P is for Petroleum

On one level this is just a nostalgia hit for people of a certain age, and not a young one, as this is from a mid-1970's colour supplement (I forgot to note which one/when), and the mid 1970's were, now, fifty years ago!

So which ones do you remember, these were all brands at the time, and the article makes clear there were more besides. Mex and Maxol are obviously sibling brands, while Sky and VIP look to be related. Some (six or seven, ten maybe, Mobil seem to have disappeared in the last decade or so, along with Chevron and Murco? Fina?) are still with us, with new ones like Q8 (Kuwait). We were a Shell family and had an account at the little garage on Phoenix Green, where they would come out in their khaki overalls and pump the fuel for us!

 

But this also helps illustrate a point I try to make from time to time . . . we all know the premiums issued by the bigger boys, even if, like National or Cleveland, they are no longer with us, because they were made in the sort of numbers where a fair amount survives; coin collecting albums (Shell and Esso), comic-book adverts for the promotion (Cleveland), surviving packaged examples (Jet), &etc.

 

But many of these would have issued some sort of incentive from time to time, and some of those would have been toys or collectables, which were never issued in the numbers to leave a trace, hell, half the above have no mention on the whole Internet!

 

But when things keep turning-up, like the 'Euro-premium' colours of Magic Roundabout figures, rather than our own Nabisco cereal premium colours, chances are they were issued by one of the above, or another, not illustrated above, or a smaller/regional ice-cream brand, or fleet of ice-cream vans, or even a regional chain of convenience stores, long since swallowed-up by the big-six?

Not generic, just lost! And what is the yellow disc one - CW?

Next day -

The link I mentioned in the comments is still there, it's changed appearance in the decade or more since I last looked, and has a legacy-page look to it now anyway, but a useful list and nostalgia read which also educates!

http://www.petrolmaps.co.uk/special/glossary.htm

G is for Gun Line

Keeping with the theme of follow-ups, this harks back to the flurry of AWI and Innovative posts a year or two ago but which also included several sets of cake decorations &etc. This time we're looking at the heavy-hardware!

The three guns together with a close up of the Britains piece which is lacking it's side tools but I seem to recall a post on a bag of bits from a show a while back in which the tools were to be found . . . all I have to do is find the bag again!

The darker of the two Hong Kong copies (both of which have the tool hooks but never had separate tools) is the one seen previously from the second (carded) issue on Innovative's, while the other may be from the earlier Shell issue, or be another copy altogether, I don't know?

Comparison doesn't help date the two Hong Kong copies as the smaller and less detailed oxide brown one actually has the better barrel, with the 'US' clearly reproduced while it is no more than a smudge on the Innovative Promotions piece. It also has more realistic plating on the barrel than the gold-chrome Innovative went with.

Because I am new'ish to this large-scale malarkey, I don't know how many generations of these there are, I suspect someone like Rado Industries or Hing Fat might be responsible for one, but given the differences we've already seen between the two issues of Innovative's (Shell's premiums first and then the Men of '76 anniversary set) I'm tempted to think the smaller one may be the Shell issue, knowing the other is from a MO'76 card, however, before TJF and the minions of the PSTSM climb up on their high-horse of idiocy, I'm musing rather than carving anything in stone!

The ironwork and wood-grain are nicer on the larger gun, but the wheels (particularly the hubs) are better-rendered on the smaller-piece, and with the differences in barrel already mentioned, it's anyone's call as to which is the copy or came first? Unless you happen to have the smaller one - in mint packaging?

I shot this (TV mini-series, press-release image) from a recent newspaper (Times I think?) a few days ago, purely to use 'one day' (imagining sometime in the middle-distance) in the future, but realising it would be ideal here with regard to the plastic colours of the carriages; I thought the colours of the wood of these two, otherwise identical [Polish?] rifles perfectly illustrates how all figure-painters are correct in their choice of woodwork colour!

One being a dark mahogany, looking like a hardwood, the other hinting at pine or softwood? Now I realise they may both be dense-rubber film-props, but I've seen the same differences in older (pre plastic-furniture) SLR's and the many shades of AK woodwork, again - before Plastic became the norm, also if they were prop's they'd be more likely to be painted alike.

