News, Views Etc . . . Links

Best Title-headline Ever!
The beauty of Trumps crass stupidity is that he is actually killing his own voter-base! And before they march on Virginia in their cargo-pant shorts, waving their confederate flags, they need to get sun-burnt and inject themselves with Jayes Fluid, not only will it protect them from Covid-19, it'll make them whiter than white . . . doit rednecks, doit!


Toy Soldiers & Candy; what's not to like?
The First two artists in this line-up are worth a moment of your time-spent


The British Toy Soldier Company (made in Stoke-on-Trent!)
News on a new show (which is dated late enough to still go ahead) in an interview with Patrick Adams, collector and maker - I like the Roman cavalry bearing-down on the cricket match!


Nice Idea . . . but . . . 
I'd probably go with a slightly higher-class of rack-toy 'Army Man' if it was up to me!


On the Subject of Army Men;
The rack-toy army women you first read about here (despite the noise generated elsewhere since!), seem to be moving away from the 'pure' rack-toy principle, with some more detailed, real-world figures and a pink option!


New York Toy Fair
Not really 'our' thing as they are articulated action figures, but if you like your sci-fi, or your Halo, this is for you!


Vanessa Childs Rolls
Nice potted history of Canada's reliable plastics


Toy Soldier Confederate
We've looked at Vik Muniz's work before here, there was going to be a retrospective at the Sarasota Art Museum, I suspect it didn't go ahead (covid-19!) but the image can be found on that there wibbly-wobbly-way.


Playmobil - The French Way
The irony of German figures being used to depict French history possibly lost on the curators?

G is for Growing . . . 'Brown Water Navy'!

In the bag that was part of Peter's latest parcel, were these three, which are a perfect addition to the fleet we saw here, although neither plastic toys, nor celluloid tourist trinkets, being manufactured of a base-metal or whitemetal, probably with a high lead-content?

Following the patterns of the celluloid keepsakes, these will probably be the next price-bracket up for tourism; ceramic and ivory being above these, silver-neff at the top? A bamboo-raft punter who looks like one of those fishermen who use trained ducks (. . . cormorants?), a small fishing vessel with three crew and a larger vessel with two crew - I'd like to know how they pulled-in that ton of fish without a winch!

From the other side; the five loin-clothed fishermen are all the same basic sculpt, the arms and legs bent to fit their final position/task, the punter seems to have been built in situ with a soldering iron, or at least - his legs/feet have been?

The 'real' Brown Water Navy liaise with a shore-patrol to check out two fishing boats, paying no heed to the old man on a raft . . . death can come quickly to the un-alert, but when your imperialist occupiers are supplied by Baravelli (figures) and Hong Kong (vessel), what can you expect!

H is for How They Come In - Peter

A few days after Brian's parcel, another arrived without warning from North of the river, something some of you are probably expecting as he's scrupulously fair and seems to send parcels together so if he's name-checked at the other place he's shortly thereafter name-checked here, or vise-a-versa!

An interesting sample of mixed 'odds and sods' (which is right up SSW's street!); most of them happy to wear the 'Novelty' moniker. /the contents of the small bag (bottom-left) is now a separate post.

I'm not so sure about the large pink mouse, however the similar mini-bath duck is a happy receipt, so I can't reject his stable mate and one day there will be an overview of all rodents here on the blog (as there - hopefully - will be for everything) and when that day comes he/she-or-it will be ready and waiting . . . for a second viewing!

The three nutcracker'esqe (or 'Babes in Toyland' style-) guardsmen are part of a larger family which hung around in the late 1990's and early 2000's, I've pinned them to two or three brands and - in at least two sizes - they were used in snow-shakers, the sort of mini-trees truckers' put on their dashboards, as novelty earrings and possibly (as here?) cake decorations.

Both the drummer and the blue-jacketed chap were new to me and we will look at them all properly one Christmas, as that seems to have been their destination, whatever the end-use.

The Kinder eggs carried the latest figure type, and they are both nice (well sculpted and approximately 54mm) and disappointing at the same time.

The disappointment steaming from the fact that as stand-alone figures they are all in a silly pose, yet the point of the pose is a bit pointless, you have to balance the 'shield' on the two hands (not easy as a dextrous adult, god knows what kids will make of the job!) and then flick them [the shields], using the over-designed base, at the paper/card flat 'baddie' targets. The hitting of which seems more unlikely than getting the shield to stay put, but maybe I'm just a curmudgeonly old-git and it's easier on a smooth surface?

