A Reintroduction

I am not completely happy with it – the curses of an artistic temperament, alas – but this year’s Sampler is up! 

It’s been up since early Thursday morning, but I wanted to do my shopping trip yesterday and I didn’t have time to make my formal announcement. My “trip” was unusual, but I’ll talk about it another day when I’m feeling a little less out of sorts.

(How unusual? At one point I was stuck in traffic behind the 2023 Corvette! That is not a typo, and no time travel was involved.)

As a bonus, I’ll offer up color versions of the pictures accompanying the Early Micro Runs article. I was originally going to include them in color in the Sampler, but I decided to keep it all in black and white instead. 

(By the way, printed copies will be available next week: I’m kind of wiped right now and I just want to chill for most of the weekend.)

It really is kind of remarkable that I have pictures of all these things, especially since I physically own none of them. I was present for raffles of the Rose Gray Proud Arabian Mare and the Red Bay Cantering Welsh Pony, but didn’t win either of them, naturally. Even back then I was not so lucky.

Oh, and for those of you joining us for BreyerFest, howdy! The current content has been a little BreyerFest-focused because it’s that time of the year, but it can – and does – change. 

I try to post about ten times a month (every three days or so) and while most of the content is about Breyer History, it sometimes veers off into other topics I am interested in, including: quilting, comic books, art history, old movies, gardening, and the weird stuff that only seems to happen to me (yes, I’m one of THOSE people!)

I’ve been collecting since 1974, been involved in the hobby since 1978, and I’ve done work for Breyer – off and on – since I published my first article in the original Just About Horses in 1985. I still occasionally do work for them, but as you’ll see, I’m also not afraid about calling them out when they sometimes do dumb things. 

I’ve done everything in the hobby from live showing to customizing to pedigree assignment (we called it “breeding” back in the old days!) but my first love has been researching and obsessing over model horse history, particularly Breyer History. 

I will confess that I don’t know everything, I am occasionally wrong, and I am sometimes a bit of a drama queen (if you didn’t already get that from the blog title). 

I also occasionally – and absolutely unintentionally, I swear – talk about models before they’re released. This is super-awkward because there are some things that I’m not supposed to talk about. 

Like the Corvette, time travel is not involved, and I make no claims of psychic abilities: I just know the market and the product well enough to be able to make better predictions than most. Whether I realize I am doing it or not.

And in case you’re going to ask, my social media presence is a light one. I have a pretty busy offline life, and other than this blog, my Internet activity is not a priority. 

I also do not have a Facebook account, and hope to keep it that way. Long story short: aside from the fact it is not a good fit for the way I socialize in general, I also happen to think that Facebook’s business model is doing more harm to the world than good, so I try to keep my interaction with it to a bare minimum.   

Glossy Chalky Buckskin

The first thought that came to mind when I saw in-hand pictures of Goldfinch was: holy cats, this is My Girl all over again.

The 2016 Vintage Club release My Girl, on the Cantering Welsh Pony, came in three colors: Gloss Bay, Gloss Palomino, and Gloss Alabaster. When I opened the shipping box and discovered that I had received the Alabaster – my third choice – I was slightly crestfallen. 

I think Gloss Palomino is a highly underrated vintage color, and who doesn’t love a lovely Gloss Honey Bay? But Gloss Alabaster can be hit or miss, depending on its shading, or lack thereof. And as far as shading goes, the initial pictures of the Alabaster My Girls showed a definite lack.

Then I opened up her actual box-box, and fell in love with Glossy Chalky Alabaster. 

I think I kind of love Glossy Chalky Buckskin, too.

If I don’t get picked from what’s going to be a very small waitlist – because people are definitely willing to put themselves in short-term debt if they know they can make an almost-immediate profit – I’ll just have to let it go. 

I have a little too much stuff anyway. 

That’s what I keep telling myself, but there I was at the toy store after I got my first COVID shot Saturday, trying to persuade myself that I really didn’t need Obsidian.

