H is for How They Come In - Chris - May - 5

And so to the military portion of the goodie-box from Chris Smith the other week, excepting that two ceremonial's have snuck into two of the preceding posts . . . Doh!

Traditions creep-up on you, and it's a fact that as these posts have gone from 'highlights' to 'most', the poopertrooping parachutist shot has crept-up to regularly occupy pole position, whether it's a Chris lot or a Peter lot, and they both send parachute toys, most times, so who am I to trash a new tradition!

The first on the left is of interest, I think he's the largest of the less-common pose ones so far, while the dark green one, forth from the end, is unusual in the smaller sizes, although common as a larger blow-mould in which guise he's still around. Note also how the orange Airfix clone is a disarmed version of the red one!

The rest are grist to the mill, but you can see the variation here, in a small sample, so you can imaging what's happening in their box or boxes - there are three now; Airfix copies, others and novelty/space, with a  larger tub for the boxed, carded and 'toob' samples. So with my own purchases at four shows since lock-down, the nascent sections of the Parachute Toys & Novelties page (posted or not) all require updates, which will be a while yet!

And Chris sent three for the novelty sections too; an original Poopa-Tooper (pre- or unnmarked- Imperial), the newer copy/homage which we've seen on the card a couple of times now and a Super-Pooper Man Bat (AHI I suspect), posed with the larger one from the previous shot, to give an idea of the size/scale.

Assorted combat types, a nice PZG running WWII Russian, another Rambo set figure in the huge-size, the rack-toy German figure in blue is a heat shrink, now shooting at paratroops, into trees or upper windows, while the stretcher man is new to me, sadly missing his oppo' and a stretcher/case.

The three kneeling Airfix paratroops have the HGL marking on the base, while the Navy guy; seated, blue, is the third now, in various states of play-worn (in fact I think this is the best paint so far) clearly removed from a larger - probably Hong Kong, probably mostly plastic - vehicle or vessel, but still no clues . . . and I do keep my eyes open?

These keep turning-up and this one looks to be the best so far, so is probably the donor for some of the others we've seen, and needs to be compared with the rest to see whether he's a colour variation of the other good ones?

Mostly generics to sort into the 'master' collection, but a - possibly Revell - kit figure; center below, whose paint points to one of the store display models, but there's not much between store-display and 1950/60's home paint stab-and-hope!

There's another kit figure hiding in the top row, on the right at the back, while the three flats; bottom left, look to be a brighter green than most of mine, which we saw here. Well, I seem to have one, the flamethrower, so now I have four - thanks Chris!

The strange doorway, is actually the gun-rest from the Corgi armored recovery-vehicle! Smallies, with a Starlux Para, Galoob pilot, another kit figure (kneeling) and some rack-toy fodder. the three in the foreground are truck troops who have been separated at the shoulders!

Jean's sentry box, a lovely thing which is in two colours by the cleaver device of having the red moulding slide under the white one, to provide a colourful plaything, and another addition to the side-collection, or sub-category of sentry boxes!

We've actually seen these ABC and clones recently in the 'matters arising' post after the Plastic Warrior show-posts, where is was actually Chris who spotted the white ones on Brain Carrick's table, although I then filled my boots too! And with the darker one I found the other day, at least one of these is new to those we looked at here, while with the white one, we are up to eight or more variations now, not forgetting Chris has found green and red-plastic examples.

These are fascinating, I'm guessing French? [British] Both missing plug-in arms, so now I know they exist I will try to find more, with arms, but what lovely samples to get free in the post; ceremonial/colonial period (mid/late Nineteenth Century?), and probably 1970's bazaar toys [1960's], they seem to be a cut above the usual types in that category, so may have another origin/explanation? There's something Poplar or Tudor Rose'y about them too!

Anyone know anything about them? Arab officer, or white officer of an Arab unit (red) and someone looking like a Balkan or Greek ceremonial type (blue), or even a Cossack? I have a feeling I should know, I have a feeling they were in Plastic Warrior magazine many moons ago?

The next morning -  from Mr. Paul Morehead the legendary editor of the aforementioned Plastic Warrior magazine: ". . . those two mounted figures with missing arms on your site are Thomas Toys Two-in-One figures. For some reason you get two figures and one horse in a box. I think they're in our old Poplar Plastics Special [publication]." As I replied to Paul; I thought I'd seen them somewhere and it could only be there! I now recall there was a cowboy/native American Indian pair? And possibly a third?

