M is for More Mashed Military Men

But these aren't original sculpts, although as the exception that proves the rule, one of them is! Also they ought to be on the Hong Kong/Giant blog, and will reappear there when I do all the Khaki Infantry together, but for now I've nicked one image from those posts to add to these new ones for a quick overview!

Not the in-depth stuff of the US figures, but after some eMail correspondence with a German reader, following-on from the Wild West flats day, about the shit I post, it is clear some of you like the 'shit' and the coverage of it here, and these figures - on one level - are about as shit as it gets!

These are the least shit of the lot, and only barely related to the others, being both larger (50mm+ for the radio operator) and better quality, but they are taken - in part - from the Cherilea 54mm Khaki infantry so they can kick this box-ticker off.

Radio operator is by-the-by, but the other is interesting in that he's a leg-reversed copy of the advancing Lone Star figure, further converted to an artilleryman with the addition of a large shell. I'm guessing therefore, these two may be play-value additions to a plastic (or cheap die-cast) toy cannon or field-piece?

The next sample, a little smaller at 40-odd millimetres than the previous trio; runs to four! They differ in having a machine-gunner who is relatively unique, lying on two sandbags draped over the rear leg of the MG's tripod it's had some thought dedicated to it, makes you wonder why they didn't produce a whole set while they were at it!

The other three are common sculpts, but these seem to be earlier that the other two sets we'll look at, and despite the warping of the gunner and chewed state of the flamethrower, these are quite good in comparison with the next two lots, and are a chalky, 1950's polyethylene plastic in 35mm.

These have thicker, slab-sided bases compared with the previous or next lot, and seem the commoner of the three types I've identified (and when got them out for the photo-shoot it was 'five types'!), although that's in part because I got a large lot of 40-odd+ of the dark 'staff-car' green ones at one go, probably the contents of a similar bag to those Pal's on Kent Sprecher's site the other day.

There were five types because whenever I get mixed lots with 'numbers' of HK stuff similar to stuff already in the collection, I tend to bag them anew until they get a sort, and their sort came at the start of the photo-shoot,; using a magnifying-glass to compare etching detail, pose signals (the officer's pistol is a grenade!), machine marks and the bases, quickly broke two bags down into the other three.

The bottom row has come-in in one's and two's over the 41-years I've been collecting, but are the same tool, although the hose of the flame-thrower has less segments, so a re-cut tool or multiple cavities? This and the next lot only seem to have the five poses - two lifted from Britains, two from Lone Star and a Crescent, the first lot - given the MG gunner - may have had more.

These are the poorest quality, and my loose sample is even poorer for being mostly distorted by early removal from the tool, much simplified, and hand-cut copies rather than pantograph; they may yet prove to be actually commoner than the previous set, but I haven't found a similar large lot yet.

The grenade of the previous two sets has become the officer's bottle, now that's how to do war in style - "Crack a tube Bruce!" Although with the distorted blue one it looks more like he's chucking a Molotov cocktail.

I also think these are copied from the first lot, not the second lot as they have the same clipped-ends to the bases.

Upper shot has the 50mm on the left (due to his posing he's the same height as the other three, but his oppo' on the com's is much taller than all of them, see below) and then the three Cherilea/Lone Star copy sets in the order I think they [probably] hit the toy racks of the West.

Lower image is a carded set from the Opie collection, but undated (due to the over-all plastic sheet cover I suspect), possibly referencing the Gloucester's show in Korea, it also gives some of the other colours you can find for this late, glossy version and these aren't distorted, so my lose ones must be a Monday morning or Friday afternoon lot!

I've seen them (some/any of the above - not the very first lot) on display cards for gum-ball machines, I know they came in crackers and I bet they were available for lucky-bags?

Finally a scaler between today's figures and those from Tuesday; you can see that the Radio Operator is getting on for a full 54mm going down to 40-odd for the common ones.

T is for 'The Horses Really Gallop!'

Not!

They do have an amusing novelty bobbing mechanism involving a pair of cranked shafts set into a central carpet wheel. Kleeware via Bonnie Built; seems to make sense to follow up Tuesday's post with another cross-over . . . over the pond!

I've stared at these pictures and Kent Sprecher's until my eyes hurt, but apart from the fact that Kleeware seem to have always used two figures, while some of the Bonnie Built ones on TSHQ have only one (leaving a lot of the fixing-slot visible), I can't see any real difference between the two, so probably mould/tool-share rather than copying.