I did manage to walk out of the store horse-free. This time.

(In all seriousness, though, if I do start buying seriously again, I think I’ll start with the homely little Standing Stock Horse Foal. Not a lot of demand, not a lot of rarities, not a lot of Test Colors, Oddities or Whatever.) 

Painted Ribbons

Breyer has never been consistent about painting molded-on ribbons and bobs, so the latest hobby perturbance over Alejandro’s unpainted ribbons has floated past me.

Earlier examples of the original Cantering Welsh Pony had painted ribbons; later ones generally did not, and even later releases have been all over the map. Most of the new molds released in the late 1970s and early 1980s that featured braiding – like Halla, and the Classic USET horses – also didn’t come with painted braids, outside of a few possible Samples and Tests.

The Classic Polo Pony rarely got the painted ribbon treatment – I believe the 1994 Show Special Silver Comet is the only Production Run release that did – and the Clydesdale Stallion’s forelock ribbon is also only occasionally painted. (And only after Nancy Young pointed out the fact that it was even there at all!)

It’s not like it’s something new with the Brishen mold, either: of the three previous releases featuring the fancy plaited “down” mane, only the BreyerFest 2013 Laredo release has handpainted ribbons. Tesoro de Oro and Dag Dia didn’t get them.

Why some models get the painted ribbon treatment and some do not nowadays is complicated, and not entirely cost-related. If cost was the sole factor, we wouldn’t see painted ribbons on $4.00 Walmart Stablemates like the recent G2 Saddlebred release in the Mystery Surprise series:

With the Walmart Stablemates I suspect it’s a matter of quantity and bulk pricing – Walmart sells tons of Stablemates! – and creating the appearance of value. Adding detailing to small, incidental items like Stablemates increases the likelihood of impulse sales. More sales? More money!

By the way, painted ribbons on Stablemates releases are a relatively recent phenomenon, all around. It wasn’t until the late 1990s that the G1 Saddlebred finally got them, in the Sears and JC Penneys Stablemates Assortments available through their respective Christmas catalogs – over twenty years after the mold debuted in 1975! Considering the execution, however, they probably should have waited a bit longer.

Partial Overpaint Special Runs

Man, I wanted Koh-i-Noor so bad, but the budget is definitely said nope:

Aside from the free postage, I do like that they added the extra incentive of variations: most will have 4 stockings, but some will have fewer, or none at all!

I’ve been wanting them to do the intentional variation thing for a while now. One of the weaknesses of shipping the bulk of painting to China is that it’s resulted in a almost boring consistency: with strict quotas to meet and Station Samples to match, significant variations like missing (or added) markings are even more of a rarity.

This is, of course, not the first time that Breyer has added some paint touch-ups to overstock and repurposed them as a Special Run. (Beyond Gloss, obviously.) One of the most famous – and one of my favorites! – was the “Golden Bay” Trakehner, made from leftover 1987 Just About Horses Special Run Chestnut Trakehners:

Approximately 467 pieces were made as a Special Run for Small World, who also received an even smaller run (97 pieces) of the 1985/6 JAH Special Run Dapple Gray Cantering Welsh Pony with gold ribbons painted over the original red that year.

A third Partial Overpaint Special Run occurred in 1989, when Black Horse Ranch had a 146-piece run of the 1988 JAH Special Running Stallion, with added black manes and tails.

The Cantering Welsh is almost impossible to find nowadays – there are less than 100 pieces, and it’s the Cantering Welsh Pony.

The BHR Running Stallion is moderately hard: although it’s relatively scarce by nature of its low piece run, prices haven’t been too outrageous when they do come on the market. While his paint job is quite lovely, especially for a late 1980s release, the similarity to the original #129 Bay probably suppresses his value a bit on the secondary market.

