N is for November's Sandown Park - Military

More of the odds and sods from the last BP show, at Sandown Park, and it's the military stuff, which wasn't numerous, but had a few interesting items to look at, including one which might surprise you, by my excitement of it!

 

There's a fair bit of brittleness, in the contents of this set, figures and weapons, so at some point, I'll probably de-card it, and save the PVC stuff for spares and scan the card, it's not like the figures are particularly rare, while a full scan of the generic card would be a useful addition to the archive.

 

Two 'Began-Beton's', probably from Plastic Toys Inc.? And one of the small Monogram/Revell copies, along with my first Lido original, I have lots of the Hong Kong copies, but the quality of this original shines through, so very pleased to have found him, rummaging through Gareth's tray.

 

Tourist keepsake for sure, poured-resin, and not the world's best sculpt, but it is a Horse Guard, whom I prefer to the Lifeguards, around 80/90mm, and one assumes not that old, but not current, as I've recently been checking-out the shops round the theatre district for something else, and haven't seen anything close to this chap.

 

Two hollow-cast nurses, and I thought the one on the right might be Crescent, but someone said they are both Britains, early on the left and later on the right, sort of Crimean War and WWI eras?

 

Crescent.

 

Skybirds.

 

Fantasyland? Or the better originals (check tag)?

 

Odds & Sods.

 

John Begg gave me a tray of small-scale. lead shrapnel, which has a few useful bits in, and which, in time, will get sorted into the rest, the Skybirds pilot is particularly nice, as they gave them several paint schemes, both military and civilian, While Crescent used many colours/shades, over the years.

 

In the last shot, the larger-scale, colonial artilleryman, and mid-19th century red-coat, standing firing, are both complete and will join the cards I display this odd, flat stuff on, while the others will probably go in the 'Don't know what to do with them, but can't chuck them' tub!

H is for How They Come In - London, March, Military

Hmmmm . . . I've just discovered, for some reason Google have changed the image-upload system (again) overnight, for no discernable purpose (again) and it's loading them in reverse order . . . not for the first time! But as I gave up pre-editing and SOE'ing with this new, glitchy picece-of-shit (but not as piece-of-shit as an HP) computer back in January, it's just another 'thing' in the fragmenting 'Internet' of a declining civilisation - enjoy it while you can; 'cos we've had the best of it! Anyway, military stuff this post;

 

Possibly Mars-Hindenburg, but unmarked these two are about 45/50mm and almost semi-flat, they're depicting the German army of the WWI era, and composition, so I had to have them as soon as I saw them!

A small bag of Sky Birds (and others), possibly from Adrian, nothing terribly exciting, and I think I have them all, but getting the various marching poses with the rifles intact is always a bonus!

Couple of Coma/Co-Ma matelots, I couldn't remember if I'd got some of these (or the air force) at a PW Show a year or two ago, so grabbed them while I saw them, and will sort them later, the one on the right needs some rust removed!

Interesting figure on the left, being a copy, scaled-up of the Giant and other Spacemen, kneeling with ray-gun. Look's like a pretty bog-standard rack-toy, of some age, but I've never seen one in this size before?

 

To his right is a 'from hollow-cast' cowboy in a bit of a state, hardly any paint left, and I think he’s had his base trimmed-off, so 'damaged', but my first example (as far as I know) and maybe one of the BR Moulds stable?

Couple of Frenchies, I haven't looked them up so I won't attribute them, or try, my 'eemies' have such fun at my attempts in that sphere! Colonial Infantry on the right, khaki on the left, slightly small at around 50mm and polystyrene.

The Hong Kong 'swoppet' paratroopers i always think-of as French-looking, we've seen them before, but these are a different (more yellowish-olive) colour plastic and with colour-matched bases, they also have black and brown plastic weapons against the silver of my larger sample.

A bunch of Hollow-cast from Adrian's cheapie tray, I can't remember if they were 50p's or £1's this time, but as it had been quite a frugal show as far as purchases went, i rather filled my boots!

