, Kent had four sets I think, on his Rubenstein page/section, with some questionable facts. yet when I show eleven and mention the dogs (which Kent's got) The Jabbering Fuck busts a blood-vessel over a thirteenth, at me! Not the 5th, 6th, 7th . . . at 'well-researched' Kent? Why? Why is it, that they hold me to a higher standard, than they hold even themselves to? Huh? Why is that?

Back in the autumn, last year, or the year before? Or every year! TJF did a post with six figures, he got four of them wrong, and it was five corrections from three of his mates and some input from a Brit over two days, before they were all singing from the same hymn-sheet!

 

And that was fine, that was nothing more than an unfortunate series of multiple 'brain freezes', totally allowed . . . I get one detail out of whack, not even a fact, sometimes; just if I don't mention something, I get "Card or paper? Where was they from? How many? Who's that? When? Why?

I am literally held to a higher standard than everyone else! Why is that? I know! And why isn't all this fantastically new and accurate 'history' (of which I got "lots" wrong, apparently), not already on Kent's site? Was he saving it? Was he saving it for us all to enjoy on a rainy day?

There is one inaccuracy in my previous post on the subject, the family's [non-toy soldier] Foundation is not still active, there were about eleven companies between the three (Irvin, Ralph and 'L' - no inaccuracies there), ten had nothing to do with toys and I didn't follow-them up the other night, turns-out that when I downloaded it all, way-back-when, it still was active, I suspect the other 'still active's will prove not to be, too!

Apologies for that, mea culpa, and I'll wear sackcloth and ashes for the rest of the weekend! And sorry for the poor imagery here, really, but it was short notice and I only had a few unused images left-over from the other day!

To be honest, TJF's latest . . . spat? Attack? Is more sad than anything else, the attack on me personally is lacklustre and half-hearted, his own input is wrong and inaccurate, I think he used a similar title before, and it's only a few paragraphs? The whole thing lacks substance, lacks meat; it's pallid, he's not even trying, while Kent hides in my comments, pretending he can't see, what we can all see with our own eyes?

And I know what you're thinking, "Hugh, did you climb on your high horse just to get the Jabbering Fuck to push you over the 5-mil, with or without the fortuitous intervention of Kent Sprecher?", and, would you know it, in all this excitement . . . I've clean forgot.

Oh . . . and there's still three Rubenstein posts in the short queue!

R is for Really Rubenstein!

Ooop . . . just let me get up on my high horse . . . that's better, now, where was I? Oh yeah! Rubenstein. There isn't much on Rubenstein within the hobby and most of what you will find seems to be conjecture dressed-up as fact! So I thought I'd add my tuppenceworth to the mix and probably ruffle a few feathers!

 

Rubenstein were a US jobber, one of a dozen or so companies/entities started by Irving Rubenstein, sometimes with his Brother Ralph, or possibly a wife, 'L' (?), always in or around North Hollywood, California. Rubenstein International were incorporated in 1977 (too late for some of the premiums they are credited with?), but are no longer active, although several of the companies (mostly involved in B2B sourcing, services, or marketing) are still extant, along with a family foundation.

 

On the left are the Euro-premium pirates (eight sculpts in the UK [Kellogg's] and 20 poses elsewhere, under several brands), on the right my fledgling Rubinstein collection about two years ago, I went on to add about three or four more sets, but they all went to storage about 12-months ago! Some described - by Rubenstein - as 'Made in Mexico', other's (most), 'Made in England' (not 'Britain', not 'The UK'). I have so far found one set credited to having been 'Made in the USA'.

The Robin Hood figures are the same version described elsewhere in the hobby (marked with small 'Canada' monikers), and seen elsewhere on the Blog against the New Zealand-made versions. As one of the 'made in England' sets, this would suggest someone larger than Tatra (for instance) as they must have been big enough to have a Canadian office/subsidiary?

The athletes are after the 'Euro' versions (with Olympic flame carrier), not the Kellogg's or Marx sculpts, and while both figure sets are soft polyethylene, the dune-buggys [sic] are hard polystyrene, like the R&L mini-kits, from Australia, but not marked-up to them.