With the continuing popularity of the Vintage Club Decorator Gambler’s Choice Sailors, however, that may change. (I haven’t seen enough of the BHRs on the market recently to judge.)

But Koh-i-Noor? I don’t know. The Christmas release that he was leftover from was pretty popular on its own, but 750 pieces feels like a fairly large run compared to other Partial Overpaint SRs.

I see two different possible scenarios happening.

The first is that the stated fact that there are 750 pieces total of this run is going to skew the market. While it won’t necessarily affect the buying habits of most active-hobby hobbyists (who realize 750 is kind of, well, a lot), it will affect more casual collectors, who will see it as A Big Deal. Thus the prices will remain artificially elevated for a while.

(Remember the first JAH Special, the Saddlebred Weanling? Same situation. Prices are still a little too darn high for her, IMHO.)

The same kind of thinking significantly boosted sales of Reeves’s “Limited Edition” models of the 1980s and 1990s, well beyond that of the Regular Run models issued the same year. I remember getting into a super-awkward discussion years ago with a casual collector/dealer at the flea market who insisted that her mint-in-box #833 Dream Weaver was really, really rare because it was a “Limited Edition”!

The second (and more likely) is that – like other similar offers that had random rare variations – the rarities will almost all end up being resold very quickly and at some ridiculous prices, then the bulk of the “ordinary” four-stockinged ones will end up on the secondary market pretty quickly also, and at a minimal mark-up.

I have other things to worry about right now, so whether I get a Koh-i-Noor sooner – or later – is not a looming concern.

My Alabaster Cantering Welsh Pony

I’ve been trying to get caught up in my paperwork, but with little success; every time I pick up a horse to examine it, I end up losing valuable time just staring at the darn thing. One that’s been particularly hard to get past has been my Alabaster Vintage Club Cantering Welsh Pony My Girl:

When they were first announced, I was hoping to get the Palomino, but I have to say that I am exceedingly pleased that I received the Alabaster instead. In fact, she’s been such a distraction in my office that I’ve had to pack her back in her box and tuck her away from my sometimes less-than-dainty fingers.

The only minor quibble I had with her – and the original reason I was hesitant to deem the Alabaster my first choice – was that she didn’t have much in the way of body shading as the original White and Alabaster releases did, especially examples from the early 1960s. Even last year’s now highly-coveted Bonus Vintage Club Stablemate Bravo had some!

But when I opened her up, that lack of body shading was forgiven. In fact, she reminded me a lot of the Semi-Chalky Alabaster Running Mare I picked up last year, who has also become another fast favorite of mine. (Her yellowy parts whitened up real nice in the window, by the way!)

In every other respect they nailed the color, other than the name of the color on the box itself. As I explained earlier this year (first in the Sampler, then here) it should have been “White”.

I only finally figured that little nugget of trivia out this year – that the term “Gloss Alabaster” is a recent invention, and that in the 1960s those models were almost always labeled “White” – so that mistake, as it were, is easily forgiven.

Ugly Horse Cooties

I feel sorry for Morganglanz. I’m tempted to buy a Big Easy Bash Gris Gris; I have money in the Paypal account, and they’re not going for much more than the issue price ($165.00). I already have a tiny cohort of Exclusive Event models he could join - one I received as a gift, two from the NPOD - so he wouldn’t seem totally out of place.

He wouldn’t necessarily be the designated "rare" Morganglanz of the herd, either. That honor would go to this sample/test shot piece I bought at BreyerFest a few years back:

The black bits aren’t paint, they’re plastic - likely from some partially painted regrind. If they were testing/tweaking the mold settings, it would have been a waste to use fresh plastic that would have ended up in the regrind bin anyway.

This is also why some hobbyists find "ordinary" plastic underneath Basecoat Chalkies. They’re just not scratching/cutting in the right places to find the color swirls.

There was some discussion at the event about "remodeling" molds like the Cantering Welsh Pony and the Performance Horse. This I didn’t quite understand. Why rework already modestly popular molds, when you have homely wallflower Morganglanz sitting in the corner, unloved and scarcely used?