The only obvious difference is the 'KLEEWARE STAGE' in raised letters on the doors.

Nice clean box for the box-ticker, and Thanks to Adrian Little of Mercator Trading for letting me shoot this at Sandown.

'GI Flats' is for every Tom, Dick and Harry!

When I first learnt what these were they were known from the other side of the pond as Kilty's Bonnie Built which rapidly became Kilty's 'Bonnie Built' and for some time now has been Hardy's - Bonnie Built and Kilty, along the way they have been joined by Pal and Remco, most of the work being done by Kent Sprecher, with Brad de Santis adding information via Plastic Warrior magazine (I can't fined the issue but was 8-10 years ago? Credit to him too anyway), later the Internet gave-up a [now looking rather dodgy] JC Penny link and today, here, we will have a box-ticking-plus look at them; adding the Argo, Loeser's and Spencer chapters to the story.

From regular contributor Brian Berke comes this group which was very useful as my samples are small and - when he sent these - were in storage; however the storage lot (and the paperwork) are now out of storage, so between us I can show you everything except the stretcher team, so you'll still need to lok for them elsewhere!

A simple set of relatively simple (as in 'generic') GI sculpts, usually in a neutral 'army' green or dark olive-drab, but sometimes in bright, primary colours and usually in hard polystyrene, but sometimes in soft polyethylene, and while usually unpainted, I do have one I think is commercially painted!

As a two-parter they can become separated but definitely my favourite from the set, the little machine-gunner and his gun; the earlier water-cooled version of the browning .30cal, with its cooling-jacket but sans water-can!

Elusive, but I may have a coloured rider miss-directed to another box (Unknown Mid-Scale Wild West Mounted!) but I know I haven't got the horse (I do have a similar sitting donkey in blue which I think is a Crackerjack premium!), the rider bucking the trend of the set in having a fully-round'ness, but with a flat horse he has the comedy appearance of the donkey-priests recently covered in Plastic Warrior.

And to be fair (or accurate) while the horse is pretty 'flat', the rest of the set are quite thick and with the near fully-round heads are better described as semi-flats, 'demi-ronde' on the continent, with some quite dimensional sculpting details; the bazooka-mans right foot for instance.

Mine are the 54mm versions as opposed to Brian's 50's but I'm not going to attempt to put a name to them as I suspect they are UK sourced from an as yet unidentified maker; Kleeware, Tudor Rose, Cheerio or Reliable could all fit the frame?

Brian's fearless fighting fellows with the Crescent 'berserker' as a scaler, you can see these are around 50mm mark. Note also that the advancing guy has the bayonet seen in Kent's pictures, on both sizes of US issued figures; over here we seem to have had an early outbreak of H&S syndrome, because they were removed . . .

. . . as we can see here in the left-hand shot. We find the joint-line running across the region where the bayonet should be, it may not be 'health and safety' (probably not; given all the other pointy-pieces in the set) but actually a production problem, which reached over to the Café Mexiq coffee-premium figures on the other side of the Channel, and was most easily fixed by blanking-off the offending area of the mold-tool? I had to use the MG to get the bayonet tips in focus!

On the right - two of mine showing the difference in size as well as base, the bright green version is the French Café Mexiq and UK Christmas cracker prize version, I dare say they got other outings as Wundertüten or 'Lucky Bag' prizes. [Incidentally - we'll be returning to both shortly!]

Another size'er; Brian's mirrored with mine. Now, I think my smallies are the same moulds as Brian's, but more interesting is that mine - although a styrene - are made of an odd plastic with a certain texture, best described as 'cellular' or compressed-foam, rather like the recycled plastic of a lot of those Polish PZG figures, and it may-be they were part of a tool-run made with a high percentage of 're-grind'.

Also note that the 54mm guy's base is squared-off like the bazooka-man or MG-gunner's while most of the others I've seen; both Kent's multi-coloured Bonnie Built and the Spencer (below) are rounded, so there's at least three versions of these, before you start counting the soft-plastic ones separately.

And there's a certain irony in the fact that the 'berserkers' are almost as flat!

So, to a document from the archive which I believe - from the handwritten 'Work Sheet' in the top right-hand corner - may be a packing list for the factory (or out-worker) packers?

Why there are no contents listed for the Artillery Squad Set I don't know but I'd hazard a guess or two; if it is a packers list - this sheet's owner simply wasn't responsible for the Artillery packs, or that the Artillery packs were sold still on a runner with the gun, or even that they never 'happened'?

