News, Views Etc . . . Forthcoming Events

It's that time again! Quite a lot on this week and we have the first auction of the New Year, it's only bloody 2019 'aint'it! Where the f**k did that come from? Ahhhh! Someone glued it to the arse-end of 2018 . . . and what a shitter that was, one would hope this one will be better, but the omens aren't good, not good at all!

I can remember wondering if I'd ever see the year 2000, and that's years ago - at this rate and with the wonders of technology; 2100's looking good for a death-bed scene, not sure the early Cherilea will make it that far, so better get them all on t'Line!

2019 may see more activity on the A-Z Blogs and/or the Airfix and Hong Kong Blogs, but I haven't really got a plan yet . . . while I think . . . ok . . . while I watch the LoTR boxed set (over six hours of extras!), here's the show list for the coming week, and as it's not yet 12th Night, the Christmas Star column-dividers can have one more outing!

Note - Some price rises.

★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★

Toy Fairs

Saturday 5th January 2019

Cardiff - Chris Dyer Fairs

Penarth Leisure Centre, Andrew Road, Cogan, Cardiff, CF64 2NS.
Web. - www.chrisdyerfairs.co.uk
Tel. - 01643 702 757
Mob. - 07966 694 579

Admission [probably] £2

Romford - SRP

North Romford Community Centre, 32 Clock House Lane, Collier Row, Romford, Essex, RM5 3QJ

Web. - http://srptoyfairs1.co.uk/

eMail: srptoys1@hotmail.co.uk

Tel. - 07739 998 012 (Paula or Gerry)

10:00 - 12:00hrs

Admission charge unknown

★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★

Sunday 6th January 2019

Bolton - Barry Potter / BP Fairs - 'Macron'

The Premier Suite, Macron Stadium, Bolton, Lancashire, BL6 6SF

Web. - www.bpfairs.com

Tel. - 01604 846 688

Mob. - 07966 527 177

[Probably] 10:30 - 15:00hrs

Admission £4.00 (up 50p), early-bird £8, (from 08:00hrs, up £1), OAP's £3.50 (up 50p), children £1

Free parking

Eastbourne - Robert Horscraft - Eastbourne Toy & Model Collectors Fair

East Dean Village Hall, East Dean, East Sussex, BN20 0DR

Internet presence unknown

Tel. I - 01323 899 879

Tel. II - 01424 846 676

Hours unknown

Admission £1.50, under-12's free

Free Parking, refreshments,

Falkirk, Scotland - McLaren Models

Tel. - 01324 624 102

(All other details here)

Midhust - SRP Fairs

The Grange, Bepton Road, Midhurst, West Sussex, GU29 9HD

Web. - www.srptoyfairs1.co.uk

eMail: srptoys1@hotmail.co.uk

Tel. - 07739 998 012 (Paula or Gerry)

[Probably] 10:00 - 14:00hrs

Admission charge unknown

Potters Bar - Toy & Train Fairs (Peter Levison)

Elm Court Centre, Mutton Lane, Potters Bar, hertfordshire, EN6 3BP

Internet presence unknown

Tel. - 01282 051 518 (Peter or Diane)

10:30 - 14:30hrs

Admission charge unknown

Spalding - J&J Fairs (John & Julie Webb)

Springfields Events & Conference Centre, Camelgate, Spalding, Lincolnshire, PE12 6ET

Web. - www.j-jwebbtoyfairs.com

eMail - jandjfairs@virginmedia.com

Tel. - 01522 880 383

10:00 - 14:30hrs

Admission - Adult £2.50p, seniors £2, 1st child £1.50p

Swindon - Retro Ronnie

Swindon Town Football Club, County Ground, Swindon, Wiltshire, SN1 2ED

Web - www.retroronnie.com

Mob. I - 07708 385 061

Mob. II - 07900 266 427

Hours unknown

Admission charge unknown

Walsall - Transtar Promotions (Geoff & Linda Price)

Oak Park Active Living Centre, Coppice Road, Walsall Wood,, Walsall, West Midlands, WS9 9BH

Web. - www.transtarpromotions.com

Tel. - 01922 643 385

10:30 - 15:00hrs

Admission £1.80p, seniors £1.50p, child £1

★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★

Tuesday 8th January 2019

Hook - Steven Clements Fairs - Hook Evening Fair

Hook Community Centre, Hook, Hampshire, RG27 9NN

Tel. - 01380 725 322

Mob. - 07958 101 891

eMail: clementfairs@aol.com

18:30 - 21:30hrs

Admission £1

Free parking

★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★

 