The point being both HK guns can sit together 'on the line', happily!

The guns crewed! Britains get their issued crew, the question-mark gets a Shell lady and later US figure, the Men of '76 gun get a British crew, with the mounted officer put on standing-firers legs and given the Britains ram-rod.

S is for Shell's Liberty Toy Soldiers

As if we haven't returned to these enough already! But there's always a tad more to add, or another angle to explore, or a new mystery, or - as in today's case - another box to tick!

I finally have a sample myself, so we can have a high-res close up of something which had remained a thumbnail, a link away! Date's clearer too; 1972, and the Innovative Promotions moniker.

The obvious thing, given these were aimed - primarily as pester-power - at kids, is; no instructions as to which is which, the legs are obvious and the matching of jacket with trousers is to be assumed, certainly by brighter kids, but there's no clue as to facings read: . . . frilly-shirt insert!

Confirmation of the Innovative Promotions base and that's it really - a sweet, neat post for Rack Toy Month!

M is for Men of Many Origins!

I lied - I managed to get this together late Thursday night, but there's nothing for Sunday and Monday will still be a late post!

When we looked at the Innovative Promotions Inc., / Shell premium 'Men of '76' AWI figures and sets last year (and the year before), slowly building the picture with much help from contributors, I think I mentioned once or twice that I had a few in storage, well; these are they!

They are not quite as I had remembered them, being both disappointing and surprising, some things I thought I had, I don't (must have seen them when they passed through the stock of the dealer I worked for a decade ago), but I'd forgotten a useful, small-sample of the Hong Kong copies, so very much 'swings and roundabouts'.

Small sample of the Shell premiums, looks like the contents of two bags (Shell 7 and 8) and a spare or so?

The carded Men of '76 versions, I'm not sure about the Frenchies with facings in Red and Purple, there may have been some mucking-about and checking with the catalogue and from last year's posts - set seven seems like a likely candidate . . . with a body-swap!

Plus a bunch of 'bits and pieces'; interesting to note that the kneeling Hessian can have high boots or shorter ankle- or George-boots*, all done with paint; over the same moulding.

* Presumably George III . . . like 'Wellington-boots' a few years later? Where Jack fits-in I don't know!

S for Star / Star Toys; shite, utter shite with all-polyethylene mouldings, no arm articulation, unpainted white boots, Japanese Katana-sword (even worse than Innovative's), real 'rack-toy' crap! Their hats fall off, the hair follows, their epaulettes are taking flying-lessons and they are more Timpo than Britains!

Needs work! Even between the Shell and MO76 the hats don't fit or are loose, the foot-spigots are different diameters, so these all have to be sorted very carefully when I have a bit of life to kill!

You may have noticed in one of the 'stash' posts recently tubs of the Timpo and Britains 'donor' versions from the big purchase and I think what I will do is have an AWI page, once these bits and the bits already here are sorted and the two lots of figures brought together.

I'll have a final look at all of them on a new page with the Britains and Timpo at the top, these three in the middle and MPC, & Marx Solids, a few French and Polish-made figures, cake decorations, Accurate &etc - at the bottom?

Plans! You know me and my plans - it'll be unfinished forever!

The sort of detail that page will look at, the Innovative-for-Shell on the left; fine detail, properly marked Innovative Promotions Inc., and nicely finished; In the middle the [also Innovative] Men of '76, the underside has been 'hammered', the holes are larger, the 'soil' pattern on the upper-side is cruder and it's clear that something happened to the tools between the two issues - I think I've raised the point before? It's as if they started again from scratch, copying their own earlier offering!

On the right we see Star's poor imitation of Timpo's base, with a third hole for the card's holding-peg and the odd 'chin-straps' at either end.

L is for Liberty . . . Toy Soldiers

The last of this mini-season on the AWI, and we return to the figures for the forth time in less than a year (I said that yesterday, but it's a bit neat, as I've added to the 'whole' each time!), and again we have Bill Nevins to thank for the imagery.

