C is for Comedy of Errors!

About eighteen years ago, Andreas Dittman said he'd dropped some stuff off with a mutual-friend, and subsequently a small bag of bits turned-up at the flat in Berkshire, which, while interesting, didn't seem to fulfil the promise held by the description, as given by Andreas!

 

Anyway, you've probably guessed the rest . . . they turned-up the other day, when the third party was having a sort-out! So, with thanks to Andreas for all sorts over the years - both before I had the Blog, and in the early years of the Blog, I didn't post everything as it came in, like I do now, so a lot got sorted into the collection without credit - let's have a look at this little lot!

 

Both sides of a nice coach, probably from a transport set, I like the busy legs of the horses! I didn't record any of the brands as I took these, and they were sorted away, awhile ago now, but Cleverstoltz, Heudebert and Wagner were featured among them, I think, with quite a few unmarked generics.

 

Might be Manurba, but issued by several brands, Peter Konrad's books can help there!

 

Snowballer and snowscene, probably the same set?

 

Buildings, not sure the stage, front-right, goes with them, it looks like the kind of platform Americans might use to try or lynch slaves or cattle rustlers?

 

 

 

There are only a few of the very early Wiking vehicles which had a figure/driver, I have the jeep and a sport-car, Mercedes, of course, but finding I've had the other two for years without knowing it, was a treat! Of interest also, given the 99% 'styrene of Wiking's production, is that the forks of the fork-lift are a flexible polyethylene moulding?

 

Two more of the dancers, we've seen before, and indeed looked at several versions of!

 

Interestingly, the 'plane may be a British export, or a mould swap/borrow, with someone like Tudor Rose or Kleeware, as we shall see in a future post, where a Made In England set carries the same aircraft.

 

The train will join all the others, away from the flats, 'Euro-premiums' often involved transport, and trains were common, but they are all slightly different, especially in their means/method of coupling, and they all have separate bags to be added to, piecemeal, with items like this!

 

There appears to be a lot of wooing going on here, with a possible proposal on the left, an invitation to dance, the 'young people' doing a duet in the salon, and a basket of fruit being offered! I am reminded of the interminable first chapter of War And Peace (which I have never got past), and the never ending (because I give-up reading, before it ends) ballroom scene, where just about everybody comes across as insufferably arrogant, eager to die for an idiot flag, or just a bit bloody stupid!

 

Three colourways of the same beer/bier premium, possibly hung round the necks of the bottles on a little string-cord? One of the most depressing threads on the old HäT forum, was a thread on beer, and how all the brands I'd enjoyed 20-years earlier had gone! Pfauen-bräu, which you could only get in a few dozen bars in the streets, or surrounding villages of Tuttlingen! Henninger Bräu was out of Frankfurt.

 

Colour is not common with premium or margarine flats, and while coloured plastic does show-up from time to time, paint is even rarer, so these with their one, two or even three-colour spray-painting are a real treat, they are also particularly fine sculpts.

 

A few odds and damaged examples for the spares/TBS tub, it looks like the two gnomes (who clip into the larger moulding, bottom/near-right) are designed to be clipped to a baby's pram, pushchair or safety-pen metalwork/tubes? Although it's a bit fuzzy, I think the Elephant is market Mamot Berlin, a bar or club perhaps?

 

Many thanks to Andreas, better late than never!

F is for First Show of the Year - I

And so we all trekked-off to Sandown Park for the first show of 2024, a lovely day in the end, given it seems to have rained every other day since the beginning of February! I didn't buy much, but there are some nice bits among all the make-weights!

 

How cool is this? Adrian gave me this Fairylight magnetic-novelty at the end of the show, when I asked him what he had on it? We like cats here, and there's a surprising number of mice in the stash too; rubber, cartoon, Erzgebirge/wood, I think we saw some musician mice one time, so adding one of each, in the same box - bargain!

 

These are under embargo until they appear in the ongoing Railway figure posts!

 

Two early Wiking 'planes, I think we looked at a good one a few years back, these are missing bases and the wire hanger, along with their little clear acetate 'propeller sweeps', which clip over the nose-cones and can be replaced. Both dive-bombers/ground-attack types, a German Junkers Ju 87 'Stuka' and what I suspect is a Japanese Nakajima B5N'Kate' or, because the tail's not right, a Grumman TBF 'Avenger'?

An eclectic mix here, which, from the top left includes, a Linde premium buffalo/wisent type, a Barrat & Sons flocked cow, and an interesting use of the Impro tooling; an eraser-rubber version, with the full marking of the originals, also left on the brightly-coloured Imperial reissues.

Below them are two Vitacup animal premiums, one in a darker than normal ivory shade (which may only be a smoker's house jobbie?) and two Kellogg's premiums of Sooty characters, actually sweep and whatsit-cat . . . Googles frantically . . . Kipper! Kipper the cat.