I had discovered them a few days before Peter's parcel, but typically in situations like this sod's law meant I had found the same figure as two of Peter's so now have three gold'n'green fish-men!

This is charming, possibly missing a few toes, but then he's probably over eighty and clearly survived Corvid-19 so one can't complain! Made in Japan and a fired bisque, hand-painted after firing there has been a bit of rubbing over the years . . . and another cricketer!

Now . . . we saw the female addition the other day and with another from Peter the total's become seven figures in a few months, from one, and five from Peter - here they all are together.

The new one is a second Spanish National Guardsman (like gendarme); an 'other rank' to my previously found officer, but the officer had a cartridge-paper board to his hat (as the Beefeater also has a card rim), while the new addition has the whole hat in the same clay.

He also has a slightly more expressive face, and while - like Erzgebirge - I suspect a regional aspect to the production, equally I suspect a different locale or town/village . . . the clay's a different colour to the other six, as well?

 

11th February 2021 - Now known to be craft figures (artesanos) from Alborox in Grenada

Another fisherman! Sans rod, so I put a 'pole' rod into the hold for the photograph, the original was probably a length of piano-wire with a piece of cotton-tread glued to the tip? Like the Spanish 'toristicas' in the previous shot, he's a terracotta/clay, rather than the bisque of the cricketer, but is also Japanese I think? And he's been glaze-fired rather than painted.

Aaaahh! I'm lovin' this! I already had the archer on the left and had always thought of him as a cartoony/anthropomorphic ancient or medieval type; a warrior archer, if you like, but the new figure from Peter makes it clear there is probably a set of 'sports cats' somewhere, and gum-ball capsule-machine inserts, or Christmas cracker prizes? Anyone else got some?

I shot it without flash (inset) to show the true colour difference.

Another excuse for a group shot was the china cat, which is also a different colour (darker grey), but the flash washed it out, so they look like twins (centre-left), and - as a group -growing ever larger!

I also have plastic copies/versions of the little kittens playing with balls of wool (front row), which are not direct piracies, being smaller, slightly different poses and . . . for another day!

The three Siamese's (top right) are chalkwear (plaster) and named, but I forgot to note it! The two dirty ginger's are Whimsy's from Wade the rest are porcelain 'ornamentals'.

Finally is this interesting chap, a Maori dancer from New Zealand, who has been glued to a paper or card base of some kind, I suspect as part of a tourist keepsake, but has a brand; G.L Models and may have had a second purpose as a colonial war-game figure, he's the right size and material under the paint?

And many thanks to Mr. Evans again, for another collection of eclectic stuff without the sending of which, I wouldn't have been able to share with you!

F is for Follow-up - G is for Great Wall

Brain Berke eMailed these to me just as the Corvid-19 crisis began to bite, so it's a bit of a late follow-up, but as a foil to the on/off, point-and-go battery-operated Walker Bulldog I'd found in Waterstone's, he sent this fully remote-control little beauty from across the pond.

Posed with the Airfix Cromwell, it's a Tiger I with rather whacky colouring and markings, but nothing a home paint-job wouldn't put right, and it comes with a 'new' small scale figure . . . looking a lot like the old Fujimi or Esci side-cap bedecked tank-commander, but there's not a lot a sculptor can do with a torso, in a turret! It's lost its lid as well?

Manufactured by Great Wall Toys, the rear of the carrier-box has a rather disconcerting mirror, which is obviously designed to display the details of both the front and the back of the tank at the same time, but it also distorts the whole thing like a stretched super-deform!

It's a long time since I followed AFV's in any depth but I think it's an early/mid variant? I don't get why so much effort goes into such an unrealistic camouflage, and a lot of effort has gone into it; it's a four-colour, approximately 55-15-15-15% scheme, well thought-out as well . . . maybe it's a current Chinese military patten?

But think of it on the drive, hunting-down the straight-line Walker Bulldog . . . one sided it would be, but great-fun!

F is for Fish'er Eagle!

Following my comment on Moonbase about another item from Eagle (I miss-remembered the page count!) Brian B kindly sent the relevant section from New York of/from whichever Eagle Annual it was, and here it is for everyone else to enjoy as it's literally stuffed with low-cost, old-school, good ideas, some of which I've employed in the past.