Wednesday 9th January 2019

Hertford - Joe Lock Fairs (Evening Fair)

Richard Hale School, Hale Road, Hertford, Hertfordshire, SG13 8EN

Internet presence unknown

Mob. - 07866 641 215

19:00-21:00hrs

Admission £1

★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★

Auctions

Monday 7th January 2019

Lewis - Wallis and Wallis

West Street Galleries, Lewis, Sussex, BN7 2NJ

Web. - www.wallisandwallis.co.uk

eMail - toys@wallisandwallis.co.uk

Tel. - 01273 480 208

Fax. - 01273 476 562

★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★

Other Events

Croydon Airport - Military, Aviation and Model Collectors Fair

Hallmark Hotel, Purley Way, Croydon, Surrey, CR9 4LT (venue - near IKEA)

27A The Grove, Biggin Hill, Kent, TN16 3TA (organiser)

www.hallmarkhotels.co.uk/our_hotels/croyden/location/ (directions)

eMail - davidsutton16@aol.com

Mob. - 07973 885 754 (for traders - Aviation Antiques)

10:00hrs - Finish

Admission price unknown - children under 10 free

Control tower visits, aviation memorabilia & militaria, books, toys & models

★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★

If you are an event promoter/show curator/auctioneer and you want your toy, model, collectable or popular-/youth-culture type sale/exhibition/event listed here - FOR FREE - or linked to; please eMail me -

maverickatlarge[at]hotmail[dot]com

- stating the date/s of the event, address of event, contact details, opening/viewing times, admission pricing and any other relevant facts/details or features - parking, travel notes, disability access, availability of refreshments, event subject matter &etc.

And please mention any flyer-art or poster-/leaflet-scans but send by separate eMail, in case they go to the 'junk' folder, from where they can be recovered and marked safe, but only if I know they're there!

★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★

The. Best. Christmas. Present . . . since the last one! It's a soap-on-a-rope Imperial Stormtrooper from Star Wars! I didn't even know they still did soaps-on-ropes! Too cool for Starship School. It's from the same Firefly/Grosvenor Consumer Products (High ridge Brands in the USA) as the 'Trooper tooth-brush Peter Evans sent the Blog's way, back in May . . . or was it May '17? The dork force is strong in this one!

To be said uttered in a guttural voice by Tommy Vance's ghost . . . or Morgan Freeman . . .

"I am become the Sudth Lord, destroyer of dirt, look upon my works ye mucky-filth and despair!"

★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★

F is for Feeble Flats in Fancy Foot-locker . . . Not!

There's a tendency to think these were all from the same outfit, believed to be Cossman & Levine Co. (later Uncle Milton), but it's clear there are two or three sets of tools (USA and Hong Kong) and several issues/issuers.

Packed in this Footlocker! Said the advertising, with a smaller 'pasteboard' toy storage box underneath, variations of the wording exist, but the snake-oil seller's intention is clear, you think you're getting a footlocker (large kit-trunk at the end of your bed in basic training) and what turns-up is a small cardboard box!

Made of Durable Plastic. Each with its Own Base . . . said the advertising, the snake oil seller couldn't stop with the foot-locker, he further disguises the fact that that the figures are anatomically cartoonish flats with stirring-artwork and waffle about bases!

However, that was then and many a disappointed child received their 'footlocker' full of polymer shite with agast in the early 1950's, by the 1970's ) when they were still being advertised in Marvel and DC), we know from the grapevine that it was a shit rip-off ad, but come the 1990's and as adult collectors we were desperate to find some!

My sample above - branded to Lucky Products Inc., of Long Island, contains a conglomeration of several sets, which fit in the one box, but mostly don't belong in it!

We'll start with the 'senior service' (although how that happened - when the navy always comes after an army - is anyone's guess?), they get a battleship and a PT Boat, or four of each to be accurate!

They are both Hong Kong copies of the - probably (and hereafter;) Nosco - originals and the PT boats are all so poor I don't know what they looked like, but there are good shots on the Internet of the US-made originals. The battleship is more of a frigate with added turrets!

The Infantry; Again all HK copies it's impossible to tell which the 'rifleman' is and which is the 'infantryman' but they are both in the bottom-right corner with darker variants. The kneeling firer is probably the 'marksmen', while the 'sharpshooter' is the prone firer, the other two are obvious, a full set should have . . .

