H is for How They Come In - Chris - Wild West

I think I'm right in saying Chris isn't much of a Wild West collector, excepting where that coincides with one of his core themes - Early British minor makes, so his parcels to the blog, and therefore the rest of you, always have a fair bit of Wild West in and a fair bit of that is interesting!

The small scale, as I've said before this all needs further sorting, and will appear, eventually, on the Giant or What? page! Two bags this time, one a right-old mix, the other quite a clean sample, and there were a few in the bottom of the box!

 

The forts too need further sorting as several people had a stab at them or copied/carried them, this isn't Giant as it has the Fort Chyenne over the gates, Giant's was unnamed.

Next size-up and we have a couple of Lucky Clover Indians, one of the - probably - French, reduced-size, premium copies of Jean's swivel waist figures. A pair of Marx, a trio of Blue Box, a horse divorced from its West German wagon, and two figures I've never seen before!

 

Both swivel waist, no more that 25mm and I think I found their horse, which may have come from Chris in a previous bundle. I suspect I have no more than one or two in all the - litaerally - tens of thousands of Hong Kong hollow-horses, sorted or waiting, and I think the other's might be a white one and a limp-green one?

 

But what a thing to find, in a donation! Both are damaged, I'm guessing yellow probably had a pistol on his left hand, and red might have been waving a rifle, but how many are there in the whole set, are they Hong Kong, or some minor make from Italy or Portugal or somwhere, has anyone else got any? Among the 'best items' in the parcel!

Next size up and inset are a small scale who missed the other shot and bits of a CGGC, Giodi or Kinder figure, with a Siku premium top-left in the main image, next to a Christmas cracker-toy of the old Marx moulding of Pecos Bill.

 

The lower row includes from the left, a semi-flat in soft ethylene who might be Hungarian, but wasn't in that bag, another of the ones I think are French premiums or bazaar toys, with the neat, parallel-sided, oval bases and two of a Hong Kong lot who turn-up so frequently I can't understand why I haven't seen a whole set (card or bag) on feebleBay yet . . . but it should turn-up one day!

Up another size for the Toumoulage originals, with - again - believed to be French, probably premiums, smaller copies, the larger unpainted (late production?) 'styrene, the smaller, the softer polyethylene. The green one, actually belongs with the larger figures and is a polystyrene original.

 

Chris has managed to find another three of the Lone Star shooting game figures, all yellow, in three different junk-lots/purchases! I have to confess with a few more come in, in the last year or two, I've lost track of them, but I think we're getting close to full sets of both colours, although they were issued alternating in the sets!

 

Below them, we have one of the Crescent/Lido poses we've covered here recently, and next to him a painted one, which from the clues on the underside of the base, has come straight off one of those W. German pencil sharpeners. Note he's larger than the standard figure, something which wasn't clear in the previous posts on the subject - I've said it before; Pantographing can go up as well as down!

 

Either side of the cowboy pair are a couple of matching hard plastic, painted Indians without bases which would appear to from a similar novelty line/item, but no clues as to what, or how many poses we're looking for?

A small bag of Hong Kong swoppet copies, same note as the canoe post the other day, a late, two-halves with belly-moulded Airfix horse, I'll give him the tail of one with a missing leg or two!

 

Three HK figures 'after' those Bergan/Beton-Airfix-F&G-Tudor Rose (et al) figures, my first Carzol premium, an MPC ACW clone, a hard 'styrene paddler from Thomas and a very interesting copy (unmarked) of a Crescent cowboy? 

Finally, a wagon driver, to which I said in my email to Chris - we always go over the highlights before I share them with you - "The Wagoneer looks modern, but might actually be older, 1970's? Although he's quite realistic, he may be from a comical wagon, or novelty?", only to be looking in the new (newish, I think I mentioned them in the autumn) thematic folders for something to send Paul M when I found him . . .

. . . bottom right! And although the wagon is almost as realistic as him (some whacky wheels action goin' down there), the artwork on the box is every-bit as cartoony as I was expecting, and I'm not claiming it for my abilities as a soothsayer, but more the old back of the mind being triggered!

 

This is lovely, he's missing his feather, but that's the sort of thing which will turn-up in a junk lot or on a tattier, loose figure, but having seen or mentioned Hong Kong, Russia, Dulcop and Kinder on these 'Charlie' figures, here's a Směr one, from the former Czechoslovakia!