Closing with the medievals; two Kinder, incomplete, but again - they go in the relevant bag until the right bits come in and I can assemble a good one, the silver Knight just needs a base (I may well have) while the Samurai needs a torso with a sword intact, a tougher call as the RP (Res Plastics) figures of that era (mid-1980's) are notoriously brittle in the fine-detail parts.

And two MPC mini-knights, the red a mounted original, the black a Hong Kong copy I think, I can't now remember, and while there's not much in it, the copies tend to slightly less well-defined detail, but copied the same MPC colours, while the MPC originals have a numeral in one of the release-pin cavities.

Thanks as always to Chris Smith for sending all this to the Blog.

G is for the Glory of Rome!

I had a lucky score on eBay about a year ago, showed them elsewhere, took some extra shots for here, and sort of lost them in Picasa, shot them again when I was putting them away with the other Roman stuff, including other Marx, and had (possibly 'in the meantime') shot a comparison with some smaller ones.

I thought I'd also shot the 30mm's (Marx's idea of HO, being their [America's] slot-racing 1:64th!), even unto mentioning them as coming in this post, the other day, but I hadn't so we'll have to wait another day for them . . . if they exist. But more on that below.

Anyway, they all went in this folder, and I then had to be a bit ruthless in what I deleted and what I put in an 'unused' folder for now, but here's the result, still with a bit of repetition but not the amount of duplication which was here this morning!

From the purchase, the two sentry poses above and a couple of the more dynamic chaps below, front and back with some variation in paint, you can see what I meant about the 6-inch figure's shield arm in the previous but one post, on this figure it's far straighter giving a neater and more vertical look to the figure.

The choice of a man with a whip is odd, these were originally from the 60mm Warriors of the World line, and as such he was called Marcus Gaius, which seems to be a totally invented name (there are a couple of Gaius Marcus's in history), so is he whipping slaves (yuck) or propelling a chariot which would come later with the 54mm Ben Hur playsets?

Shot the previous top row again, with the addition - far left of upper row - of a soft PVC version from Heimo's European operation. These two are my favourite poses, possibly in part due to their having been copied by Giant and others in small-scale.

I like them so much in fact, I shot them again! Call it 'Trooping of the Colours', with the previously seen here on Small Scale World; pencil-sharpener statuette, and err . . . no colours!

The other guy from the top again, with a damaged orange polyethylene one who might be a good rack-toy copy or a reissue from Mexico or somewhere, I don't know? But a nice enough figure throwing a small spear or javlin.

I really like this guy as well, but he doesn't look terribly Roman! Some Illyrian, Thracian or Dacian 'barbarian' maybe? Equally, if you take him out of the time period, he's a Greek with the right helmet and a large Hoplon shield, but a very good sculpt with much dynamism.

My 54mm Ben Hur sample is incomplete and modern reissue production, so nothing to write home about, but that's alright I'm already home so I'll write it here as a box ticker. A few useful figures, but not a set which has ever got me excited, the seated figure is sitting on an ancient warship from a board-game which happened to be passing - Escape from Atlantis.

I shot these ages ago, they have been turning up in ones and twos, pretty much since I started collecting, so have some age, the most I've seen at once is three which came in from Peter Evans, but he'd probably also collected them over time, so the conclusion is something like Christmas crackers or gum-ball / capsule-machine prizes? Note that one of them is actually a Marx Egyptian pose - bottom right.

However, you can see here (taken after those three from Peter, or a Chris donation, maybe an Adrian lot?), that the bases are very Marx like, with two mould-release pin-marks, although also marked 'Made in Hong Kong', so . . . There were a few Biblical sets in the Marx Miniature Masterpiece lines, some of which may have contained the Egyptians (another - damaged - one added in the above shot, bottom left), which would explain the tool but not the base mark!

Equally, I don't know of any Romans being in the MM-sets, which is why I didn't photograph them, I don't have any, I do have Vikings, but they went up against the (very Tudor) Knights in this scale, and while the Knights get a soft-plastic unpainted version in the window boxes, the Vikings weren't promoted to those lofty, late production levels, let alone any no-existent Romans!

But, we have seen similar bases from Ri-Toys as Marx re-issues, mostly of known Miniature Masterpiece models as retailed in the UK by Marksmen and covered here once or twice now, but these Roman/Egyptian sculpts weren't among them and they (the Marksmen)weren't marked-up to Hong Kong.

All firms start small, even one which would get as big as Rado Industries did in the 1980's/90's (seem to have gone now, their place rather taken by Hing Fat!), and there's a possibility that if they got the HK Marx mould-tools which they clearly did (some at least), and if there was an Egyptian tool (for the biblical sets), there may have been with it, a Roman tool which didn't get used by Marx, maybe one tool, it would only be 12-16 small cavities.