But five lines have been left in the document for them to be added, Kent mentions them happening elsewhere and they seem to be the larger Lido design also used by several others.

Brian's standing firer - all [one] of mine are damaged! Again - the smaller figures have much narrower bases, even relative to the overall reduction is size.

Text reads;

$2.98

Complete

Just roll Cannon-cars, harmless shells automatically fire and knock over the plastic soldiers!

New "Argo" toy sensation—as full of action as a real battle! Your boy will love it! As he rolls the strong steel cars, they fire rat-a-tat-tat—shoot a continuous stream of "shells" that dwindle the enemy ranks! And see all he gets! 5 Cannon-shooting armored cars with rubber wheels. Steel ambulance with bell that clangs as it dashes along. He gets 10 realistic plastic soldiers including stretcher bearers, 40 harmless "shells," 50 cardboard road-blocks, targets, soldiers. Only at Loeser's in all New York.

It would appear that the 10 plastic soldiers are one force, the other being cardboard, as there appear further to be five targets and five piles of logs in the picture, can we assume there were 40 card soldiers - not shown in the image, because they were a bit naff?

". . . in all New York"; a territory or store exclusive then, available elsewhere with other jobbers or under other branding. And someone needs to give the stretcher team Congressional Medals of Honour! If it's the famous Frederick Loeser & Co. of 5th Avenue, they closed forever the following year! Argo was - of course - Jason's fleece-finding ship of Cyclop's-blinding ne'er-do-wells.

The advert is from the 16th-of-something 1951 and I thought it may be the same New York Daily Mirror as that Marx set the other day, but the date's written along the edge of the page, not down it - in a column - and the font is slightly different, so as it's the same year it must be a different NY paper?

The one in the middle is the soft plastic figure, and probably - only 'probably' - factory painted. TSHQ lists soft plastic examples, but doesn't mention paint.

He looks to be the same as the green one in every other way, from a cursory glance, but is actually quite different, having his mould-release pin marks on the other side, this could be a sign of another set/maker, or just a reversed cavity in a multi-cavity-per-pose tool, I suspect the former, but it's an open 'call'.

You can also see that while the small figure is 10-12, maybe 15% reduced in scale/size, the equivalent reduction in the width of the base is nearer 50% making them harder to stand-up and almost impossible to use with rugs or carpets!

Text reads;

100 TOY SOLDIERS (N-988) . . . A real Spencer buy! With the kiddies in mind we made up this special assortment. It has everything! All plastic and realistically khaki colored. Enough for little ones to fight mock battles. Youngsters will find Bazookamen, Machinegunners, Infantrymen, Flamethrowers, Corpsmen, soldiers with bayonets and hand grenades and stretcher bearers. 100 Soldiers from 1” to 21/4" high. ............. $1

Theses seem to be the 54mm versions; I don't know where Spencer operated, whether it was a local/single-State thing like Loeser's or a more national, wider thing, or even a catalogue? Pricing puts them (or this ad.) in the 1950's. 'Corpsmen' is (or was; 70 years ago?) the American term for army medics.

There is a Spencer Gifts, operating all over New York it seems, either as stand-alone stores, or franchise 'kiosks', selling the tat we love to Blog here, there was also a Spener's Gifts advertising in American TV guides in the 1970's, if all three are the same company we will be returning to them here at Small Scale World - as Spencer's Gift's - shortly; with Britains guns and Lucky-LP stuff!

Note; no mounted officers, and I can't quite get it to add up to 100, the MG's seem to count as a 'soldier', the ammo boxes likewise and I think there should be 14 each of the two poses at the back, which gives 99-items 'in frame', maybe with the mounted figure left off the photo . . . due to his naffness? Which; 70 years later - is seen as mere nostalgic charm! That would give a more likely 101-count.

With flash photography Brian's sample magically change colour! These are pretty-much the same shade of olive drab as mine, but a better/smoother quality plastic, I also silhouetted mine holding them up against Brian's on the screen until they blocked the image out and they matched - even to noses and rifle tips, so I guess they are all the Pal one's shown on Kent's site - you should get about 40 in the little bag on that page?

As I suggested in my contribution to Plastic Warrior magazine a few years ago, the Ammo-carriers are the stretcher bearers. Obviously with little plug-in ammo-boxes, the right hand's hole seemingly filled-in.

The multi-coloured ones available this side of the pond ('Mexiq and crackers, et al.) have another version with the other hole (in the left hand for holding the ammunition-boxes) also filled in - as a marching officer?