 

Finally, this pair were in a lot from Australia, which won't be in these posts, as they are destined for greater things elsewhere! But these two are interesting for several reasons, first we're back with the Crescent hollow-cast/Lido set again with the chap on the left.

 

But he's clearly paired with the mounted figure who seems to be a copy of a semi-flat, possibly home-casting mould, which could be another Schneider or even something more local . . . there must have been Aussie metal manufacturers? The quatrefoil bases should be a clue?

 

And who made these, between the Australian end and the island next door (NZ) there are about a dozen names in the archive now, not all of them necessarily toy makers, not all of them shooting plastics? So tatty, and probably very old, but fascinating additions to the stash, cheers Chris!

H is for How They Come In - London Show December 2022 - General Purchases

And so to London, as the saying goes, with the final toy soldier show in the calendar at the Haverstock School, Chalk Farm, where I had quite a good show, given it's mostly metal these days, but various 'Plastics' guys are there and between them gaps were filled and rarities found!

This came from a mate, and he actually had two different, but I only grabbed one and it'll feed my need for regular injections of horse-drawn stuff, but it is both a delicate and space-consuming heft of packaging, so one is fine, my first Brumm, known from the catalogues which aren't rare and of which I have a few and very well-made when you actually get to see/handle it.

Modern combat forces got a good boost, with a bunch of Frenchmen from Cofalux, Starlux and one or two others . . . I picked up a few more a week or two later, then got some more in the machine-gunner lots, so I've done well on Frech plastic this past autumn/early-winter!

To their right are a bunch of Japanese from Britains Deetail range, I knew I only had one or two, and realised (quite late in the afternoon) I had seen all of them on two different stalls, so having some cash still warm in my pocket rushed round as people were starting to pack-up and purchased both lots.

Thus giving me five of six poses, alternate painting of the advancing chap, and two different treatments of the LMG, along with the US recoilless rifle re-purposed to the Land of the Rising Sun, to keep Britains' costs down! I'll have to hope the missing pose is among my existing few!

Below is two shots of a very clean Trojan jungle fighter, I seem to be building my Trojan Japanese, Australian/Anzac and 14th Army samples one figure at a time which isn't the cheap way, but it'll be fun when I find the last one - about another ten years at the current rate!

Now, I didn't shoot or record the maker (on the back of the cards) before they went up to the unit, but I may have some of these already in the collection (I've certainly seen them before), so when everything is sorted out, we may well de-card a duplicate, set them up and have a return post with all the details . . . modernish (1970's?) and aimed at the tourist trade I suspect.

Had a good score on Gem/Gemodels, with four knights (from the 'orange paint batch'!), one of the King's Men from the Humpty Dumpty cake decoration vignette (he appears to be laughing and pointing at the 'scrambled-egg'!) and two others, the snowman with an icing spike and a skater in yellow base polymer, along with a Hong Kong copy of the Crescent Santa Clause, I already have one or two in that section, but I think the paint on this chap is far superior to previous finds?

These were from Matt Their at White Tower Miniatures, and while you know my views on 'new' poured metal (as displayed in the last post!), the smaller guys aren’t so expensive (despite having higher overheads/unit costs), so I try to support them when I can, and while I always admire Matt's stuff I haven't previously bought any, so I thought I'd better rectify that with a  swift purchase!

I bought one glossy 'toy soldier' style finished figure from the Robin Hood series, and one matt painted figure from the Wild West range, and they are both really nice figures, Robin himself summoning the Merry Men for some shenanigans, the Indian is from an older hollow-cast moulding I think Matt said, but now done as a solid. Matt also sells all of them as unpainted castings.

This MTB/PT-Boat was nice, some age (dime store type/era), and pretty clean, but there is a small question mark over the opening beneath the conning-tower, and the two openings just in front of it, I can't work out if something is missing, or if someone has had a dig to fit a couple of figures, now missing, no brand or brand-mark, nor the typical Kleeware/Tudor Rose circular mould-release/blanking disc marks, so maker is totally unknown but could be an early Thomas or Lido/Pyro/Reliable type thing?

A pair of beautifully painted Commonwealth 'World Dolls'; Ms's Hawaii and Holland, and painted by George Hanger, who used to paint stuff for the BMSS museum and their magazine articles, indeed, given who I bought them off (who also gave me their history), I'm guessing those Mokarex/Figurines Historiques Musketeers (bottom of post) were painted by George as well?