I have made wire trees, I haven't made an eight-foot length of railway-cutting! I suspect (well, let's be honest, due to some clues in the text I 'assume') the 'piece' is a collecting-together of twelve weekly or monthly parts, and I have a tatty set of the pages somewhere in the archive, but Brian's are very clean.

'Strip wood' . . . from a time before the invention of Plastruct or styrene-rod or '20-thou' sheets! I've had a stab at wire fences, matchstick corrals and paneling from old weathered ply as mentioned the other week in a News, Views . . .

This was the page I remembered the most, as I was never convinced the colour 'target' would be anything more than a rather psychedelic target! Compare the roof drawings with those of Terry Wise in his Introduction to Battle Gaming if you're lucky enough to have the latter.

Part two of the lake and you start to see how it could work if you airbrushed the 'target' and used a dark blue textured glass, or some glass-paint (which I have some bottles of somewhere, probably contemporary with these drawings, but the lids have been stuck-on for the 40-odd years they have been in my possession, so not much use except for purposes of nostalgia!

While the cabins would look good in a Wild West scenario?

If you do four instead of two and butt them to the edges of the cover-plates in pairs you'd have an equally convincing box-girder bridge? The 'American' design is equally good for post-war Europe where so much infrastructure was lost during the hostilities these simple, utilitarian, 'post-modern' types (often pre-formed concrete 'kits') were common.

I tried the barrels . . . made a complete pigs-ear of it, although I think the 'best one' survives somewhere in the stash! I had more success with the coal-load, and you can also do tarpaulin covers by putting the paper over the outside, and folding the ends across (after cutting to an oblong) like a parcel. Once you've folded and before you glue, attach button-thread to 'tie-down' the corners.

In fact these days you could print-out GC-overprinted 'private owner' branded tarp's?

I also have (from some dodgy auction lot) a whole load of crafted telegraph poles like those illustrated, in spot-soldered steel rod and wire and I think many of the early model-railway shops would have a half-a-stab at commercialising this kind of thing, once they'd got a jig set up (holding/placing pins in a piece of balsa or boxwood), they could produce identical units quite quickly?

Notice also; to the left of the telegraph poles . . .

. . . the clever moniker of the artist; Walkden Fisher. . . and the driver of this post's title!

Many thanks to Mr Berke for this blast from the past, it always brings back memories to flick-through these, the annual from which they are taken was all I had to read during a period of childhood illness/bed-rest . . . flu or something?

H is for Horde of Homies

Not really a 'horde' but quite a few and the A-Z trope has been hacked to death now . . . although I'm not sure what a 'horde' consists of; a horde of guns might be less than a dozen, but a horde of enemy warriors tends toward thousands as a minimum!

Mr Berke sent us these just as we all went into lockdown . . .

All new poses with seven homie's and three babe's hanging around the 'hood and three more 'doing something'! I like the Ice Cream trolley and the guy in his bathers seems to be accidentally advertising Macky-D's while the chap in blue reminded me of a figure already in the collection, so before I'd looked to check, I eMailed Brian to say I thought I might have some really early Homies in the storage-section of the stash . . .

. . . but it's not a Homie (bottom middle, blue jacket with the red stripe), he's marked Hasbro or Mattel (I can't remember and I've put him away now! and dated 2002 I think?) on his back but he fits in beautifully and looks like a teenage BA Baracus - Wha'da'yer mean FOOL; I aint gow'in no 'plane! He's been posed with all the front-branded Homies-shirt wearers, from both the donation samples.

While top left we have "But officer; all me'Homies have a pet lizard?" and top right is "OK, so it's Ma' Buggin's Doughnut's on the corner of 7th and 33rd and I tell 'em you sent me, cheers pal; I owe yah one!"

There's a good potted history of the line here, and there's a useful checklist here, they now do Homies big-head deforms and bobble-heads, but I prefer the original gum-ball machine toys!

And many thanks, again, to Brian for another bunch of these charming figures.

H is for How They Come In - Brian

As the current closedown was spreading it's shadows and I decided to self-isolate (more than a week earlier than the PM considered it necessary!), I received a parcel from New York (the virus doesn't survive on absorbent surfaces - so please stop fucking-up the Metro dispenser by pulling one from underneath, you minority of ignoramuses!) and had managed to thank Brian just before I withdrew from society!