Comparisons with a few other semi-flat WWII/GI types, except the Osul figure which is a Portuguese colonial era-uniformed figure. Thanks to Dario for the green 'Italy' figure and are the Australian figures Aussie Woolworth's or Sanitarium premiums?

Known Issues - Alphabetically

Built Rite (Warren) (purportedly - from a senior member of the 'old guard' might be confussion with Bonnie 'Built')

- Multi-coloured 54mm versions (maybe)

Café Mexiq (Coffee premiums)

- Multi-coloured 54mm versions

'Christmas Crackers' (probably Tom Smith)

- Multi-coloured 54mm versions

Hardy / Bonnie Built

- Army Combat Miniature Figures (54mm khaki versions)

J.C. Penny (Department Store)

- Whirlybird Helicopter (+/- 30 figures, a tank, gun, truck & jeep - Remco re-box? See note below)

Kilty (29¢ per set, 54mm khaki versions)

#100 - Infantry Marching (8 marching, 1 officer)
#101 - Infantry Combat set (2 Bazooka, 2 grenade, 2 standing firing, 2 fixed bayonets)
#102 - Machine Gun Squad (2 mg, 2 MG gunners, 2 ammo carriers, 4 ammo boxes, 1 each - bazooka and standing firing)
#103 - Medical Squad (4 bearers, 2 stretchers, 2 marching)
#104 - Artillery Squad (contents unknown)
#105 - Tank Squad (1 tank, 1 each standing firing and fixed bayonet, 2 each bazooka and Grenade)

Loeser's (New York department stores, 1951, 54mm khaki versions)

- Argo (5 tin-plate, free-wheeling, canon-shooting armoured cars, ambulance, 10 plastic soldiers, 40 shells and 50 cardboard roadblocks, soldiers and targets - look to be the 54mm versions)

Pal (29¢)

- Pal Playthings (approximately 40 figures? 50mm versions)

Remco

- Bulldog Tank (reported by TSHQ, unknown quantity, 50mm versions)

- Motorized Whirlybird Monkey Division (Red Herring? - they used the Marx 50mm copies we lookedat here)

- Whirlybird Motorized Rescue Helicopter (as previous)

Spencer (Dime-store chain, $1.00, appear to be 54mm khaki versions)

N-988 - 100 Toy Soldiers (5 stretcher teams, 5 ammo box carriers (giving 20 figs) 10 each of most others, 15 standing firing, 15 slung-rifle, appear to be 54mm version)

Unknown

- Soft plastic, multicoloured 54mm versions (factory painted?)

In addition they probably did service in Pinyata, as wundertüten or in 'Lucky Bags', having themselves thrown out of windows wrapped in coloured paper at Maltese religious festivals, they were also issued in Christmas crackers and I bet some Hong Kong ones will turn-up one day!

So that's three new names attached to these for your archive; Argo, Loeser and Spencer, new to the Blog, new to the Internet (I think!), new to the Hobby!

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.

A is for Archive - Minimodels 'Scale figures'

It's funny, they thought to correct me on two 80-odd years old Spanish rubber figures last Christmas, yet seem to know nothing about anything, especially space figures! That was priceless the other day, they couldn't have got it more wrong between them if they'd tried, but then - by making it up as they go along - they are trying to get it wrong, comedy cretins and too funny, just too funny, he's got a little black box with his brain in it!!!

LP are not especially 'rare' and have been much covered here and elsewhere.

You don't know Co-Ma's Selenites yet?

They are not Thomas or Poplar; Thomas spacemen with bases are piracies.

Poplar were a Thomas offshoot.

Solpa are Greek not French - But then Schilling are American not German!

Amusing, yet pathetic - I mean it's painful to watch as you hear the gears clunking. If you're going to sit in my dust copying my recent output, at least try to get it right! Then the next day the idiot lectures the knowledgeable Frenchie and we get 'everybodyelsesstuff' Because Stadsstuff hasn't got the rightstuff and it takes ten of them and FacePlant.TwitSpacestuff to get it right!

Anyway, thought I'd put this up here as the Cock-whacking Monkey Lizard got a bit confused about these in his attempts to 'elucidate the Vichy' a year or so ago, despite it mostly being here at Small Scale World for some years!