4 Battleships

4 Bazookamen

4 Bombers

4 Cruisers (PT Boats)

4 Infantryman

4 Jeeps

4 Marksmen

4 Riflemen

4 Sailors

4 Tanks

4 Trucks

8 Cannon

8 Jet Planes

8 Machinegunners

8 Officers

8 Wacs (Women's Army Corps, US Army, WWII)

8 Waves (Women Accepted [for] Voluntary Emergency Service, USN, WWII)

8 Sharpshooters

To which was sometimes added other items instead of the mythical footlocker, but it lead to a reduction in the contents; 'Fighting Force' of Broadway, New York sent out 50 items with a 51st cardboard gun which fired (rubber-band mechanism?) while Homer House Products issued something in their 21 Piece Task-Force, which looked a bit like the Pyro space-gun and fired plastic BB's.

As these latter sets had no footlocker, and the more ephemeral pices have long since bitten the dust, it's hard to know if you're looking at them, but I suspect they are here in the post somewhere!

Artillery; three clear variations here, with the larger Nosco having a heavier appearance/calibre and a higher firing-elevation, a Hong Kong version in the darker olive-drab and a less-detailed clone with smaller base and more tapered barrel.

Two tanks in my armoury, again a heavier Nosco and the poorer Hong Kong-manufactured pretender, looking a bit like an M22 Locust air-portable it probably wants to be a M24 Chaffee!

Transport is provided by a generic 6x6 'deuce and a half' which has clearly been made from a half-track's cab and some milk-crates, no winch, no bumper (fender) and no un-ditching roller! Looks more like an einheits / ersatz Mercedes!

The Jeep! Best bit of any set, Nosco on the left of both pairs with the fine-edged base and HK on the right; a particularly crude copy.

The officer, there seem to be various versions of this sculpt, even the Nosco (centre pair) come in thick and/or thin legged/bodied, while the HK clones have two clear versions, with a reversed chamber on the bases, and the right-hand ones having a little mould-release, pin-hole

Junior service ("With good reason . . . crab air . . . fussa-russa . . . "), a sort of generic 1950's jet, more pointy from HK; a bit Sabre-like (but not really a Sabre) from the US maker. The HK ones also have much smaller tail-plains and fin . . . they would paint-up as nice additions to a Trigan Empire air-fleet!

Ah! Yes! The B46½! The most schizophrenic bomber in history, not sure if it's a B36 Peacemaker or a B52 Stratofortress, it exhibits features of both! It also has a hollow-body to keep material costs down.

Duff, duff, duff! After the disappointments of a footlocker being not a footlocker, and the whole set being less than accurate flats, little 'Buddy' (he always seems to be Buddy in the movies) had to contend with the fact that over a quarter of the contents were shit poses! In addition to the 8 officers we have all these, eight-each of the two women and four matelotes!

The simplicity of the poses helps to identify at least three variations again, the Nosco (left pairs) being well-fed, the two Hong Kong versions much slimmer. I think the WAVES are the ones with a Sunday church-hat, the WACS have the pill-box headdress?

The sailor looks like Beetle Bailey!

Brain Berke sent these shots from New York over Christmas (triggering the post's photo-session!)*, and aren't they lovely; if you collect plastics for the material (as I think I do?), you can't not be impressed by an aqua/jade/turquoise marbling, as of these!

There is a hint of this colour in the tail of one of my Bombers, while another has the signs of black marbling embedded in the wings, so these were probably run at around the same time as my green ones.

I'm also pleased to see that the Lucky/Nosco 6x6 truck has a much better front-end, although it has the same high-sides, so a cargo-specific wagon, not a troop-carrier, and now wearing a White's scout-car cab!

*Which is how everything-else in the queue (400+ articles) gets pushed-back one place!

M is for Micro-Mush; Shackman's Slush-cast Smallies

To wit, the 'smallest' ever made? Are they? I think not, but they are pretty small! And they are among the smallest made commercially, with running wheels, although plenty of Edwardian and early post-war board games had smaller vehicles as playing pieces, some of which were hollow- or slush-cast.

The contents match the artwork in configuration (two each of three designs) but not in colour mix, where there is a less random mix than suggested by the artwork! A tad bigger than N-gauge (so Lone Star's Treble-o beat them for 'smallest' for starters!) and representing no actual vehicles?

Maybe a US taxi-cab or police 'Paddy-Wagon' (the green ones?), Ford Model-T (the red open-tops) and something French (yellow/blue)? Copyrighted to Shackman, they are actually sourced-in and marked Japan.

Some vicious flash on the upper-pair and finish - on all - is what you'd call un-fettled!

