Lord of the Rings - 1979 American Express style.

 

Back in 1979, American Express card holders got the chance to lay their hands on a pewter set of 12 Lord of the Rings miniatures. I don't have many details unfortunately, but was lucky enough to pick up a slightly worn set a few months back which has just arrived courtesy of a friend in the good old US of A.

The underside of each base was inscribed with name of the character in capitals followed by;

Limited Edition

Fine Pewter

authorized figurine from 

The Lord of The Rings ™

by J.R.R. Tolkien

©1979

Elan Merch, Inc.

The complete set.

Gandalf.

Frodo.

Sam.

Strider.

Boromir.

Gimli.

Legolas.

Saruman.

Galadriel.

Gollum.

Nazgul.

(note the unhappy broken axe)

Orc.

Unfortunately I have no more details regarding the sculptor or reason behind the choice of characters... surely the Fellowship should have been represented in full? Perchance it was the usual suit decisions...

The Certificate of Authenticity, presentation box and leaflet images have has been sent by a friend via old eBay auctions and are presented here for information only with all kudos to the original owner(s?). If anyone has them and can get the chance to scan them I would love to replace them.

Any more details? Please let me know!

All the best for now.

David

enquiries@deartonyblair.co.uk

Lord of the Rings - Heritage / Der Kriegspielers style

As per previous posts, the joy of painting old school minis is something that never leaves me for long... this time it was a few of the Heritage Orcs, back from when they had the licence for the 1978 Ralph Bakshi cartoon version of Lord of the Rings. Max Carr sculpts and they really capture the feel of the movie.

1811 Saruman's Urak-Hai Orcs of the White Hand Clubs

I've since tidied up the helmets a little as I noticed the red at the metal edge looked wrong.

Besides a myriad of blisters for the range (including Cliff Sanderson sculpted 75mm ones), they also did a couple of boxed games... no exclusive minis unfortunately.

Edit - apparently the balrog only came with this set. The blistered variant was much larger.

The full range (and more) is on the Lost Minis WIKI;

http://www.miniatures-workshop.com/lostminiswiki/index.php?title=Heritage

A few years earlier Duke Seifried (amongst other sculptors) at Der Kriegspielers sculpted a large 'not' Lord of the Rings range including this Fellowship set. Games Workshop imported them back in the day but they were too expensive for my hobby budget at the time. I've named the Hobbits as I think they should be... Frodo is the only obvious one...

1057 The Companions

The four Hobbits

Gandalf

Strider

Boromir

Legolas

Gimli

Frodo

Sam

Merry

Pippin

The full range can be seen on the Lost Minis Wiki;

http://www.miniatures-workshop.com/lostminiswiki/index.php?title=Der_Kriegspielers_Fantastiques_%281000%29

Michael over at Classic Miniatures has most of these old ranges available nowadays;

https://classicminiatures.net/

Finally, a couple of minis I am completely at a loss to identify... a wizard and a monk. Early 80's or late 70's I assume. Help!

As always enquiries@deartonyblair.co.uk

Citadel Miniatures Middle Earth (1980's) Dunlendings

Back in the day (well, 1985), Citadel / Games Workshop had a licence for Lord of the Rings that they took over from Grenadier Models Inc (range here) who had only ever released 4 boxed sets. The earlier Heritage Models Inc release was based on the Bakshi cartoon and remains one of my favourite ranges ever (link to Heritage here). The pair of  (ME45) Dunlendings were sculpted by Bob Naismith... I asked him why he sculpted them in this large style but he couldn't remember - apparently they had a lot of free reign back in those days. The Lost Minis WIKI notes that they were shown on one flyer as ME45 Dunlendings Ogre Men. Great fun to paint and I feel the need to get a few more together. They're approximately 33mm from foot to eye level so quite large for ordinary 'wildmen'.

I've compiled a listing of this range below; most of the blisters featured a mounted and foot version. Strangely there was no Galadriel... 