But still time to thank him publicly, for a nice sample of stuff from 'across the pond' and to mention that my thoughts are very-much with him and those close to him as New York faces the worst of the fall-out from Trump's arrogant grandstanding, ignorant dithering and crass, childlike stupidity.

More Homies (post already done), top-ups for two of the '100 thing' comic-ad' sets and firemen - large and small - for the forthcoming page, a nice sample of Hong Kong copies of Airfix 1:32nd scale paratroop piracies in 25mm, and in a purplish-blue polymer, which is new to me, along with a charming carded set from Pyro . . . of all people!

A set which is pretty self-explanatory if you know Pyro made a series of early ship kits and vessels some (most?) of which were box-scale, several of which (along with offerings from Aurora and Monogram) scaled-out at around 1:90, 1:96 or 1:100, explaining also the diminutive size, and generic sculpting of these chaps!

Indeed, the walking chap - once painted - would pass for scratch-built and I wonder how many I may have seen, on deck or dockside in the museums at Greenwich or Kensington? Captain, First Mate and four swabs . . . Brilliant! And mint as a minty-thing that's been grown in a pot of mint to be served with lamb . . . or julep!

Needless to say . . . like a rat up a drainpipe, like a moth to a lamp, like a fuckwit to a populist's rally, she was in the box in seconds, for keeps! Just how she likes it - about a quarter of the size that would be comfortable!

H is for How They Come In - Week 12

Really a continuation of week 11, as I always put any Friday purchases in the following weeks News, Views..., and these were Friday and Saturday's snaffles prior to our full shutdown.

On the way to post my brief hiatus-post on the 13th (Friday the 13th!) I picked up a few more dinosaurs and three Henbrandt separates; nothing exciting but a couple of Dimetrodons!

I also picked this up in The Works because it was as cheap as chips and one day we'll have an 'angel overview' here, so into the stash she goes! Real glass in the style of those miniature ornamental Christmas trees, she has a delicate filament of yellow glass for a halo and yellow wings both of which - as you can see - reflect through the clear.

On the Saturday (complete with face-mask) I went into town for the last time to buy stuff to help sort toys* during the lockdown (which would be half-announced the following Monday and not fully implemented for another week! If you rely on your Government at a time like this, you stand a good chance of dying!) and in passing dropped into a charity shop which was still open and found this plaster-dig dino-skeleton from Keycraft . . . I think it will be August before anything else features in these posts . . . although there are two donation posts still to come.

Check out the bent-backwards arms of the Stegocerus!

* Record cards, 'Really' Useful Boxes, click-shut bags and some of those multi-packs of little see-through takeaway tubs in four sizes - I've been sorting the Wild West for the last three eight weeks!

H is for How They Come In - Week 11

Missing from my sudden departure was the H is for... thread, so here it is as a separate thing, which it might have been anyway, as, after a slow start; nothing from the Friday to the Tuesday, I then picked-up quite a bit, just before modern life melted away!

The Tuesday find was four bags of stuff thematically sorted into a bog of dinosaurs, a bag of funny ugly/rubber jigglers, and two bags of domestic animals, one with mostly dogs, the other having quite a bit of Cherilea!

Dinosaurs were a mix of generics and marked examples, with Safari and AAA/'Triple-A' among them, the rubber jigglers were two-each of three designs while among the dogs were some MEG's  - Puppy in my Pocket. I'm loving the shocking-pink flamingo!

The Wednesday saw me blow four 50p's on these, the flamenco dancer goes with the terracotta civil-guards, military and ceremonials we looked at the other day - and because another came in at the same time, we will look at them all again; any day now.

The bear with the phone is another of the HH Hill's we saw a couple of, a while ago, while the standing, anthropomorphic one is unmarked, as is the squirrel . . . I've picked up several squirrels (and foxes) recently, most in resin!

The next charity shop along gave me another ELC fantasy figure, I've since brought them all together, as they have been appearing in ones and two for a few years here now, and will do a post on all of them at some point.

Finally I picked up another bag of figures, the resin otter is not the first recently either? The two footballers are the same 'Gazza' sculpt as the one with base Chris Smith sent to the Blog a while ago, but different 'strips' so clearly you could find your favourite team . . . provided your favourite team is one of the 'big four', or six or whatever!

