O is for Old Crocks

It's funny isn't it, the human experience, I get the impression from pieces in the media, that today, young adults hanker nostalgically for the era of the Ford Escort, Capri and Cortina, an era which to me, is only the other day, but which historically was thirty or forty years ago, as far back, indeed, as the old Jalopies and Charabancs of the 1920's and '30's were from the 1950/60's? In other words there's a reason why 'Old Fashioned Cars' were everywhere (clothes, place mats and coasters, mugs, tiles, prints, books, even movies), when I was a little kid, but are, relatively, nowhere now.

 

It's a complicated thing about generational groups I'm not erudite enough to explain here, but is explained in David Sheppard's book on the rocker/biker-oriented youth club he ran as a young priest, in which a generational gap was explained to him, by someone from the Salvation Army - I think?* Being, that we move through existence in tranches, each tranche being a clump of one age-group with older hangers-back and younger hangers-on.

 

*A book I know I've read, but can find nothing about on Google!

 

Which is both a complicated and vaguely deep intro' to this morning's post, which grew out of some follow-up images from Brian Berke, and a few scans I already had on the PC, along with a couple of shots I took, and which we'll meander through now, as I'm just going to load them as they are in the folder, and weave some blurb round them!

 

The range of Charbens Old Crocks, at its fullest extent, from the 1960 catalogue, and including the mini-military ones we have seen some of here in the past as show-table shelfies, I think? Not particularly rare, but hard to find in good condition, due to both play wear and metal fatigue.

 

No. 2, the 1905 Spyker, which came in recently with a mixed lot, can't remember when/where, but it was here to be shot in 2019. This is about average for how you find them, paint is shot to bits, the metal body is starting to suffer from the alloy equivalent of lead disease, but the wheels are still OK, and nothing's broken-off yet!

 

Also from 2019, and I don't know why I photographed them separately, aught to have all been together at the time, I think they have since joined my older sample, which is very cracked, and with lots of broken wheels, but these obviously came in at some point, and seem to have been shot a couple of hours before the Spyker? I must have been sorting or something?

Brain Burke's Spyker is an almost minter! Passenegrs from Merten? Sent as part of a follow-up to a couple of posts back in the autumn of last year (https://smallscaleworld.blogspot.com/2025/12/f-is-for-follow-up-earlier-today.html), you can see how, fresh in the shop, these were attractive and colourful, as well as being affordable. Brian was 'crewing' his up for a project to model the early days of the Wisbech and Upwell Tramway, but the project fell by the wayside.

 

Given they never really had a scale, they go quite well with HO- or OO-gauge railways, but then, I well remember helping Simon College, of Mattingley move an Austin chassis (7 or 10?) around, and the footprint of these old cars was not much greater than a Willys Jeep's!

 

Four more of the Charbens originals, also from Brian and also cleaner than mine! They have had replacement steering wheels, which improves the look and lines no end, but rather crowds the cockpit!

 

These are 1960's (?) Japanese knock-offs (with their own people?), and are - frankly - more colourful, albeit a bit thin or narrow in the wheelbase? Brian states "It would seem they were popular with HO railroad modelers as I found them as ex-layout models at shows. Interestingly they don't seem to have the metal fatigue of Charbens."

 

Charbens on the right for comparison, also a cleaner version of the 1903 Standard than mine, I'm not sure which is better, the Japanese lack of steering wheels, or the Charbens originals, like small nails!

These are from an undated Charbens catalogue, but as a smaller range, presumably predating the 1960 catalogue seen above? And pre- 'Old Crocks'.

 

Further to those previous posts, Brian also sent a couple of shots of a mint Dublo Dinky original and Aussie copy of the same from Wizard;

 

"As you may remember I drove an old retired London Taxi, an Austin FX3 when an art student. When I started my train layout I wanted lots of taxi models for my 1950's London. A prewar Austin was made by DG and I added other cars from their range as until the '10 year MOT test' started the streets were full of prewar Austin 7's. Once they were tested for, steering, brakes and lights they vanished off the streets within a year.

Wizard models in Australia were made by someone who had been a British Railways signalman who emigrated. He made an Austin FX3 that used the body die that Hornby Dublo had sent to either Australia or NZ to make the Dublo Dinkys there. The body was one piece and he created a new cast base."

 

Brian's photo-shoot seems to have been triggered by his running of a childhood survivor, the three-rail Hornby Silver King, streamlined, it's been with him for over 70 years and is still running. I have a later two-rail Duchess of Sutherland in maroon as my treasured steam-era Loco.