S is for Sandown Starter

The last Sandown Park toy show (7th September) was an odd one, in that most of my purchases, were bagged, boxed, or otherwise 'stand-alone' type things, rather than the usual handfuls of this and that, so I think I'm going to work through them as a series of smaller posts, with a few other bits in-between, to that end, one of the more mixed shots I ended-up with, was this one, so we'll get these novelty bits out of the way first, and I'll lump the few other odds (some military and sci-fi figures), in the last post!

 

Clearly a wild west theme here, with two Hong Kong rack toys, and the UK equivalent of a dime-store item, issued by Thomas in the 'States, and in a roundabout way, also a rack-toy equivalent! The interest here being that the trio of canoeists and their vessels, are hard, glassy polystyrene, like the Indian family, as issued in the US, rather than the soft polyethylene associated with UK production - thankfully with all oars and feather intact, but on a Poplar Plastics card.

 

This destroys the last remaining 'rule' in my head about this set, that the hard plastic was US and the soft was UK, and with the Thomas-Pp-T*R rules looking increasingly shaky, it's anyone's guess who manufactured/issued/carried what, when, where and why!

 

And, you can see where the Giant 'Canoe Race' set came from, a direct lift of this set, but with an extra canoe, and probably a much reduced (as much as 50% less?) retail price-point, the frugal would have taken the other home!

 

We've seen both the horse and the rider/s in the past in mixed lots, donations or charity-shop plunder, we may even have seen them together, but the beauty (loose use of the word beauty!) of a small, sixpenny, or half-shilling generic like this, is the confirmation it brings, of what [rider figure] goes with what [horse type]! Note the flash on the rider's left arm!

While the jig-puzzle toy came as part of a novelty lot, with three other jig-toys and a Merit . . . no, I keep making that mistake . . . a Kleeware locomotive whistle, possibly a mould swap with someone like, or copy of - Lido, Pyro or similar, as it's a US type locomotive, albeit with simplistic wheels! The bowling-pin is new to the collection and the fire engine is a new colour-way.

S is for Seen Elsewhere - Unknown Canoe

It's one of those facts of life that you get together with someone to do a 'mini-season' on canoes, you think you've done a good-enough ('for now') job, and then more keep dribbling in! I can't remember if it was a BIN or a low first-bid, but I picked this up really cheap the other month, and it's a lovely novelty Indian canoe, with Native American flats as crew!

 

I think these are some of the first shots with the new camera, more on that later, but in comparison with the one Brian Berke sent us - first as images for the mini-season, and then as this physical example in one of the two parcels he's sent recently - you can see the new one is the current holder of the largest canoe in the collection title!

It's a similar set-up to the small-scale 'hollow-horsed'/'Giant' type, with clips in the bottom of the boat to receive the figures, but here they are seperate, not on a strip, however I suspect some relationship, if only of the plagiarism/influence type?

Quite thick flats, with plug-in oars, both the figure and oar sculpt are repeated three times.

And obviously you can plug the oars in from either side, note the pond towing-eye at the 'front'.

Although having a lot of the hallmarks of Hong Kong production, I feel it could be early British (Tudor Rose, Merit, Lipkin or somebody like that?), but equally could be European, and is obviously in the same vein as the artillery shooting set (large scale flats) by Ideal/Kleeware? Any ideas?

L is for Lone Ranger

I Posted these elsewhere the other day, not something I collect, and we never went down the Wild West route with our Action Man (men?), so purely for those who will like a look, or enjoy the nostalgia hit, it's the The Lone Ranger line from Marx Swansea's 1978 catalogue.

 

Hi Ho! Silver, Away!

M is for Merry Mass of Malleable Model Mayhem! 9 - Wild West

So, we reach the end of another fantastic donation from Chris, and in the end I got it down to nine posts, not that I try to minimise it, but I tried to go for an 8/9 images per post, to keep it interesting, and today, it's the Wild West.

 

Two of the lollipop figures, and I think one French, one Polish? The other yellow one seems to have some contention in that I showed one pack, and someone else recently posted them as something else, while the painted cowboy is from the Bucking Bronco magnetic novelty of the 1950's.

 

And we have another Blue Box character figure, I think he has a damaged bow, but a 'styrene figure, sold singly to scud-about in the bottom of a biscuit-tin or cigar-box with everything else is bound to get damaged, so if you have a whole one, I suggest you're a lucky chap/chapess? And it's from the 12 known poses, not the mythical 31, still up there as a falsehood!