And I'm sure most of you will recognise the Charbens circus elephant, it's easy to ID from this side!

 

A couple of cheap lots of smaller (35mm) flats, actually the upper lot are technically semi-flat, being a bit fatter, German troops painted as Fins, by the simple expedient of painting the flag Finnish! I'm not sure on the lower flats, but they do have base markings under the paint, which I shall address at some latter date, there is a fair bit of material to dig into on these.

And this was also a gift, Christian Hatley had mentioned them a while ago, and not recognising me with my Spring haircut, it took him a while to realise who I was, then gifted me this Diddy Man, who, I found when I got home, is another KT novelty figure! And there are probably at least three more to find, if they are aping the Cherilea ones?

V is for Volkseigener Betrieb (VEB) Part 3; Civilian Plastics

A selection of bus models from VEB Plasticart, Espewemodelle and MK, they are all Icarus prototypes, although the company did manufacture other makes. Modernisation in the East consisted of new bolt-on features, a system that was easy to reproduce in braille-scale. Here a new radiator assembly is all that's required to update one model from the range. As economics improved prior to reunification, peoples diet also improved, this is reflected in the larger driver of the later issue!!! (This is a humorous aside and should not be taken as a serious social (or socialist!) opinion of anything). Also; in the East you either got a coupon to get your hair done, OR, your face made up, but not - apparently - both! And; Can someone tell me what Herr. Hitler is doing driving an East German bus?!! The little 1:120 scale model (TT gauge) Icarus 'Reisebus' (coach) from MK, halfway between 1:87 (HO gauge) and 1:160 (N gauge). The MAB Mobile Tatra 815 truck model, sold in three versions, this one with a plank load, as a flat-bed with no load, and with a canvas tarpaulin. The chassis was also used for a fire-engine. The plastic cab assembly was sourced in the West and actually supplied by Wiking, while VEB Kombinat Metallaubereitung Halle produced the die-cast body. A small sprue with the rear-view mirrors was included for home assembly to prevent damge in transit, a very Western practice, which shows how the East were trying to 'raise their game'. Tie-ins like this were quite common with West German companies like Herpa and Brekina supplying parts or whole re-packed models to their Eastern brothers. As E.Germany was a sealed economy there was no real competition and it was a useful way of getting a slice of a market they were otherwise unable to penetrate. As an aside; The West Germans did whatever they could within the Soviet structure to help their fellow Germans in the East, and the Berlin senate - as well as picking-up the tab for three occupation armies (Brit, French and American) - made regular 'donations' to E.Berlin, either financial or as more practical technical aid, as did Bonn to the wider E.Prussian 'Lander'.

W is for Wiking

Produced at about the same time as the Lego figures and the first appearance of Jouef's rather crude effort, these were at the budget end of the model railway figure market.

Coming in little strips of 4/6 items (depending on the size), you were to brake-off the figures when you got them home. Notice the man carrying a sack in the packet on the far right, he was pirated by EKO along with a few others.

A few of the vehicles by Wiking (pronounced "Viking") also include figures, and here we see the VW Beetle with two passengers and a Fork-lift operator. When collecting, certain items are always going to collect a premium, as more than one group collects it, both 'Bugs' and construction equipment have a second set of collectors and - with Wiking - you are fighting specific Wiking collectors as well!


Close-up of a complete strip, this is the 'standard' strip of 5 items, in this case a family group.

Footnote; some early publicity material and catalogues meant for the US market actually spell it 'Viking' as the Americans couldn't get used to the W/v differential! These were shipped to the US quite early and in some quantity, where they went head-to-head with the heavy-metal products of Comet/Authenticast - amoung others - for the 'Railroad' market.

M is for More Motorcycles

These are the early LEGO people, there is a motorcycle and side-car I haven't tracked down yet and two bicyclists I will save for another day, along with a small range of HO gauge vehicles.

My brother - who knows a thing or two about them - thinks the two in the middle of the top row (and the brown one) could pass for a DKW so below is my started attempt to convert one into a German WWII dispatch rider, by adding the torso of a Hasegawa artilleryman, handlebars and arms will follow one day...?

The next one shows two die-cast game playing pieces from old board-games, both are 'flats'.

The one in the foreground is quite common [2018 - Monopoly, post war sets] and comes in various colours with a Bulldozer, Airship and other means of transport, the rear one is less common. They probably date from the early 60's as prior to that, this type of playing piece was usually lead yet by the mid 70's most game's were using plastic for everything.

I'm pretty sure this little chap is very early Viking, they also produced little strips of break-off figures for railway layouts and such like. Size wise he is totally compatible with the LEGO and manufacturers like Roco and EKO.