If they are painted -

They are from Minimodels, of Havent in Hampshire (posh name for-/posh end of- Greater Portsmouth!), another of the many subsidiary works of Lines Bro's Tri-Ang/Metoy/Playcraft. Paint is minimal with gloss weapons and matt flesh and uniform/equipment-highlights. We have looked at some of the better pieces before here and they were sold from counter-display pick-boxes

 If they are unpainted -

They are Almark who offered them as boxed sets, on the runners as multi-pose type construction kits for home assembly, a few years after the Minimodels issues, in part to tie-in with their WWII publications. Almark didn't offer all the 'extras', but went on to commission some further sculpts from the original artist Charles C Stadden, which were issued as metal kits, we have looked at some of them too!

Minimodels were founded in 1947 by Bertram Francis (a former toolmaker) in London.

Minimodels moved to a purpose built factory in Havent between 1954 and 1956.

Minimodels were sold (by choice) to Lines in 1958.

Minimodels were the manufacturer of Scale Figures.

Minimodels were the marketer of Scale Figures.

Minimodels were a wholly-owned subsidiary of Lines and/or a administered as a branch of Triang-Mettoy-Playcraft.

Scale Figures was a sub-brand/brand-mark of Minimodels and sister-brand to Scalextric.

Minimodels were the contract-manufacturer for Almark.

Almark were the 'Jobber'.

Almark Model Products was a sub-brand/brand-mark of Almark and sister-brand to Almarks Transfers.

There is no, and never has been an Alamark Minimodels.

They are all dead! . . . Except Pedigree - strangely; they seem to be abeyance, possibly by/for the Hornby Group, the Pedigree name being held by a shell-office in Margate?

V is for Very Vast Vac-formed Village!

I had an eMail the other week from Graham Smith who'd found the Selcol page on the A-Z Blogs asking me what I knew about these (below); I had to point out that I knew no more than was on that page, which was . . . nothing! By the time you read this though, these will have been added!

Selcol, large scale village

Graham writes;

"I am interested in model villages and have seen your "Small Scale World" website. I have some SELCOL buildings made from white plastic which have to be painted and they lose the paint very easily, as you can see from the attached photos. I wondered if you have seen any others (I have a Market Hall which seems to be a different scale) and also if these buildings were based on those in or near Braintree near their factory which you mentioned."

Now, having established I know nothing about the buildings as Selcol per se, it has to be pointed out I am no expert on Braintree or its environs either - I had a school-friend who lived in Brentwood!

Given that we will sort most of it out to some extent in the next few minutes; can anyone from the Braintree area or with knowledge of these buildings (or indeed; Selcol's wider production) help; particularly with that last question?

I asked around at the Sandown Park show with no luck but to draw an interesting selection of blank faces and have asked a couple of other experts to no avail, yet, as with all these things, dozens of people must have been involved in the design, production and marketing of the buildings, and - at least - hundreds involved in the purchase and use thereof, back in the day?

A close-up of one of the little (not that little!) thatched-cottages; they seem to be blow moulded, or rotary-moulded (the larger hole?) polyethylene, hence the failure of paint to adhere, and to have been filled with expanded polystyrene-foam, for rigidity.

The subsequent/resulting plug is clearly marked Selcol, so the one fact which is known is that they are Selcol! Now, there's a possibility that they were originally beach-toys, sold unpainted to place round your sand-castle, but I think that's clutching at straws, and that they were designed for garden railways, being scaled somewhere between O-gauge (building dimensions) and G (figures in the next shot).

A couple of the people I've spoken to on the subject have drawn the obvious parallel with the Spot-On village from Tri-Ang/Mettoy, but that was 1:42/48'ish, against the 1:35/32'ish of these, and I can imagine the PoplarPlastics bus drawing up to this rotunda/market cross/corn exchange to pick-up the [not so] little people and take them into the nearby city!

You can see - from the damaged sections - the polystyrene foam inside, and Graham's railway viaduct in the background! He runs O gauge trains including Triang, Big Big, and Timpo rolling stock and has been doing so for 46 years!

Any information on these, such as when they were advertised, any other buildings in the range or whether they represent real subjects - from Braintree or anywhere else; would be much appreciated by Mr. Smith - and other Garden Rail, or Model Village fans - I'm sure.

As an aside, does anyone know if John Ruddle's buildings have been featured in any works other than the one shot shown in an old modelling magazine? Graham; being a fan of such things, is keen to see them, and having been lucky enough to 'have the tour' myself, I know they are worth a look - being taken from Victorian Edinburgh to Kabul, via Khartoum and back via Calcutta, in a walk round a modest suburban lawn is a real treat!