Consequently, Ri-Toys might, early in their existence, have pushed both (Egyptians and Romans) through an injector and hawked them round the market as cracker/capsule novelties, with an added base mark? Lots of if's and maybe's, so I'm not saying that's what happened; definitely don't quote me! But it’s a possible explanation for these rare'ish and unusual versions of Marx sculpts?

As I was putting them all away, I found this chap, who is one of the missing poses above, indeed; the missing 'colours'! He's a chalky polyethylene in cream and probably Swansea production, home painted, you can see the white fogging of superglue near his left wrist, it's the only thing keeping him 'as produced'!

And thanks to the above named trio and others; my sample of the 30mm oddities is larger with duplicates and some probably came from John Begg, Gareth Morgan or Trevor Rudkin, it's all the oddities these guys save or send to me or the Blog/for the Blog that make the tale more interesting.

H is for How They Come In - Chris - May - 4

Vehicular 'Access All Areas' with this post on Chris's recent package to Small Scale World's Central Control Room, with a look at flying, floating and free-wheeling types - can you tell this first paragraph is sometimes the hardest to fill? If the muse has turned-in for the night, then she's turned-in for the night and that's it!

From the cake decorations and premiums pile; two Festival candle-holder trains, particularly pleased to get the yellow one as previously I though only Hong Kong had done it! Teeny-tiny coach with its father (a Hong Kong copy of a Manurba one) behind and a cereal premium 'Transport of the World' Chinese Junk.

Actually, there seem to be several iterations of the set, both either side of the Channel (La Manche) and either side of the pond, with cereal premiums claimed (UK/USA), margarine and coffee premiums (Germany and France respectively) and others, and different issues having different line-ups, there are also soft plastic copies from the colonies and bagged sets in opalescent pastel-colours which probably came via beach-side vendors at the sea-side, consequently (like the athletes) every example adds to the whole picture . . . one day we will look in depth at all of them together, this Chinese vessel is a subtle pink-white.

Hong Kong sports car on the left, odd body-shell on the right which might be Triang Minic or Jouef-Playcraft, they both had similar lines as rail-drive/new vehicle delivery items on their model railway flats/low-loaders/transporters? They were also both Lines Brothers!

Also a civilian car I suspect, probably from a bagful of rack-toys, but in a military green which makes it a staff-car! It actually looks quite like the Zephyr Dad had sometimes when he was 2IC in Hereford, or commandant in Brecon? Or was it a Zodiak? Big bench seat and wallowy suspension like American Cars, my brother and I thought it was better than a Rolls!

Another which is shadowing the verge between civil and military, both Chris and I have Googled all the likely movies with no luck and haven't found anything like it so it would appear to be from a  minor cartoon/movie or even small scene-specific? It's marked Disney so should be a shoe-in to ID, but so far no banana!

If you know, put us out of our misery! The driver slides back as the other [same] guy pops up to man the 'Gatling Gun'! We both suspect McDonald's, but the lack of any other mark beyond the 'DISNEY' (not even a date) rather rules that out as their Kid's Meal toys are usually covered in consumer information and licensing marks?

It's bloody cool though? Very Indiana Jones, or WWI'ish, and would [will!] go well with the Disney Store Indy' stuff - I wondered at Incredibles II which I haven't seen, or the latest 101 Dalmatians?

Actual Military now, with a Micro-Machines Frog/Scud divorced from its 'TEL' (transporter/erector/launcher), and a current twin-gun rack-toy tank, which we may have seen or not, there are a few out there!

Now . . . this is brilliant, a traditional, 1970's style, rack-toy BRDM, in four-part clip-together polyethylene, with the standard (for the era) US roundel from early-war aircraft! But . . . clearly a copy of the Play Art die-cast model of the same vehicle, most unusual, and a very gratefully received present!

Mini and Micro 'planes, I rather like the Iwako style eraser helicopter (plastic skid landing-gear and prop'), and again the rack-toy 'ethylene AWAC is fun. The teeny one on the middle is a Fairy Fulmar from Airfix's 1:600 Ark Royal - I ruined one when I was a kid!

The silver trainer type jet has a plug underneath and may be from a larger scale Carrier toy, while the mosquito is an MPC copy.

One the right two from cheepie sets, one camouflaged, one more colourful and a nice bronzed/weathered pencil-sharpener which will join the rest of the 'mocherette' accessories, for that still-in-the-pipeline page! All die-cast alloy.