Now the text is all over the place, I just started adding this at the start and when I tried to delete it found I was deleting the line below? In fact the cursor is jumping all over the place (especially when I hit 'enter') and the radio is reporting problems with British Airways leading to 90-flight cancellations . . . and they think we're going to get to the stars? We can't make a garden shed waterproof for ten years!

Three more Siku premiums, you may have noticed these coming in, in ones and twos for almost the whole history of the blog, they are rather all-over the place and I'm still miles away from a full set of cowboys or Indians, in either size, painted or unpainted, but it'll still be nice to get them all together soon and have a decent look at them!

Finishing off with a few more of the HK copies of the Waddington's/Rojas e Malaret US cavalry from the Battle of the Little Bighorn boardgame, These must have been a gift from someone, or very cheap as they're not something I'd normally buy.

 

I keep hoping I'll see their - probably bagged - set on evilBay, as they're not exactly rare and must show-up with some empirical clues at some point! And because I do have a tub-full, I hope to paint up one of each one day soon'ish!

C is for C&T Auctions - Forthcoming 12th December 'James Opie' Sale - Final Reminder!

Sale's tomorrow, probably the best collection of Skybirds you'll see at auction this decade?

★               ★               ★               ★               ★

JAMES OPIE AT C & T AUCTIONEERS

FINE TOY SOLDIER AND FIGURE SALE

WEDNESDAY 12 DECEMBER 2018 – TUNBRIDGE WELLS

FEATURING

THE DEREK GOLDBERG SKYBIRDS COLLECTION

Rare Factory made models in original boxes

Rare early boxed original kits with glue packets and instructions (Mint)

Extremely Rare made up kit 16, Armstrong-Whitworth ‘Atalanta’ with an original Factory box

Original books by James Hay Stevens, Skybirds designer

Originals and copies of the ‘Skybirds’ magazine

Royal Air Force figures, pilots, dispersal, ground crew, aircrew, Irvin Air Chute etc.

British Army figures, airfield defense, anti-aircraft, staff, guns and trench system

German Infantry and Aircrew – many of the above in original boxes

Fighting, transport and refueling vehicles and accessories, some unusual colours

Hangers and other airfield buildings and structures, civil and military

In excess of sixty individual aircraft

★               ★               ★               ★               ★

Not forgetting Pat Campbell’s Delhi Durbar collection . . .

. . . and all the other prime toy soldiery!

Contacts:

JAMES OPIE Toy Soldier Consultant:

Tel. +44 (0) 20 7794 7447

E-mail jamesopie@yahoo.co.uk

Web site www.james-opie.co.uk

C&T Auctioneers:

Unit 4 High House Business Park, Kenardington, Nr Ashford, Kent TN26 2LF

Web site www.candtauctions.co.uk

Catalogues and Bids:

Tel. (three lines) +44 (0) 1233 510050

E-mail enquiries@candtauctions.co.uk

C is for C&T Auctions - Forthcoming 12th December 'James Opie' Sale - Skybirds

Over the next three days SSW will be premising the forthcoming sale at C&T Auctions, by publishing the articles accompanying the press release for the sale, today we are looking at the background history of the section of the auction dealing with Derek Goldberg's collection of Skybirds models - C&T Auction Lots 505-559 inclusive.

Lot 525

SKYBIRDS

The vast majority of boyhood toy soldier collections that I have seen dating from the later 1930s to the Second World War have a residue of Skybird figures in the bottom of the carton.

The whole period of rearmament in Britain was closely mirrored by the toys available in the shops, at that time provided by Britains, Hill, Taylor and Barrett, Crescent, Meccano Dinky, Astra and even Elastolin and Lineol. Not least among these were Skybirds, the pioneers of 1/72 scale aircraft modeling.

Alfred James Holladay, the leading light of the Skybird range, was no stranger to the toy industry. He had been in the trade since 1893, the year that Britains started making toy soldiers. In the Boer War, he enlisted in the City Imperial Volunteers. After he came home, he joined the wholesale firm of C. F. Eckhardt, and may well have commissioned the famous Army Supply Corps two-wagon set from Britains, which had an escort of marching City Imperial Volunteers.