He doesn’t have a big or fanatical fan base that would get overly dramatic over any alleged improvements either, as I’m sure would be the case with the Cantering Welsh. (That they’re even suggesting that idea on that mold, frankly, is heretical. Ne pas toucher le CWP!)

And he’s really not all that homely - a new tail and some buffing/surface polishing of the mold, like the Trakehner, would go a long way towards ridding him of his "Ugly Horse Cooties". Here’s a quick silhouette of him in his original state:

Here he is with a different tail (one I did in 5-10 minutes - thus the lack of finesse):

Dress that up in some nice clothes - a simple yet sophisticated Dun Pinto like last year's Surprise Roxy - and I’m fairly certain that you wouldn’t have seen half the run on eBay or MH$P.

Scaling the Mountain

We’re getting to that point in the flea market season where I’m now beginning to regard the models I’ve left behind as my touring collection; I've even named a few. All I bought this past weekend was some produce, a few china miniatures, and a clutch of empty and unused Testor’s 1/2 ounce paint bottles. Because they cost almost nothing, and reminded of the artist Joseph Cornell.

(In case you were wondering, they are just a tad too small to squeeze most MiniWhinnies in.)

I swung over to the nearest Tractor Supply on the way home, but it didn’t look like they had fully set up their Holiday Stuff yet. Even though some people are apparently already listing them at - and getting! - some crazy prices on eBay, I have no worries. I somehow managed, in the chaos of last week, to secure a Grail of mine so scarce that I had some years ago deemed it nonexistent.

To dampen that joy, I also discovered the whereabouts of a more recent Grail. That one will most definitely not be coming to live with me, now or probably ever.

The former item you’ll hear about in due time; the latter you will not. Not here. (All I will say? It’s not about the money involved.)

Now, onto the matter at hand - the Secret of the Reissues. It turns out that the bodies involved in creating them weren’t just leftovers from recent Regular Runs and Special Runs: based on their mold marks, they’re older than that. The Clydesdale Mare still has her original mold mark, for instance, and the Shires still have the U.S.A. imprint. So it’s possible that these bodies may be pre-China leftovers.

The problem is that Reeves hasn’t been real consistent with altering these mold marks, and with multi-year production gaps, it’s almost impossible to pinpoint the exact year when each mold was altered. The portion of the discussion on Blab where people were trying to determine the Clydesdale Mare’s mold mark change has since been deleted, due to the hacking incident; I think it was narrowed down to somewhere between 2003 (Lanark’s Rosebud) and 2007 (the Picture Perfect Black Pinto Spotted Draft).

(Don’t quote me on that, though. My memory of large portions of last week is extremely hazy.)

It’s been one of those topics that I’ve had on the back burner just a little too long; since late 2003, when I first noticed the alterations on some of the Early Releases for 2004. And some did not: I swear I saw examples of the Cantering Welsh Pony release Party Shoes - the one in Palomino with high whites - with the old mold mark as well as the new, sitting on the shelf together at a local toy store.

(Some of Reeves’ PR photos of Party Shoes show a model with a U.S.A. mark, for what that’s worth.)

The relatively low number of Clydesdale Mare Reissues compared to the others was also thus made explainable: it wasn’t just that they shipped/sold more at BreyerFest, they also used bodies from that same stash to make this year’s Volunteer Clydesdale SR. Same old mold mark!

I can’t recall if it was determined that the Betsy Ross (2007 BF Prize model) or Palisades (2012 Passage to the Pacific SR) were also pulled from the stash, but it wouldn’t surprise me if they were.

The Del Mar - a 2009 SR release - definitely was not. It amuses me to think that while Reeves may have had a small mountain of Clydesdale Mare sitting in a warehouse in New Jersey, they were molding and manufacturing entirely new ones half a whole away.