The civilians are rather in the same vein as the larger ones we saw at the Toy Fair, and while slightly similar to Homies (coming again soon), are a bit too big, and seem to be an exclusivity thing with clear nods to nationality, ethnicity and disability.

News Views Etc . . . Links

A lovely reminiscence of the childhood opening of a Marx Blue & Grey set and it's resultant life-changing influence . . . and does anyone know where the battlefield cloth/map seen in the pictures can be found, it looks modern?


They've definitely eaten all the pies! What happened to trusses?!!!


Don't know how I've missed this, but the cheeriest man in the hobby has a website! I used to lust after the stuff on Andy's stall in Portabello, long before I knew him to nod to at shows, and this is a very professional website (it's actually on WordPress but you wouldn't know it), I don't know how I've missed it, but I'll add it to the main link-list!


Can't argue with a well-written rant, and Clue was very good!


Some actual toy news, about toys, how boring!


Wait for one-minute-thirty in!

L is for Look Upon Our Wonders Ye Hobbyists and Purchase!

A real oddity today . . . and a real survivor! I believe this is an old Aurora shop-window display model, from the early days of both model kits and hobby stores, and has managed to survive a transatlantic crossing with no more damage than two broken block & tackle lifting-rings, both of which I have in a little self-seal bag somewhere!

And the transfers, the original waterslide transfers are being slowly shed like the last fragments of a snake's old skin! Although the modern Atlantis re-issue has the same sheet on better quality stock!

Back in the day, the early plastic kit manufacturers - Adams (Revell/Frog), Hawk, Monogram, Pyro, SNAP and Aurora, (among others) - would set out-workers to constructing so many of each new kit, which would be sent out to adorn the windows or display cabinet's of selected hobby shops to show the finished article.

A basic paint job was added along with a full set of transfers (as per the instructions!), in this case a reasonably austere scheme of black and silver . . . yes, I know, but you should see the gloss Buckingham or racing-green some of them got! It was a different era, and the companies knew 'little Johnny' might be using a tin of household gloss from the garage!

A few highlights. The construction is professional (clearly liquid-poly has been used - long before it was commercially available), everything has been properly trimmed back, all flash and gate marks cleaned-up and the paint seems to have been airbrushed on the runners and touched-up only where necessary, the highlights on the rear deck achieved with a printers roller and only a team building the same kit all day could get the tracks that perfect . . . oh, is that just me . . . Mr. Gardenglove Fingers!

I don't know if these are worth much, after-all you can still buy the kit  most days of the week somewhere on the secondary-market as about three Aurora boxings, two (?) Lindberg or the current [full price!] Atlantix and make it how you want it, so it's probably more of a curiosity? And . . . when you find those 1:30th/1:50th hard 'styrene crew figures in a rummage box, with a basic flesh, silver and gloss black paint-job, they probably came from display models?

1:48th scale, M-46 General Patton Medium/Heavy Tank . . . it just managed to be an M-[19]45! And if you do find one the Atlantis is a slightly different moulding (but matches late Aurora tooling) with the MG placed forwards, two (too thick) aerials added and some other, lesser changes

S is for Scandinavia . . . and the Baltic!

Something completely different today; a World War II British/Allied airman's silk escape map.

When my father was setting-up the International Long Range Reconnaissance Patrol School (ILRRP or 'illerp') at the Fallschrimspringer barracks in Neuhausen ob Eck, South-Western Germany, he happened upon a stash of unused silk escape maps (at Ron Silverman's in London - I think?), and bought them to present to successful students (including Bundeswher members) at the ends of the various courses, as little prizes/keepsakes of Escape & Evation (E&E or EE).

I'm not sure how many designs there were, I think I have ended-up with over a dozen different ones (they tended to be presented to my brother and I more frequently! But when you're only twelve and you've just climbed the Zugspitz with the HAC I think you're ready for the odd freebie!), and they come (came!) in three versions, some are almost 'raw' parachute silk, like home-made, war-time knickers, very silky and shiny, then there is an intermediate type which is slightly papery, possibly a cotton-mix (?), the final type, is this type which is a chalky, stiff, coated/treated silk, with a yellowish tinge, yet - as you can see - still thin enough for the two sides to show through.