In 1916, he bought out the company and changed its name to A. J. Holladay. He remained a successful toy wholesaler right up until the Second World War, and as such developed the Skybirds as exclusive product for his business. In this he was ably helped by James Hay Stevens, a precocious teenager born in 1913, whose first love was toy soldiers, and who had been drawn into aeromodelling at the age of ten when he lamented the fact that Britains as yet produced no models of aircraft. At first, he modeled in 1/36 scale, close to the size of his soldiers. When he ran out of space in this size, he decided to halve his scale to 1/72^nd.

Enthusiasm for aviation in the early 1930s was at its peak during a period when many famous manufacturers were bringing out ambitious new aircraft on the urging of government inspired plans, both military and civil. The proving of air routes and the excitement of record breaking flights and air races engendered the right atmosphere to sell aviation toys.

When James Stevens started to cast around for a suitable way to earn a living, and met James Holladay, the energy unleashed by the meeting between the seasoned entrepreneur and the eighteen year old enthusiast was almost instantaneous. Stevens was a brilliant draftsman, designer and modeller, designing and prototyping at least seventy-three issued aircraft kits in 1/72^nd scale between 1932 and 1942 made out of wood and metal parts.

He also had a major part in devising and developing the amazing number of airfield buildings, personnel, vehicles and accessories that made Skybirds into the addictive collectable that more than held its own with the likes of Dinky and Frog, and was to be the forerunner of Airfix and every other manufacturer of 1/72^nd scale aircraft. My old friend Algy Sinclair, without whose ‘Skybird Notes’ it would have been impossible to write this article, claimed that ‘no range as comprehensive had been made before or has been since’.

Each kit took between three and six months to develop, with Stevens closely in touch with the manufacturers and the Air Ministry to glean every possible detail of the prototype in advance, as much as security would allow. The issue of the first kit was coordinated with the record breaking solo flight of Amy Johnson to Cape Town in July 1932. The box artwork for the De Havilland Puss Moth by Stevens shows the G-ACAB aircraft ‘Desert Cloud’ that Amy Johnson flew, and it looks to me like her flight helmeted face that features in the titling, and continues to appear on subsequent early kits.

At that time the aviation community was still relatively small. Stevens and Holladay were right in the thick of it. Many famous personalities agreed to honorary enrollment in the Skybird League organized by Holladay to publicise and support the range. W.E.Johns of ‘Biggles’ fame, A.V.Roe, Geoffrey De Havilland, Amy Johnson and C.W.A. Scott, winner of the MacRobertson England-to-Australia Air Race all accepted Honorary Membership.

Holladay’s proudest memory of his Skybird venture was that many of his Skyleaguers, with his encouragement, joined the Air Training Corps from 1941 to become part of the backbone of RAF aircrew from 1941 to 1945. At the end of this period there were 18,000 Skyleaguers enrolled, which gives a measure of Skybirds popularity.

James Opie

More details on the lots available, including nearly all the pictures, at www.the-saleroom.com. They are also hoping to offer (being completed at time of press-release) an online ‘flick-through’ version of the catalogue on the C & T website www.candtauctions.co.uk.

More information

Thanks to Mr Opie for article and images.

H is for Heads-up! C&T Auctions - 12th December

A reminder that C&T are preparing their pre-Christmas auction as I type, and already it's shaping up to be a bit of a humdinger - as I believe the expression is, with signature collections of Britains hollow-cast, Delhi Durba and Skybirds to bid for.

We've looked at a fair few Skybirds over the years here but nothing compared to what's going to be in the sale, although some of the better pieces I've shot at shows may well be among those items on offer in December?

As well as vintage (and veteran) Britains hollow-cast figures there are plastics in the sale including the 'Crazy Clown' (and other) circus, while other metal includes Heyde railway figures, Vertunni, CBG, flats and named Courtenay's knights.