One of the things that were missing from the posts last year was the Shell bag with header, and here we have the evil local representative of the hated occupier (surly that should be 'legitimate government'? Ed.), one; Lt General Earl Cornwallis! From both sides - of the bag; he never 'crossed the floor'!

Close-ups of both sides of the header, the mounted 'officers' become 'lieutenants' in the MO76 retail, carded-issue, but are otherwise indistinguishable from Washington and Cornwallis as far as the figures go; Paul Revere gets a grey jacket and non-weapon hands.

You can produce regular cavalry by swapping their gold facings for the white of the infantry, indeed, once you've picked a few of these up, including the later clearance and copies, you can swap various facing with various jackets to make specific regiments or imagiments - new word!

"What unit are you with soldier?"

"1st-15th Imagiment Sah - Foot & Mouth!"

Some forts get a decent 'starter set' of figures - being at least one each of all figure sculpts but no Paul Revere nor Hessian/French colour-ways. The above seems to have an extra marching Bluecoat and missing marching Redcoat, but a typo on the white boxes seems to be the '1 Standing Bluecoat' - all the sets I've seen in pristine condition have two.

Compare with this old screen-cap of an ebay lot, the marching Brit's marched-off again (well - they left him in  a French fort!) but the rest are 'right'. This tray is to be found in the white printed '76 fort boxes and [presumably] the Jefferson Sales Corporation sets, but Bill says they (the figures) don't come in the plain brown 1776-coded set (with hard plastic fort), which rather mucks-up some of my musings on the time-lines of the sets over the last two days, but without one of the boxes it's still be to better sorted.

At an RRP of $1.49, the Shell fort was too cheap (even in the early '70's) to have the figures and doesn't suggest it has them on the above card, so it looks like the soft plastic forts were first made available in a box yet to be rediscovered, but similar to the 1975 box, they then carried over into the white boxes (with figure tray), then the hard plastic fort appeared as the 1776-coded box (no figures) the quality being offset against the price of a big ticket item, the soft plastic forts being retained for unit-cheapness made-up by/with the added play-value of the figures.

Like Airfix selling you just a hard-plastic fort in a box, or a full battle set with figures and a soft plastic version of the fort - which they did for a while and at around the same time - early 1970's? By 1975 all Airfix forts were hard plastic as all Innovative ones seem to have been in the end?

The pamphlet (issued with some retail cards but all forts it seems) we looked at the other day is © 1972, 1973, 1975, and clearly shows the grey, hard plastic fort with the metallic charcoal accessories, while the Shell card seems to be hinting at the gold soft-plastic fort. And do earlier pamphlets have less dates on the front cover?

They seem - in fact - to have run alongside each other for a while, the soft plastic as Shell and the code-101 Revolutionary Fort box (although its instructions were 'Liberty'!) as a stand-alone play-set after the '72 premiums, and before the '75 retail figure-cards? Then with the hard plastic code-1776 full Fort Liberty as a budget 'accessory' to the '75 retail issue.

At some point, the pinky-grey soft plastic fort was issued as an 'off' batch, possibly mid-term, ending up in some white (code 101) boxes and some plain (code 1776) boxes, before the hard plastic - Bill is sure his 'soft grey' is in a code-1776 box too? The hard-plastic eventually replacing the soft in both box types, but only for the . . .

. . . final sighting; this was the Jefferson Sales issue, hard-plastic with the (a?) figure tray but with no mention of 1776, either as a code or as a bicentenary! It does however have the MO76 flyer, Fort Liberty title and MO76 fort instruction-sheet - a right old curate's egg!

More digging is needed, we need to find an original Shell carton (from '72) with a date and code and contents to settle this!