This was in the 'Bulgarian' bag, and if it isn't another iteration of the old Britains Hollow-cast Colonial/Yeomanry-era cavalry horse! The Indian may not go with the rest, but I think he does, same plastic, and he fits, he's just got shorter legs?

 

Small scale to be sorted another day, but items of interest are to the right, with foot figures, Blue Box bits, a home -painted tee-pee/tipi and the hard plastic roof guard from a die-cast metal stage-coach I always forget the maker of, but hard to find with the rifle intact, and in the less common brown plastic - they're usually black.

More of the Crescent/Lido family, we had a good look at them once or twice recently, and there are three different sources represented here, marked, unmarked and a soft 'ethylene one, so they will get sorted into the main and revisited in the future.

 

Three probably French bazaar types from two sets on the left, with three of what I used to call Culpitt's on the right, but we now know they are also, or can be Jouets Super Plastic set from France, as almost certainly supplied by Injectaplastic, while with the animals Azur, Prior and Rena also become involved, and a further chapter involving farm and circus, with another branding, is growing in a folder in the long queue.

 

Hong Kong copies of Gulliver (Brazil) copies of Atlantic (Italy) figures, scaled between the sizes of the Italian originals!

 

Mixed lot, all interesting with a Hong Kong sub-scale rider, I think I have a spare stubby-horse for him somewhere! A larger copy of the Airfix/Tudor Rose et al rider for the old Britains horse seen above from Hungary, Airfix and Britains piracies of enough merit to have their own zones, and a hard-plastic horse we will be returning to soon.

 

A hard polystyrene canoe with is clearly marked Tim Mee so I'm assuming its Timmee Toys but I stand to be corrected by one of those more knowledgeable, yet normally less vocal than myself!

I can't recall if this was in the Hungarian bag, or is just another Hong Kong piece, but rather unique with the rod-stand, and obviously a copy of a Britains Herald piece, it's a lovely addition to the stash?

 

As is this! How fantastic is this? Obviously a Christmas Cracker/'Gumball' novelty, with a lenticular picture of a chap struggling with a bucking horse, just a lovely thing to be sent, free, in the post. And an amazing survivor of the . . . 1970's?

And this is Chris Smith's third parcel this year? With two lovely ones from Brian in the 'States, while Jon Attwood sent four huge ones which were really five, because two were taped together! Peter Evans has sent half a dozen bags of bits and brought more loveliness to shows for me. John Begg, Adrain little, Gareth Morgan and others have saved bits for me, or put interesting things aside to give me 'first dibs' and it's difficult to get across how grateful I am to all of them, but believe me, I know and appreciate how lucky I am to have that much support, when I have so many apparent 'eemies'!

 

Cheers Chris, another parcel full of beautiful things, interesting things, quirky things, funny things, rare things . . . I'm very grateful.

C is for Canoes - 24 - Langley Models

 Well, having pulled the 24th post and shelved three others, there wasn't going to be a 24th post on this 'canoe season', started by Brian Berke's sending of his images about (over?) two years ago. But Jon Attwood kindly sent these yesterday after some eMail shenanigans, so we have a twenty-forth instalment!

Langly Models have a vast range of civilian and military subjects, aimed primarily at railway modellers, among which are these two modern sports canoes, a single-seater and a double seater of the fibreglass-reinforced resin type.

 

Quite similar in looks to the Airfix commando canoes, you could equip the Matchbox guys with a few of these instead of their silly little rubber jolly-boat!

Many thanks to Jon for these, and many, many thanks to Brian for his original tranche of photo's which kicked this off, and for his patience as it kept being put back for one reason or another, in the course of it all I have added the new 'canoe' tag to a few older posts, and while I probably haven't found all of them, and we certainly haven't covered more than a few, it's a good basis for further study!

C is for Canoes - 23 - Marx

I've recived shots for a 24th post, which won't surprise you, you had no idea of the plans, but they were originally for 22 posts, which stated to look like more a week or so ago, although the original 24th was to be Thomas-Poplar, but I may hold them for now as we covered them quite well a while ago here, and they can be a stand-alone post in a few weeks, or something?

 

In the end we might have got to 30, but I pulled the posts on Modern Metal production as the images were mostly current commercial ones sent to me more for reference, and likewise a Ron Barzo post, where I think The Toy Soldier Company are still using all the images! But, Dogs Of War, Frontline, Jon Jenkins and Little Legion all have very good white metal native canoes, Barzo have done two or three over the years, in resin, and I meant to do the Crescent slush-cast lead one, but it didn't happen!