W...T...F...? Gotta'be a wing-walking team, but who? Galloob? Corgi? 'China'? And why do only two have their goggles painted in (making them look like extra's on The Fly!) . . . that's the pilot, in brown, by the way - on his back . . . four ladies dancing on an aeroplane's wing . . . Mono- or Bi-? Answers on a postcard, or just let us know in the comments!

Naval elements include two Chris had previously sent me images of for a follow-up which never sort of happened, but it was also conversational in that emails were exchanged, they being the outside two.

Nearest the camera and the aircraft carrier are Hong Kong copies of TriAng Minic Waterline ships, while the coloured one is Galoob Micromachines. Which leaves the one I had question-marked against the WHW vessels and possibly also being WHW, but I fear it's looking more likely they are a lesser HK thing? Jury's still out on that one.

Ahh, yes . . . Royal Fail and Parcel Farce, conspiring to carnage! The Marx 'miniature Masterpiece' medieval horse will glue, as will the rather fine terracotta Santon with fish-baskets on a yolk-carrier, but the fixed-turret, twin-barreled, rack-toy tank has been well and truly unfixed!

I can't complain because thanks to Chris Smith they were all free! And it'll be the military figures next.

H is for He's a Big Boy Isn't He?

There was going to be a Technolog post here but with 160-odd out of 190-odd countries holding the parent country to cultural, military, political and financial sanctions or embargo, I feel it is my duty - as a believer in the basic tenets (at least) of liberal democracy - to do likewise, so, as this only came in yesterday, it can go here . . . in fact I must go and leave feedback!

Marx six-inch Roman, the paint is well done, but the all over blue (azure I think?) is a little disappointing if you ask me, and you sort of did by coming here! Hard polystyrene lump, here compared with the Poplar Roman who at 75mm is three inches himself, so not the best comparison, but the 60mm Marx and 30mm Miniature Masterpieces (next 'Ancients' post) were away to storage some time ago!

It's worth noting that his shield-arm has been rearranged (or was rearranged on the smaller ones) from the straighter posing of the other sizes, I suspect that was a mould-release issue, in the smaller sizes the figure might pop-out without trouble, in this scale you may have had catching, with all the verticals, angle it slightly and it may release more easily? 

I thought the face was particularly well done, I know it's easier at a larger scale, but it's still a skill to be impressed by! Although - a face only his mother (or a succession of possibly desperate eastern European 'models') could love; he looks a bit like Trump straight out of the orange spray-booth! This set was known as the Goldmarx series.

H is for How They Come In - Chris - May - 3

So continuing with the nice lot Chris Smith sent the blog at the beginning of May, brings us to the civilians, and kicks off with the sports figures!

I photographed the diminutive circus chap the wrong way round, and he's off to storage a while back, so a bit of a boo-boo there! He's in the style of the mini-copies of the Commonwealth 'dolls', but clearly a circus performer or ring-master, I guess a cracker prize/capsule toy, but he could be from an as yet unknown set!

The athletes we've seen before, and it's the large number of them in many sizes which makes every example useful against a future post on all of them. While the other item is fascinating - he appears to be a tobbogan or luge rider, so-far so normal, but his 'machine' is a large slab, and on the underside is a grove with angled striations which would seem to suggest movement over a simple worm gear? So some kind of enclosed, interactive plaything he's come lose from? Anyone recognise him? He probably goes back and forth in a slot or track of some kind?

A page of Firefighters is definitely in the pipeline, but in the meantime they keep coming in, and I haven't progressed much on the labeling, despite the fact that Theo van de Weerden has helped ID a lot, including some of these!

Racing drivers! Like firefighters these are many-aplenty in odd/job lots, and ID'ing them all will take the rest of my life! Two big ones, from beach/lawn toys, and a little die-cast chap from something which should be easier to find?

Likewise the many, many seated figures who have escaped their vehicle, horse, railway station or wagon over the years, the red one - front, is Tudor Rose I think, the red one - rear an Airfix or similar 'old fashioned car' model kit's driver in 1:32nd or 1:35th scale.

The rider (horse?) bottom right seem to have been coloured to match early Thomas rubber kids, but is a Polyethylene Hong Kong thing. Painted blue - front, looks like a Century 21 or similar Hong Kong chauffeur, while painted blue - rear, is from a similar Hong Kong item, possibly a crane, dump-truck or a variation of the popular fork-lift truck toys? The other three are random rack toy fodder!

Solider ground here, with two from a modernish (1980's/90's) set, an armless Blue Box mechanic with the larger 45mm Marx road/construction worker (sold here with the plastic, Hong Kong Muir Hill type dump truck, where the figure was also made) behind, and finally two of the possibly Lucky mechanics, taken from Dinky via Blue Box!