Listing

Shell Petroleum 'Liberty Toy Soldiers'

Premiums (bagged with header-card, all sets © 1972 - bases fitted to figures)

Unit 1 - Kneeling Bluecoat, Standing Redcoat

Unit 2 - Kneeling Redcoat, Standing Bluecoat

Unit 3 - Marching Bluecoat, Marching Redcoat

Unit 4 - American Officer on Horseback

Unit 5 - British Officer on Horseback

Unit 6 - Standing Frenchman, Kneeling Hessian

Unit 7 - Indian Scout, Standing Minuteman

Unit 8 - Kneeling Minuteman, Molly Pitcher

Unit 9 - George Washington on horseback

Unit 10 - Cornwallis on Horseback

Unit 11 - Paul Revere on Horseback

Unit 12 - Cannon

Purchasable Accessory

? - Fort Liberty (© 1972 (?) carton unknown, with moving gates, jail, British and American flags and flag-pole, soft plastic only - no figures)

Interim Play-set

101 - Men of '76 Revolutionary Fort (© 1973 - white carton, with moving gates, jail, British and American flags and flag-pole, soft or hard plastic - includes below-listed figures:)

Muster List (bases fitted to figures)

1 George Washington

1 Standing Bluecoat [seems to be a typo printed on all boxes, actually: x2 are present]

2 Kneeling Bluecoats

1 Marching Bluecoat (Afro-American features)

1 Standing Minuteman

1 Kneeling Minuteman

2 Cannons

1 Cornwallis

2 Standing Redcoats

2 Kneeling Redcoats

1 Marching Redcoat

2 Indians

1 Molly Pitcher

1 Fort

Innovative Promotions 'Men of '76' (blister cards, all sets © 1975 - all bases separate)

501 - Set No 1

Muster List

1 George Washington

1 White Horse

1 Standing Minuteman

1 Standing Bluecoat

3 Stands

502 - Set No 2

Muster List

1 Cornwallis

1 Black Horse

1 Field Cannon

1 Marching Redcoat/Cannoneer

2 Stands

503 - Set No 3

Muster List

1 Paul Revere

1 Brown Horse

1 Indian Scout

1 Kneeling Redcoat

3 Stands

504 - Set No 4

Muster List

1 Field Cannon

1 Molly Pitcher

1 Kneeling Minuteman

2 Stands

505 - Set No 5

Muster List

1 American Lieutenant

1 Brown Horse

1 Kneeling Bluecoat

1 Kneeling Redcoat

3 Stands

506 - Set No 6

Muster List

1 American Trooper (Afro-American)

1 Field Cannon

1 Standing Redcoat

2 Stands

507 - Set No 7

Muster List

1 British Lieutenant

1 Brown Horse

1 Kneeling Hessian

1 Standing Frenchman

3 Stands

508 - Set No 8

Muster List

1 Standing Redcoat

1 Kneeling Redcoat

1 Indian Scout

1 Standing Bluecoat

1 Kneeling Bluecoat

5 Bases

509 - Set No 9

Muster List (not necessarily in correct order)

1 Standing Minutemen

1 Indian Scout

1 Kneeling Hessian

1 Standing Frenchman

4 Bases

510 - Set No 10

Muster List

1 Aaron Burr

1 Field Cannon

1 Standing Bluecoat (Afro-American features)

2 Stands

Accessory Fort

1776 - Men of '76 Revolutionary Fort (© 1975 - plain carton, with moving gates, jail, British and American flags and flag-pole, hard plastic only - no figures)

Jefferson Sales Corporation (© unknown - full-colour, foil-laminate carton, with moving gates, jail, British and American flags and flag-pole, hard plastic only - no figures)

? - Fort Liberty

Contents (to be confirmed, assumed the same as Innovative)

1 George Washington

1 Standing Bluecoat [typo printed on all Innovative boxes, actually: x2 should be present]

2 Kneeling Bluecoats

1 Marching Bluecoat (Afro-American features)

1 Standing Minuteman

1 Kneeling Minuteman

2 Cannons

1 Cornwallis

2 Standing Redcoats

2 Kneeling Redcoats

1 Marching Redcoat

2 Indians

1 Molly Pitcher

1 Fort

Generics (clearance, blister-cards)

? - Various contents

Star Toys - S For Star (blister-cards, Timpo-style bases)

606 - Redcoat Soldiers (1x foot, 1x mounted, 1x gun in pieces, horse is Timpo-copy)

607 - Bluecoat Soldiers (1x foot, 1x mounted, 1x gun in pieces, horse is Timpo-copy)

Sub-Piracies (blister-cards, Timpo-style bases)

? - Various contents