 

Did we do the five-piece plastic Cherilea one? Oh yes, years ago, now tagged, and the other day, with bits and bobs in other posts . . . My 'eemies' have very small victories, but they have very small minds! Heehee!

 

Marx UK version of the Johnny West canoe, Now I have a confession to make here; when we were kids I hated the Marx 12" Wild West set, for a number of reasons, all of which fail to meet the test of retrospective scrutiny. To wit: Wild West (we had Action Man, and he was all WWII-to-Modern), PVC accessories (like late Action Man sets!), Hong Kong manufacture (well a lot of Action Man's stuff especially the stuff shared directly with GI Joe was firmly stamped HONG KONG!), different articulation (they still pose well), lack of real-cloth over-clothing (they are well detailed) . . . it was simply some sort of childhood/childish snobbery!
 

The fact is, as 'any fool know', they are very well-made, characterful and the PVC accessories have mostly stood the test of time, if I had a better budget and more space I'd probably start collecting them!

 

Luckily I don't have enough of either, but for those who do, they don't seem to be that rare (but then neither is Action Man these days, after the heady gold rush of the 1990's, a lot has come out of the woodwork!), although, I'd collect through part/bitty/job-lots, as the near perfect ones are often set far higher than they are worth!

But the canoe doesn't seem to come up so often and may be worth any premium it carries, there were none available when I looked on evilBay the other day. A US made version, shown above, I think.

 

Marx also did a 54mm/1:32nd scale canoe, and this is Brian's reissue. We saw the nominally 'HO' one, in the small scale post a few days ago. Many thanks again to Brian for the images.

C is for Canoes - 22 - Others, Unknown

Quickie tonight (this morning!), it's funny how there are rhythms in randomness, I often lose or drop my posting rate as a new month starts, and it's nothing deliberate; purely real-life intervening, but as phenomena, these events do seem to come around regularly!

A couple of shots I took at the end of the domestic photo-shoot, using a couple of my buckshee paddlers (20% of the vintage Cherilea items acquired!) and showing one of my unknown boats, it seems to be two halves, but no sign of glue so possibly friction welded and again, like many of the others; a bit too smooth, but would benefit from a painting, by someone who knew what they were doing! Timpo load fits nicely! Unmarked, but Hong Kong - I think, and a polystyrene or hard propylene?

 

I also have this which is quite a big beast as you can see from the two Crescent Natives. It's  hard polystyrene as well, and ribbed a bit like the Thomas/Poplar ones, but with wider gaps between the ridges, also like them, it is sufficiently rounded and keeled to lean to one side on a flat surface, and would certainly displace enough water to float. Any ideas on either of them? Is this one a roof-load from a dime-store car?

C is for Canoes - 21 - Others, Known

Scraping the tail-ends fo the folders now, and we've missed loads, but it's been a reasonable wizz round some of what's out there, and here are a few shots, mostly from the Internet, of other brand's canoes.

 

Alphabetically, we start with the Lego canoe from the Wild West range, pretty-much gone now, and started after my Brother and I had given-up Lego, it's obviously marred by the locating-studs in the bottom of the boat, but could provide the basis of a reasonable conversion into something more realistic! 

Safari . . . humm . . . I'm not sure that it's even a vessel to be placed on water, as it might be a cooking/washing utensil? That half-hollowed log next to the boy, centre-right is what I'm looking at, more of an Amazonian Indian practice piece I fear!

Schleich go with their usual larger scaled piece, but it's nicely finished and would make a good war canoe for war-gamers, as it would take a shed-load of 54mm Native Americans!

 

Starlux chose a sort of vac-formed piece which has more of the look of a Nile Vessel, of several thousand years earlier, made from bundles of reed-straw! But, it was only ever meant to be a toy, and its fragile nature means it doesn't turn up often.

 

This is the smaller, earlier Tim Mee again, I somehow missed the image when doing their post a week or so ago, my bad! It's got those weird pins on either side to hold it level and upright, which makes you wonder why it took until Britains/Timpo to come-up with waterline versions, until you realise many hollow-cast and solid metal makers had flat-bottomed canoes, for years or decades prior, and that Tim Mee were just guilty of trying to be too clever!

C is for Canoes - 20 - Wend-Al (and Quiralux?)