I've seen these in an O-Ei-A catalogue as being credited to Kinder, but they pre-date Kinder by fifteen or twenty years at least, the trouble with those catalogues is that if it fits in a Kinder-egg it tends to end up in an O-Ei-A 'Preisfuhrer' whether it was actually Kinder or not! Although - to be fair to the authors - over the years Kinder have sourced all sorts of stuff from half-a-hundred manufacturers!

They (Shackman) also did a train; Toot-Toot! You only get the four in this box and with only three different items of rolling stock, but I love the passenger-cars which look like someone took a Wells Fargo overland stage-coach and plonked it on some railway wheels - which is probably close to what actually happened!

My driver lost his head to a low bridge long before he came into my possession, but continues to serve his locomotive with diligence . . . and integral, semi-flat moulding! The pen-top is to give a further sense of scale, but again these aren't the smallest.

 

DeWitt Clinton train (1831) exhibited on latter-era flat cars.

 

Indeed with the exception of the tatty pencil-sharpener engine (top left) these are all smaller, apart from the grey car which is about the same size. I have more of this shite somewhere, but we looked at a few in the novelty posts a few Christmases ago, and I just happened to have these in front of me, so when I've got them all together we'll have a better look!

Gum-ball machine capsule prizes, gift-eggs, Christmas crackers, crafting sets/items, a pencil sharpener 'statue' and the grey car may be from an N-gauge scenics line?

DLR is for Dockla . . . No; that would be the silliest attempt at a humorous title ever!

Let's say: Deluxe Reading is for Topper Toys!

These were in my collection for years as Thomas, but that was back when I took the advise spoon-fed by the elders! They are actually Deluxe Reading (latter: Topper) and we know from recent work by the PW-guys(issue 159) that they had a facility over here, control of which was handed to Lines in a licensing agreement.

We've looked at the larger G.I. figures acouple of times now, but these are the figures you're probably more familiar with; quite unloved, they turn-up in mixed lots, junk lots and 50p/rummage trays all the time . . .

. . . which is good point to thank all those who save junk-stuff for me as they will all have contributed to this post over the last 25 years - Jim, John Begg, Peter Evans, Gareth Morgan, Chris Smith and Trevor Rudkin for certain and probably also Graham Apperley, Mr Carrick, Paul Morehead and Jan Yarzembowski.

Above we have three types of plastic, the bottom row being probably the earlier (and possibly 'US only' imports - FeebleBay has a lot to answer-for!) production in a chalky/cream-white plastic, the main sample in a greyish-white polymer and the two down the bottm-right of the shot who are a semi-translucent 'wishy-washy' white.

All are softish 'beach-toy' polyethylene and I am missing one human pose - another bloke with a radio-telephone; and a little sitting dog, who may be with the other dogs; both of which give me reason to run these again one day!

And a monkey, there's a little space-monkey missing, cheers TJF!

I also have examples in various shades of orange, one or two almost marbled, and I think the palette of colours has more to do with unstable pigment than actual production batches!

Politoys in Italy issued some Deluxe Reading stuff, they may have been responsible for the orange ones?

In addition I have a painted one, but he's so tatty it's hard to tell if it was factory or home-paint, and I suspect the latter as the black strap just doesn't quite have the practiced badness of a factory/out-painter, but rather the studied, tongue stuck-out badness of a home painter with little practice?

It gives us a line-up of - 50mm possibly painted; orange and white; the three whites; the three whites again in 30mm (the wishy-washy one is not quite so wishy-washy!) and a base variation of the 30mm with a slot for locating on studs attached to the toy-models they came with.

Note also the double crescent-shaped 'dents' or cut-outs in the edge of the bases and the twin, mould-release pin-marks - removed from the slotted-base guy, who's slot - incidentally - is the same (shape and size) as that found on the previously seen G.I. figures.

The 30mm figures only have five poses (there's a pointing chap missing from this lie-up) and represent US Naval personnel (or US Coastguard), rather than the Air-force/Rocketry/Space troops of the 50mm set. It's ironic, but the 30mm rifleman is more likely to be found with his muzzle intact than is the 50mm chap!

Partial Set Listing

50mm Airforce

- Rocket Base USA ("The Most Amazing Toy Ever Made")

- Operation X500 (the 2nd most amazing toy ever made?)

30mm Sailors

- B-400 Battlewagon (battleship, 1963)

3026 - Task Force 109 (destroyer and PT-boat)

Some of the above figures may have been issued in Italy by Politoys with different titles.