I don't know much about hollow-cast, but I know a nice set of old toy soldiers when I see it, even if it's outside my budget!

JAMES OPIE AT C & T AUCTIONEERS 

FINE TOY SOLDIER AND FIGURE SALE

TUNBRIDGE WELLS

Catalogues available 10 days before the sale

COLLECTION OF THE LATE PAT CAMPBELL

PART II

The sale is scheduled for Wednesday the 12th December 2018, and previews can be seen at www.the-saleroom.com; well worth bookmarking and stick it in your diary!

Thanks to James Opie for some of the images (more with a reminder in a week or two), and he was also one of the respondents re. the Selcol buildings we looked at here earlier.

F is for Follow-up - Artillery

As an addendum to last year's post on Artillery this is the stuff that's come in, in the last four years, as I said in the first 'round-up' post: I will redo these, or just start an Artillery page one day, but for now, here are a few more!

The upper one is the little cannon claimed by Kinder collectors as one of theirs (and may well have been in the eggs at some point), but has been available long before, and from various sources as a tourist trinket, key-ring &etc.

The lower gun is (I suspect) an apprentice piece, handmade from high-quality brass-plated steel, with hand-cut wheels and a leather finish to the barrel (lizard or snakeskin by the looks of it), it has a loop for a charm bracelet but is a tad heavy for the purpose. maybe and engineering student's end of year thing, or jewellers first piece...even a bit of 'War Art', but the quality is really too good for that?

The upper shot here is a lead solid Skybird's howitzer, it makes a super mountain-gun for Airfix Australians or Gurkha's to drag through Burma...or even to be given to the Japs! The lower shot shows the wooden ones from the sorting post earlier today, in better detail...home-made or austerity/craft 'manufactured'? They elevate by means of a panel-pin pushed through the barrel as trunions.

Above; classic and common 'antiqued' pencil-sharpener gun of the 1800's, issued by several brands over the years and a favourite with museum gift-shops and tourist kiosks the world over.

Below; Kleeware large-size cannon from the yellow, marbled-plastic, clip-together forts.

The six together with a plastic ship kit Naval gun for scale and (inset) a French penny toy from SR in lead with a heavy wash of pale-grey gloss paint.

T is for Two - Metal Machine-gunners

Quick box-ticking one tonight - literally; as it's a couple of boxed sets, photographed in recent months, one last week, the other a while ago;

Britains Set No. 198; Machine Gun Section 'Seated Position' (there were prone sets as well), four figures with Vicker's MG's, each having a little seat on the rearward leg which seems to be a Britains invention.

A hollow-cast expert has come to the rescue with a better explanation...I'll hand you to Mike Niederman;

Britains Maxim-gunners with a Vickers to the far right

"Some info about the set to explain the seat: It was introduced in 1920 with the gun being a Maxim. I've attached a couple of pictures. A very few years later, Britains updated the gun to the Vickers, a slightly smaller gun. They didn't update the gunner, so they had to retain the seat. Why they also left his hands clutching above the firing handles is one of those unexplained (to me, so far) mysteries. The set expanded to 6 units in the late '30's."

  1904 Maxim Gun (with seat)

Returning to a perennial favourite, the Skybirds Set 9; Motor Cycle Dispatch Rider and Machine Gun and Crew, this time a Number 2 on the gun is supplied so hopefully no stoppages!

H is for How Many Officers?

When we looked at the figures from Sky Birds Here I commented that I didn't know which of the officers with swagger-stick were factory paint and which weren't...the answer seems to be most of them where!

In fact one boxed-set had six of them all with differences, some very subtle. Otherwise just a quick post to show a couple of boxed sets I photographed a while ago and keep meaning to blog but a lot of real-world shite has rather kept me from blogger this year...Hey-Ho! Obviously one of the figures is damaged and may not be the one supposed to occupy that slot, but I think it's right?