An eclectic mix here, with a guardsman! How do the ceremonials keep turning up in other themed shots . . . don't ask Hugh; you should know, you took the photographs! . . . anyway, I'd love to know who copied the Britains Shetland-pony in smaller scale, I have several now although this is the first in a  realistic brown, some Polly Pocket type thing?

Second upscale Matchbox game shooter clone this year, having never seen them before! A reverse colour-way of the cereal-premium hunter we looked at here. Behind him is a board-game hunter we may have seen here, or he may be one of two in the queue, but he might actually be new, he looks like a 3D version of the Trek (Spears Games) 2D flat?

Which leaves the figure I was told was used in those weather-clocks, but I believe he actually [also] turns up in cheapo copies of the Blue Box safari Land Rover?

Love the craft-carved 'yokel', he has the look of Greece, Turkiye or somewhere else in the Balkans? Common Ertzgibirge to his left, there's a Matchbox-copy farmer in a soft silicon ruber, I've yet to ID the set but it will be a rack-toy or die-cast of some sort.

A pair of legs (Barbie/Kinder?), two heads (Star Toy knock off's of some vintage action figure I've mentioned before I think) also copied as Monta-Man by Montaplex sobres, in monochrome.

The medic is Corgi - as an unpainted moulding - but I'm still not sure about the painted ones, die-cast accessories anyway, also die-cast; a wagon horse to be ID'd, and a PVC Micromachine Policeman finishes the shot.

And back to sports or 'horseflesh' as the trade has it! The two green ones are from that educational package set, the outer two are cracker toys I think, I used to believe they were from a board game, but many variations and colours have turned-up now, so Christmas crackers from the budget end of the spectrum seem more likely?

Many thanks again to Chris for sending them all for us to enjoy - vehicles and AFV's next . . . after more Romans?!!

News, Views Etc . . . Barney's shops!

New news from Herald Toys & Models;

"...We are delighted to announce that we have now acquired the remainder of the Wiltshire collection, which has particularly strong sections of Cherilea, Crescent and Lone Star, including many harder to find figures. This week we are kicking things off with the Charbens section, including some superb ACW Confederate and Union 'Moveable' soldiers. We will also be selling a large number of Britains Deetail toy soldiers and Timpo Swoppets, from the same collection, mainly via our Herald Toys and Models eBay Shop, though some will be available here through our website..."

There's an eBay shop? I didn't know there was an eBay shop! So . . .

Website

evilBay

F is for Fanciful Fellows!

Bit of a box-ticker, literally as it's the contents of the Charbens & odds ancients tub! I don't have many, but have managed to find most types (I've just realised I think there's a blue Hong Kong copy missing?) and all the poses.

My two originals, paint's a bit thin on the ground these days, but then the ground is shiny polymer which never held paint well, and although some early Charbens were chalky for the reason of pain adhesion, this set was a late addition to the range and didn't get a chalky iteration.

Unpainted/home painted, they may be from one of those home-paint sets, I don't know, but it would make sense? Flesh plastic and another two poses, you may have noticed they are all fighting over the wild strawberries . . . in their scale; the size of watermelons!

He's just helping himself with an axe swing! They were sold as Romans, but everything about them screams Greek, and a rather fanciful, pre-Classical era, Trojan War/mythical Greece at that!

This one is unpainted hard polystyrene, and may be a Prindus (Prison Industries) figure who avoided the painting phase in his hurry to find giant strawberries?

Duplicates from the recent/current form of re-issue, a dense, rigid polymer in a neutral grey. You may have also noticed the kilts are a bit short? The greaves look a lot like pantomime booties as well, so there's a quite theatrical look to them, but they have plenty of charm, and might work as Etruscans against true Romans?

Because there's a bit of room in their tub, they get the odd's which are - from the left; an Athena Greek . . . Greek tourist figure, not that rare, but finding the spears intact (polystyrene) is always a bonus.

Then a chess-set pawn, who's a bit more Roman. I think you can still find these in various finishes on Amazon, as whole (and not cheap) chess-sets, in metal or plastic, but these older ones are often to be found in rummage trays at shows, and while not a copy, his shield seems to have been influenced by one of the Marx 60mm set. Finally a modern Greek from Conte Collectibles, I think.

This guy's also in the same tub, a bit bigger than the others around 60-65mm (I didn't check at the time!) and from the liberal quantities of gold and silver paint; probably Argentinian! The fish-plate or scalloped armour has me thinking of Poseidon, was he from a set of gods? Also quite Ray Harryhausen'esque!