Blister Packs

ME1 Fellowship Heroes (Strider, Frodo & Gandalf)

ME2 Fellowship Heroes (Legolas, Boromir & Gimli)

ME11 Gandalf the Wizard

ME12 Strider, Aragorn the Ranger

ME13 Frodo, Hobbit Hero

ME14 Legolas, Elf Hero

ME15 Gimli, Dwarf Hero

ME21 Boromir, Man of Gondor

ME22 Elrond, Half Elf Lord

ME23 Rohirrim (there were two versions released)

ME24 Gondor Citadel Guard

ME25 Rangers of Ithilien

ME31 Silvan Elves of Mirkwood (two versions, the 2nd release had multiple variants)

ME32 Noldor The Deep Elves (two versions, the 2nd release had multiple variants)

ME33 Dwarves (two versions, the 2nd release had multiple variants)

ME34 Hobbits of the Shire

ME35 Beorn: As Man & Bear

 ME41 Goblin Warg Rider

ME42 Orcs of the White Hand (two versions, the 2nd release had multiple variants)

ME43 Half Orcs of Saruman

ME44 Uruk-Hai (two versions, the 2nd release had multiple variants)

ME45 Dunlendings: Hill Men

ME51 Orcs of the Red Eye (two versions, the 2nd release had multiple variants)

ME52 Olog-Hai Troll (two versions)

ME53 Southron: Evil Haradrim

ME54 Easterlings

ME55 Mouth of Sauron: Evil Warrior Mage

ME56 Sauron, Saruman, Nazgul (Sauron seems to have been released separately as well)

ME61 Sauron: The Dark Lord

ME62 Saruman The White

ME63 Lord of the Nazgul

ME64 Black Rider: Ringwraith (two versions)

ME71 Corsairs of Umbar

ME72 Deadmen of Dunharrow (two versions, the 2nd release had multiple variants)

ME73 Barrow-Wights

ME74 Snagga: Goblins

ME75 Knight of Dol Amroth

ME81 Aragorn: King of Gondor

ME82 The Hobbit (TM) Personalities Pack

ME83 Tom Bombadil & Fatty Lumpkin

ME84 Great Eagle of the Misty Mountains

ME85  Treebeard: Mighty Ent

Boxed Sets

BME1 Fellowship of the Ring

BME2 Nazgul on Winged Beast

BME3 Balrog: Encounter at Khazad-Dum

Lots of images of the ranges are at the links below;

http://www.miniatures-workshop.com/lostminiswiki/index.php?title=Lord_of_the_Rings_%28ME%29

http://www.solegends.com/citlotr/index.htm

http://www.collecting-citadel-miniatures.com/wiki/index.php/Lord_of_the_Rings_-_1980%27s_Releases

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Any queries or, indeed if you have old lead to offload, give me a shout on enquiries@deartonyblair.co.uk

Der Kriegspielers - Lord of the Rings by any other name...

 

Back in the early 70's, Duke Seifried set up Custom Cast Inc which became one of America's largest manufacturer of wargame figures. Der Kriegspielers 'Fantastiques' were one of the earliest fantasy ranges (beaten by Miniature Figurines in '73 and Jack Scruby slightly after) and certainly the most diverse and colourful! The 1000 series was absolutely based on Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit with slight name changes in many case being probably too close to Tolkein's creations.

A full listing can be seen on the Lost Minis WIKI here.

I picked up a few pieces back in the day when Games Workshop (via Dalling Road mail order) imported them but they were, as was the way back then, too expensive for my meagre means. Michael Thomas now has most of the ranges available again (https://classicminiatures.net/) and I can vouch that they are indeed excellent high quality metal castings. Anyway, I was sorting through boxes and came across a bunch of the range so thought I'd better post them here... 

Lots more posts on DK if you click the labels on the right of the blog.

Hope you're all keeping well in these turbulent times.

enquiries@deartonyblair.co.uk