Some of the maps, particularly these chalky ones have post war dates (a nice Middle-East map including the Gulf of Hormouz is dated to 1949 or the early 1950's), but this one in an earlier one, and clearly meant for aircrews flying north into the cold of the Arctic Circle (which is marked on the map - so, if you survive the loss of your aircraft, you know why you're so fucking cold!), looking to make their way to the western coasts to try and steal a vessel and get back to Blighty?

Now - the perceived wisdom is that these were sewn into jackets or greatcoats, but I can hardly see the RAF having everyone's linings re-sewn for every new mission/geographical destination, so I assume you were issued them prior to missions under certain circumstances (expected high-loss missions?), or that plane's commanders (or navigators?) received one, or something, and that the hiding of them was down to the ingenuity of the holder?

The purpose of the silk is not its sew-able'ness, but to prevent the details being lost if held next to the skin, but that might mean hiding it in boots, underwear or armpits, where a paper map would A) get damp and rub-away to little wormy pieces, or B) be bloody uncomfortable!

I think they were sewn into some clothing supplied to POW's through the Red Cross, but that was a risky thing and you'd need the relevant maps to end up in the right Stalag, you wouldn't want this map ending up with prisoners held in Italy for instance!

We all know how the Soviets and the Nazis split Poland, while those who do the history 'thing' are familiar with the Finish campaign, but the international boundary-adjustments to this map make it clear that Russia helped itself to anything it fancied prior to the 'Great Patriotic War'!

It's funny, but a certain type of less-educated, 'patriotic' type of British, American or Russian citizen (patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel!) struggles to understand why they or their country are hated elsewhere in the world (or the neighbourhood), but a little study of their history; British Imperialism, Soviet Expansion or American Hegemony, would explain all!

One hopes that when we finally come out of Covid-19's shadows (18-months hence?) there may be the 'great levelling' being talked of, or talked-up . . . but I doubt it, I still see war coming, another repeat of history - how boring!

M is for Manurba's Miniature Military Men

Or; T is for Tallon's Terribly Tiny Toy Troops!

Depending upon the order all these 'stockpiled' articles get published, you may by now have realised that I shot some of the German plastic over the last few weeks, among which was these intermediate scale chaps, in a sort of NATO/generic 'army man' US-G.I. style.

Eight poses including two baseless figures, one kneeling, one prone and not much fighting being done . . . but then there's only four M1 carbines and three [holstered] pistols between them. A sign of the genuine unpopularity of 'war toys' in the post-war Germany; although not quite earning - the rumoured - full ban, it was nevertheless an unpopular subject.

Sharing base designs quite similar to what little I know of Koho's output, these have been attributed to Manurba (so BIG-branded play sets and Wundertüten too?), while over here, in the UK, they appeared in Tallon packaging, as a small-bagged, pocket-money, rack-toy line.

Possibly an early painted version, but I suspect home-painting; those headphones are drawn-in too finely! Commonest in green, the second most common are the grey ones, with other-colour versions also out there - as seen above.

About 20% or one-in-five of all found examples are marked 'Made in west Germany' and the lack of marking on same-poses suggests a multiple cavity mould-tool, at least three of each with no marked kneeling or prone figures. You can also see that while the grey is pretty constant (there are a few darker ones) the green can vary considerably from a yellow-olive to a dark olive-drab.

News, Views Etc . . . Links

There'll be no dates for a while, I know things are being worked on in the background to save something from the mess that is a Global Pandemic! I'll do a separate post on Barney's news in the next day or two, and a prasie of Vectis's mail-shots. For now a few links to pass the lock-down time!


Toy Soldier Collector - avoided Covid-19 in the most drastic fashion.
https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2020/mar/09/brian-armstrong-obituary

Made irrelevant by Covid-19, but better pictures than the last (Manchester?) report;

https://www.gazette-news.co.uk/news/18292036.toy-soldiers-go-display-colchester-castle-support-help-heroes/

Tradition's new 1st Carabinier Regiment, Belgian Army, WWI, lovely figures for lead collectors.

https://www.traditionoflondonshop.com/product_info.php?products_id=16181

I can't remember if we've had this one before, but it's toy heavy, and fun!

https://mymodernmet.com/adriano-alarcon-fifty-fifty-beard/