Polish [French] cavalry from PZG, going for a song in a little bag, I'm not sure on the horses, so gave the most obviously different one to the Trumpeter, and the other odd one to the 'officer' in white!

Smaller single/rummage-tray pick purchases include (going vaguely clockwise from the top left); Kinder fantasy figure, I've several of these come in recently (so not rare) in both blue and green, a large native American Indian type from . . . Lido? Tudor Rose? Someone like that, he's in the archive somewhere and probably tied-in with a Lone Ranger or similar movie? And finally in that shot -  a US MP with pod-feet, again I should know, I've seen him before and I think I have him in dark blue, so this may be a 1990's reissue?

Poplar tractor (another!), an aluminium totem pole (Wend-Al or Aludo?) and a tin of my favourite brown! I have the old Authenticast semi-gloss leather version and the bog-standard gloss, but this matt dark-brown is hard to find these days, or seems so to me, so I thought I'd grab a 'newie' when I saw it!

A Toumoulage French soldier in metallic mauve polystyrene (why not!) and a rather nice-paint Cherilea Egyptian share the line-up with a less common cake-decoration deer sculpt and one of the Airfix (or Frazier & Glass I think . . . now!) cadets.

Finally another big Indian I should know, and another of those teeny-tiny Topo Gigio (Louie Mouse) figures from Italy, which I keep finding (or being sent), I have four or five now, I think in three colours, but all the same pose? Board game pieces maybe . . . or were they an early Kinder or a gum-ball capsule-dispenser thing?

The Toumoulage Indians we've already looked at above, with a mix below; the big guy is a Marolin, probably post reunification? Next to him is a better-quality Hong Kong copy of a Herald sculpt, with a French-made cowboy on the end of the row. In front a Marx 45mm PVC-rubber cowboy and a French (or more likely Polish) Indian with peace pipe, one of several (with pipes) who've come-in recently.

Big Joe from Big, what Jean Höfler became, a Gulliver late-issue copy of an Atlantic cowboy and a Pech y Hermanos artilleryman, the gun in front is similar to the Pech one he should be found with, but bigger and a Hong Kong (or early British garden/beach toy, it's unmarked?) Aussie jungle 25lbr without splinter-shield.

Quick note; I've finally bitten the bullet and switched from Firefox to Chrome, still getting used to it, but it has changed the gaps between images and paragraphs, nothing I can do about it, the Internet like most everything else these days seems to be slowly fragmenting and getting worse not better!

T is for All Moulding . . . Maybe!

Toumoulage; a French company, the meaning of which is probably no more translatable than Triang or Meccanno but which can produce the above English, or variations on it ('Mould All') in translation engines, so may well mean that (input from friendly French welcome!)?

A hard polystyrene plastic original, factory painted, behind, with a soft polyethylene premium in front, the premium probably isn't Toumoulage, but rather a piracy/licensed copy, reduced in size by somebody-for-Procter & Gamble France?

P&G had issued unpainted polystyrene versions in their soap power, which were shown on Ludo's old site, so I guess the smaller, soft plastic ones are a later edition for the same companies products? But they could be from another issuer, these premiums tend to 'do the rounds'?

I think there are eight poses in total (plus a mounted line, we'll look at another day), I've still to find the crawling Indian and cowboy with lasso, and you can see they are part based on the second set of Lido Wild West (also copied in Hong Kong), part based on the earlier Crescent/Lido from hollow-cast Wild West set (seen here a while ago), with elements of the Siku premium set maybe and even the Thomas/Poplar for Quaker cereal premium set.

This is not to say they are straight piracies, they have their own style (a sort of art-deco meets yellow-submarine!), but the above named companies would have been contemporaneous-with and clearly influenced these.

Close-up of a couple of the smaller copies, so far I've only found them in the soft polyethylene, but as stated above there was a hard polystyrene issue, while the Toumoulage are always 'styrene, but can be painted or unpainted.

Colours found so far, I shot these from a very small sample before I'd found the larger ones (there may be a few more in the storage lots?), so there's not much else to say about them!

Elkie the moose shall sing no more, but he'll taste good and make excellent moccasins! I think the moose (Hong Kong) and background foliage (which includes a coral!) were in a lot from Chris Smith which was to-hand and the moose was the right size to suggest the vignette!