The other set, pilots and ground-crew with a very late-WWI / inter-war years look to them. The lose figures are not rare, but sets in this condition are like piles of rocking-horse shit on the summit of Everest!

Nice!...as they say in all the best Jazz clubs...apparently!

M is for Miniature Mosquitoes

No, not more insects! I've loads more, but I can bore people on Facebook with them now!

I got a really nice little Mosquito from Mercator Trading the other day, turned out to be Beeju (EVB), so I thought I'd do a little round-up of the sub-scale 'Mozzies' in my collection...

So here they are, from the left we have a composition one from Zang for Timpo, made of compressed pumice in a combination known as 'Timpolene'. Then the Beeju newcomer, a Hong Kong copy of the old MPC 'Minis' 'plane and finally a small polystyrene version which I have tentatively suggested might be early Airfix.

Detail, both accurate and inaccurate make all four very different, yet they all manage to carry-off the distinctive lines of the original, just not when formed-up next to each-other! Scale is I guess from about 1:120 through to about 1:150.

I believe Timpo bought the rights (or remains) of Brent, and not wanting to confuse themselves with a factory full of hollow-casting machinery and equipment, turned over or contracted to Zang, the timpolene production. We've looked at the figures before Here but several aircraft were also made, I've seen an early jet (Whittle?) and a Hurricane as well as this mozzie.

As far as I know, Beeju hadn't been credited with sub-scale aircraft, being know for a range of mostly buses and fire engines, first in a distortable cellulose acetate, then is a more stable polystyrene. This is an early Cellulose-acetate one but mercifully hasn't warped much. It has the most exquisite little propeller plug-in/pop-ons made from the same material. The EVB mark is hidden in the under-wing roundels while MADE IN ENGLAND is present in relief along the bomb-bay.

I don't have the MPC mosquito, although I do have most of them and will cover them here one day, but there are several 'levels' of Hong Kong copies, of which this is from the commonest. Also the latest, being included in various sets when I was young in the late 1960's/70's. It was a smaller range than the original MPC range, or some of the earlier ranges of piracies. This is the lowest grade quality-wise, but carries over the detailing from the MPC version, just in a chunky fashion.

My speculation that this is Airfix, is based on no more than it seems to be the same plastic, in the same colours as the later version Animal Flats, contained in building blocks and baby's rattles. While they could be Tudor*Rose or Kleeware or any one of a dozen other early British makers; the colours (I have a handful of these; Lancaster, Spitfire etc...) particularly the pea-green and pink are identical to both the early cellulose acetate and late styrene Airfix flats, and the marking 'MADE IN ENGLAND' is more Airfix that the other main makes who tended to use circular marks. Still it is only a possibility, not an absolute confirmation.

This is a styrene examplr and it has warped, but due to early removal from the mould, I have a red one with broken wing which is much straighter. I would imaging that they would have been sold as a small handful, possibly in conjunction with a larger beach/bath toy, or as 'party favours' or cake decorations?

The rest are now to be seen here; Airfix Mini Planes

Finally; J. E. Beale - the trading arm of the still extant Beales department store in Bournemouth, UK, commissioned a set which contained both two Timpo/Zang Mosquitoes and some Skybirds figures, being two 'plane guards and an MG-team.

C is for Charbens

You may remember a while ago when I was looking at Skybirds figures (S is for Skybirds) and accessories, I mentioned that they might have bought some of their bits in, as the searchlight they used was the same as a truck-mounted one on another maker's slush-cast lorry?

Well - this is the lorry I was talking about, I believe it is Charbens, and you can see that the searchlight is the same as the Skybirds one. Charbens would go on to use a Die-casting process with a mazak type alloy/compound, and the two lower shots are of later mini-scale vehicles from that range.

 

While mentioning Skybirds, here are a few more shots, courtesy of Mercator Trading who were carrying them at a recent show. We've seen a better tanker-refueller (also thanks to Adrian - I seem to recall!) but the 'under-wing' refueller is new to the blog and a harder model to get hold of.