Just a box ticker as the two folders (Brian's and mine) thin out to a finish! This was on feeBay about two years ago, and while I did have a couple of other images of colour variations, I noticed the other day they are still on sale! So I won't use them now, but, Dude, if you've relisted something for two years; your Buy-It-Now is set too high?

 

As I've said for years to anyone who'll listen (attracting a few more 'eemies' along the way), none of this stuff is 'rare', it was all mass-produced!

 

Playful, chunky and almost indestructible! for such a 'solid' material, the figure is a nice animated sculpt, but the boat is definitely toy-like, and too short. Wend-Al and maybe Quiralux, in different paint?

 

But retuning to the previous point for a second, I was perusing this Faceplant site earlier today;

 

https://www.facebook.com/groups/270886240594726/?hoisted_section_header_type=recently_seen&multi_permalinks=1000722010944475

 

 . . . and there are guys on there with boxes of Astrid, or trays of Miniajouets or a shed-load of Gulliver, Pech, Comansi . . .  or whoever, literally; none of it is rare.

 

The rarities are the exceptions, where a set was never issued (Britains 'Superdeetail'), or the mould was lost on the first morning of production (Lone Star Musketeers) or something equally catastrophic, or the firm was very small, and it was a long time ago (some of the early 'from hollow-cast'), but for everything else, it's just a question of waiting!

C is for Canoes - 19 - Dorset Models RCMP

Brian had a hankering for a Royal Canadian Mounted Police canoe, and when he couldn't find a decent premade one, he bought a casting or two and painted-up his own! Inspired by the books, comics and annuals of his childhood . . .

"When I was a lad watching TV in the 50's & 60's there was a rule that only movies of a certain vintage could be shown on TV, nothing recent if there was any chance of renting them out to the Cinemas that ran old films, the Rerun Houses.

What was shown were old 30's films with the RCMP bringing law and order plus songs to the frontier. As a result of that imagery, also covers of pulp magazines and some old schoolboy adventure books of my Dad's I developed a romantic view of early American explorers using birch bark canoes."

 

 

He chose the ex-Dorset Models casting, now part of Imperial Miniatures, to which order he added an RCMP and Native paddlers. I can't add much, so enjoy the images!

 

Many thanks again to Brian for all his Canoe stuff, there are a few more posts in the queue, but I've pulled one or two and need to have a rethink, but still more to come . . . !

C is for Canoes - 18a & 18b - Airfix Blog Updates

I've added a bit of content to the two Airfix Commando pages, which includes all three different canoes, so a sort of Brucey-bonus for the canoe season!

 

 

Ist/4th (current) type

http://airfixfigs.blogspot.com/search/label/Commandos%20-%201st%20Type

 

2nd (British production/3rd (French production) type

http://airfixfigs.blogspot.com/2015/09/1978-wwii-british-commandos-1732-01732.html

C is for Canoes - 17 - HO-OO Scaled

A rather limp chapter in this canoe 'season', as I haven't done all the Merten/Noch/Preiser ones for a start, there's at least one metal one, and there are others, but here's a few which I happened upon as I was building these article folders

Atlantic have given us a trapper canoe in the Davy Crockett set and a raft in the Kit Carson set, smaller boxings would have one of each whole runner, sometimes cut into two with a smaller piece (the four - common/duplicate - mouldings beyond the obvious gap) and a larger piece with all that set's unique pieces on. Larger sets could have up to four or six complete runners, they aren’t rare; just over-hyped!

 

Woodland Scenics give us a pair of modern touristy/back-packing boats with obviously young people on a day-out/adventure, pre-painted polystyrene in the manner of the European figures mentioned above, but not painted to the same quality as Preiser or Noch.

 

The little Marx boats from various Miniature Masterpiece sets; silver paint only adds to the decorative nature of these, which were to be parked near the camp (there were no suitable crew/paddling figures), where matching toylike teepees were to be found, some of the other Wild West accessories however were much better, and the same camp would have a really nice little drying rack for an animal skin.

 

My homemade effort, I found it again in the recent moving of stuff, but it got damp in the 2007 flood and needs to be rebuilt, or just replaced! It was an evening's exercise in paper folding or curving; a boat is a dynamic shape, and a waterline model of one has it's own complications! Either side of it are the Thomas/Poplar canoes, painted with gloss brown by someone other than me!

 

Poly Pocket from Bluebird Toys, licenced to Mattel in the 'States, provided another leisure craft for the diminutive little madame to punt about in a flooded powder compact, but hide the seats with stores and paint it up, it's got the lines of a nice Native American boat?