The tree on the far left is particularly interesting as it's a variation on the stackable Merit type, but with a single stepped-trunk you drop the greenery over, unlike the more common plug-together stack of separate sections . . . I recently picked-up a larger one, which is former-Soviet, so this one may be too, I can't remember?

H is for How They Come In - Week 18 - 3 Prehistory, Wild West and Civilians

Let's get straight into it . . . lots to cover!

Chinasaurs! The two oxide-brown ones and the yellow one are variants of my favourite silicon-rubber set from my own childhood, so well pleased to get them in the post! I think the pink one goes with them but I don't remember having him when we were kids. Meat-eater gets the ice-picks!

Sliding forward a few millennia's worth of millennia and we see the rise of the hairy-pink monkeys, who, I'm sorry to report have rather taken the role of T-Rex with added fire . . . power!

The three little ones (Tim Mee clones - possibly (from the quality) licensed/permissed) are or were Toy Major and came in the same sets as the TM versions of the Hornby Battle Set's figures (which Toy Major (or their contract manufacturer) would have supplied), indeed, I think these may even be from The Hornby take-off of Jurrasic Park?

That all got too convoluted! The three in front are ex-Tim Mee sculpts reduced-down in size, possibly with permission and were issued in various carded sets by Toy Major (TM)™ and/or their associates and a Hornby model railway playset . . . period!

Behind them are - either side - figures we've looked at before and will return to at some point, while in the middle is the Safari cave-man engaging some mega-fauna in a bit of extinction!

The Horse we saw earlier; it has some of the lines of Texas sculpting but isn't a known Texas thing; however Italy or Spain is a likely origin? The 'big guy' is Phidal-like or Disney-store, and presumably from a Pocahontas play-set of some kind?

The brown-pair are lovely - for sub-scale/sub-standard clones! I think probably Christmas crackers, but that would mean 'capsule' elsewhere? I may have some more somewhere (it's the sort of thing I have spirited away over the years), if I find them we'll have a closer look.

The Totem pole is very interesting as it's a Comansi sculpt, but unmarked and hard 'styrene. It also has a small cavity at the base-rear, which would seem to facilitate the insertion of a card-holding peg, such as used by S for Star/Star Toys and others, so a larger set of theirs?

The running cavalryman is nice, modern I think and slightly damaged, I dare-say they are out there somewhere in a tub of 100 - Hing Fat, Americana? Someone like that, but I don't know offhand?

Three late rack-toy clones, but different for being Timpo 'swoppet' copies rather than the usual Airfix (or Jean!) clones, another of the premium-looking 'unknown' ones, a Texas backwoodsman/cavalry scout rider, Siku smoker (larger size) and Toumoulage archer.

In front is a quite unusual figure who has a plug-on base in the style of Timpo or that Brazilian (?) lot who copied Britains, but he's a relatively original sculpt, probably European anyone recognise him? All polyethylene and seems to be factory paint and (because I've learnt to turn my figures upside down, and read!) he's not marked 'Nardi', 'Italy' or even 'W.Germany', having a smooth underside to the base.

There was lots of Wild West in Chris's parcel, I've just shot a few of the interesting pieces for now, you may have spotted in the first post, several Lone Star shooting-game figures; I'm going to save them until I have a full set in both colours, as I've blogged them here several times now and PW has published the full set.

Civilians; a lovely soft-plastic Hong Kong copy of the Gem golfer, usually HK copies of Gem are hard polystyrene? Then an unpainted Dinky road worker, probably ex-outpainters leftovers, as they are usually painted?

Two little girls I know nothing about, the same lifeboat crew as I think Chris sent before, but complete and I have since confirmed that they are from the Frog kit, the tool for which seems to have ended-up in Russia. Nice copy of the Corgi safari guide, seen here before but only as a chewed/broken example!

Equally nice rubber fireman, who is very similar [in material] to Auburn but smaller? I guess some US maker and I'll try to find him before I do that page - which is still happening! In front is another PVC figure, a petrol-attendant, but kneeling, so probably included in a racing-car set?

Finishing-up with some footballers, the small one is from the least-common type of Gem copy (this one is 'styrene) with the oblong base, the other two (not necessarily on the right bases) are from a recent part-work (I think, I did find them the other day or Chris sent me a link?), anyway they are rather nice and - obviously - personality-specific sculpts.

Thanks again to Chris for sharing these with the rest of us and there's more to come - sci-fi, fantasy and TV/Movie next!