The boxed set of figures is also really nice, I'm not sure how you are supposed to differentiate between the officers and NCO's though, there are only two poses in the box?

L is for Late again - Show Report; Sandown Park

Missing both December shows (London Toy Soldier and the NEC's general toys) my last show of last year was the other big general toy fair at Sandown Park racecourse in November, and in complete contrast to the post below, I only bought 10 items and none of them that exciting...

These all came from Adrian at Mercator Trading (who has more should you fancy some - link to right of page [all gone - sorry]), I have a side collection in all ammunition, whether inert 'real world' rounds, Drill or Practice or toy and model rounds, shells, suckers etc...and these three are a welcome addition to that collection.

The Lone*Star ones were late production and I well remember as a kid being a bit miffed that they wouldn't go in all our existing cap-guns which took either the round loads (usually red plastic) or the paper strips. The Devil Bangers are those paper-wraps little boys still annoy people at bus-stops with to this day...and may even be current? The Italian set is totally new to me.

First purchase of the day was the bag of micro-vehicles during the car-park trading before the doors opened, simply marked 'MADE IN WESTERN GERMANY' twice and 'ASST 18' (presumably meaning; Assortment 18 - of how many?). I adore the polythene truck marked err...'POLYTHENE TRUCK' a title that covers both the subject matter and material very succinctly!

The Chariot is a Hong Kong copy of the Thomas/Polar Plastics one with the old Bergan/Beton horses, while the tractor (also from Adrian) is a fair copy of the Britains [not Dinky!] number, and they've even copied the lifting mechanism on the hay-rake, but in plastic. This was surplus to requirements vis-a-vis a forthcoming book on farm vehicles, which I will plug until it's published in the hope of a cheep signed copy!

Finally; wandering around the halls during lulls, or on the way to get coffee I picked up a decent Britains Beefeater, I'm trying to get one of every version made - not hard; but it gives you a little goal within the world of "never collect it all". The flame-thrower in 50mm looks Spanish, but is made of PVC and I would love to know more about him [see; 'comments' on this one].

The Skybrids figure I picked-up as I couldn't remember if I had him already or not...I think I have and had blogged him, but he's clean, so nothing lost. While the Action Man spanner came off the floor when we were clearing-up; Thanks Mr. Don'tcheckyourpitch Guy!

S is for Stringbag Fokkers

Yeah...but these Fokkers are other makes, phnar, phnar!!!

I am reliably informed by several collectors of these things that they are indeed Flybirds, not as you might otherwise have guessed; Skybirds. Although the tin-plate building in the background is Skybirds and looks a bit like my memory of the Primrose cafe at Eastleigh!

Flybirds were obviously tripping on the coat-tails of Skyirds, when these came in they were with a load of the latter leading brand's 'planes and the difference between the two was marked, the Skybirds being altogether a superior product.

I have catalogues for a couple of others makes, one American (not Monograme) and one British but they are not to hand at the moment, however the online Meccano magazine archive (which I will link to when I remember to find it!!) should contain adds for several of these early establishers of 1:72 scale as an aero-modelling ratio.

I is for Initial Introduction

Below these three shots - If I get them all loaded today; are 7 other articles, which this picture will help with, as far as identifying the various figures goes and judging the sizes against each other.

Soldiers, pilots and civilians/rail passengers, the relevant rail staff are dealt with in a couple of the posts below somewhere and the entire range of Hornby Dublo/Hornby/Hornby-Triang and Hornby Railways sets and issues will be covered in another post another time, as will a more in-depth look at the relationships - as I understand them - in the Modelmaster/Merit/Wills/
Slater’s/Peco/Guagemaster family of semi-flats from old die-cast moulds.

For some reason this is not enlarging when you click on it, probably too much coding on the image, I'll re-load all three seperately in a day or two, sorry for that, it's the one image in all 8 posts you want to open - peer hard!!!...Done!

Three years later (05th April 2014)...we'll try this;

That seems to have done the trick...click on it to enlarge them all to tha same relative size!