Other figure sets include the ex-Raja Conjunto do Espaço 'space set' (which explains a question-mark from the very start of the Blog; my shiny yellow one is Rubenstein!), ex-Commonwealth Plastics dolls and possibly the dog breeds, but this is where I need to point out that so far, and I have been looking hard for over three years, there is NO empirical or circumstantial evidence for the Soldiers/Warriors of the World/All nations having ever been in Rubenstein packaging?

 

And if the dogs were issued by Rubenstein (and I suspect so), they were the multicoloured ones (from Mexico; not England), NOT the silver or gold ones issued with Nabisco breakfast cereals in the USA, for which the evidence is as sketchy as for the military set.

 

Indeed, let's get this out of the way, Rubenstein International were an 'Import & Export' outfit, according to their licences, and it's very unlikely they ever "made" a single toy! So whoever was supplying Rubenstein, would also have supplied the cereal or ice-cream guys &etc., and earlier, I think. Also - we know Tatra (for instance) were responsible for the warriors/soldiers . . . in silver and gold!

The R&L styled mini-kits, I now have three of these for us to look at in greater detail another day, indeed I think most of these are the shots of the auctions/BIN's I won, I wouldn't use so many evilBay images in one article if I didn't think I had a tad of moral ground under my tippy-toes! Not sure if I ever succeeded in getting the Cars, but I know I bought two sets of motorcycles, so I can make one set up, for a Blog post!

I actually managed to get the Antique Cars photographed, though! But I think I might also have got the set of Wagons, although I might be confusing it with the Historical Vehicles which I know I got but also didn't photograph? Interestingly, while the Dune Buggys are polystyrene, these are polyethylene, and the Penny Farthing in the Historic's set is probably the one Brian Berke sent to the Blog, as an addendum to that premium kit post!

So far the only set sourced in the 'States which I've found, which is not to say there aren't more, but the same eleven sets keep turning-up, with a possible run of the dogs in multicolours, making a dozen.

 

These are also nothing like the others, and we saw a pale-blue Hong Kong example of one of these in Chris Smith's last donation, so, a common gum-ball machine prize, or those rack-toy cards with a bunch of teeny header-bags for a dime or sixpence?

 

All of which gives us;

• Action Athletes - Mexico, after Manurba/Linde et al.
• Antique Cars - England, after R&L?
  
• Comic Animals - USA
• Comic Moon Figures - Mexico, ex-Raja premiums
• Comic Pirates - Mexico, ex-European tool
  
• Dogs - Mexico, ex-Nabisco premiums
• Dolls of the world - Mexico, ex-Commonwealth 
• Dune Buggys - England, after R&L?
• Historical Transportation - England, after R&L?
• Horse-Drawn Coaches - England, after R&L or Pyro/Kleeware?
• Robin Hood Figures - England, previously/also Canada, after Marx
• Soldiers of World War II - Hong Kong, contents unknown, Airfix clones?
  
• Super Motorcycles - England, after R&L?

Sourced from England x6, Mexico x5, Hong Kong and the USA x1 each, for a twelve-count, which make-up grosses, which is how this rack-toy stuff is ordered/wholesaled thirteen-count; a bakers dozen!

The reason I've question-marked the possible R&L connection, is because R&L is another one where there may be falsehoods hiding as fact. When they turn-up in British or European products as premiums, they usually have A) very fine parts, B) 'R&L' somewhere on the runner, these four/five sets (the Dune Buggys may be from another source) are simpler and unmarked, while there is the various Italian sets of similar kits and the De Gruyter connections to consider.

Still no soldiers/warriors, though! Four days later - Still no soldiers/warriors!

Thanks to the Jabbering Fuck and Kent Sprecer for their contributions, not!

R is for Robin's Roustabout Rebels - Part 2 - The Figures

I also grouped the earlier post's figures by character/thematically, for closer comparisons, and this post is the result of those shots, in the course of preparing this pair of articles, they all got put away and taken out again several times, and one of the archers has migrated to another set!

Robin Hood's above and Will Scarlet's below, along with the guy I used to think was falling or sitting, but who I can only picture hiding in a tree now! The guy middle-bottom is an unnamed character - one of the Merry Men - but could pass for Robin or Will!

Now, there is no discernible difference between the two smaller Will's, and in the course of taking these mages I came to the conclusion I'd had the Down Under version all along, which means I need to find a Canada one at some point, just to satisfy myself as to their differences/similarities, as all the other figures do have clear differences between the sculpts and I believe the Canada issue is an unnamed figure?

The Maid Marion/ian's; Marx's 'ian is Rubenesque sexy in a Viking-court sort of get-up, the antipodean 'ion is a bit Hippy-chick sexy in plain Anglo-Saxon villager's garb, the Canadian 'ian sculpt looks like a rather dry Mother Superior or a 'Flanders mare' in full Norman aristocratic finery and Robin would be a fool to get involved with her, she's just gonna' whine alot!

'The Tuck'; my kind of priest - a godless one! I prefer the Marx sculpt, if he's got a staff he can get fightey-bitey, but the smaller ones have him holding a scroll or torch/brazier - it's not clear? This is the other pose (after the archer, if mine are of different sources) which has little change beyond base markings between Australian and Canadian issues - the Canada one is better detailed/etched and slightly taller maybe?

The two sheriffs' (Nott's & Darby!) and tree-climber/falling guy again! He's actually the most dynamic pose of all four sets (I haven't shown/got the other Marx set), but this may have meant he was a bugger to manufacture - lots of weird undercuts, not in the pose per se, but in relation to the layout of the other cavities/rest of the tool?

Little John; the difference between the two smaller ones is clear here with heaver sculpting of the thin parts obvious, while the dagger on the Canadian chap is longer. Neatly; both/all three issuers have gone with a taller sculpt for the man whose name was a play on his notable height, he's half-a-head above Robin and has a good [scale] six-inches on everyone else.

Alan-a-Dale/Minstrel, a close-up of the base marking differences, the 'Canada' sculpt is on the right. I find red plastic a bugger to shoot (so don't know why I concentrated on this one!) but with a black & white filter and some stopping-down it seems to show what's needed. The unnamed 'minstrel' could used as/taken to be the Coeur de Lion's lover; Blondel?

Much the Miller; I seem to remember him from childhood stories, although Marx haven't named theirs, they all share the same hood and similar kilt/surcoat tails, so they were all watching each-other or the Saturday-matinee's for their fashion leads, rather than historical sources, although they can all be painted-up for medieval armies!

Down Under this one's Will Stutley, another one I recall from tales told to me as a child, or read in comics, elsewhere he's the anonymous 'signaller'! One of the missing Marx versions has the green guy shouting with cupped-hand and no stowed-bow!

♪♫♪ Stick-fighting Maaaaaaaaaaaaan! ♫♪♪ The best candidate for converting/repainting to court jester or fool!

The other three! Australia/New Zealand give them all names, Canada doesn't bother, but they still make-up the numbers. The rock guy needs a siege-engine, but there are plenty around to chose from, and Will Stutley would make a good No. 1 to this chap's No. 2. While you can never have enough medieval archers, for Crecy, Agincourt or the other one where we gave Frenchie a good spanking!

Done did!

The lack of available information on the 50mm set from Down Under leaves questions still outstanding, for someone to follow-up, somewhere, sometime;

• ·         Which cereal were they issued with?
• ·         Were they Australian or New Zealand-issued, first?
• ·         Who made/manufactured them?
• ·         Did Canada issue a license or are they pirates
• ·         Was there a Sherriff or 'tree-hugger'!?

And - to be honest similar questions remain over the 50mm 'Canada' figures!

Many thanks again to Glenn Sibbald for revealing the antipodean versions and donating a set to the blog - New to Hobby/Internet - cheers Glenn!