What this all means is that I’m now seriously considering ordering the Reissue Clyde Mare. Dang it! Someone really needs to invent a 27 hour day.

"By Popular Demand"

The past few days have been crazy stressful, again. The work schedule’s been changing on a daily basis, I’m still working on that Very Important Hobby Matter, and I had a dentist’s appointment today. (I get to keep ‘em another six months, yay!)

Due to the time crunch, I had to put away most of the bodies I was "playing" with. I haven’t lost the need to get all funky and creative, I’ve just moved back to sewing and quilting: when you have to do most of your crafting in your car, sewing is much more practicable than Dremeling. (No, I don’t need to know if there’s an attachment for that.)

One of my newer additions here - part of my latest box lot purchase - is this pretty solid-faced variation of the #105 Chestnut Cantering Welsh Pony:

Even though I seem to have an insanely large number of Cantering Welshies, this is the first solid-faced Chestnut I’ve had the pleasure of owning.

I don’t know why I didn’t see the need for having one before; I remember being very, very obsessed with getting the original bald-faced version of the Chestnut when it was discontinued in 1976. That was a couple of years before I became involved in the hobby, and the only way I could obtain such a rare and valuable creature was to harass my parents into dragging me to every toy store within a reasonable driving distance to our house.

(FYI: Mission accomplished.)

In 1979 Breyer brought her back, "by popular demand". It wasn’t all that unusual a maneuver in the 1970s; the scuttlebutt I heard was that it was done, primarily, to get rid of warehouse backstock. If the initial sales were good enough, they would put the item back into full production.

Such was the case with the Cantering Welsh: not only are most of the later pieces painted differently than the earlier ones - with solid faces and no ribbons - they also sport the "B" mold mark, common on molds from the late 1970s and early 1980s.

The solid-faced Cantering Welsh Ponies are somewhat less common than the bald-faced ones: the bald-faced pieces were available from 1971 through 1976, while the solid-faced ones were available from 1979 through 1981. There’s not a huge difference in the price between the two of them, though, since the demand for the mold isn’t what it used to be.

Little Miss Dressup

I was in a really strange place yesterday, during and after work. I felt almost euphoric. I didn’t have any reason to be, other than at the prospect of finally getting more than a few hours of uninterrupted sleep. It was more likely from the lack of sleep itself, and the sugar buzz I got eating half a bag of dried pineapple for breakfast (Hey, I was running late, and it was the best available option in my car’s pantry. Yes, my car has a pantry.)

So they released a couple more pics of BreyerFest SRs - a Bay Semi-Leopard Cantering Welsh Pony as a British Spotted Pony, and a Fleabitten Dappled Gray Jumping Horse, as the Best of British Contest Prize. Neither one of these pics were a part of the leaked batch, so they were both a surprise to me, too.

http://www.breyerhorses.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=1955

Well, I was expecting a CWP, and a British Spotted Pony; wasn’t expecting them to be the same model. Kinda cute; don’t know if I want her yet, but I won’t rule her out, either. The only thing that worries me about it is what it means about a potential Bouncer SR: now it seems more likely to be a raffle model, or a live show prize (the Brookside Pink Magnum, in gloss.)

That would be scary. Hobbyists haven’t exactly been rational on the topic of Bouncer, lately.

I am not extremely excited by the Contest Prize Horse. It’s not that I don’t like the model or the color, or the combination thereof: it’s that I already have two - a QVC SR Gem Twist, and a Test Color Alabaster Jumping Horse, from the mid-1980s (another Bentley Sales Dump Bin Find, at Model Horse Congress.) So it’s not like I really NEED another.

I’m still entering the contest, regardless of the quality of the prize. It’s about the competition, man! I’m sure he’ll be beautiful in person - I’m imagining a paint job something like the FEI World Cup Strapless from 2007. Loved it.

I need to start brainstorming some ideas, though. I’m trying to not be like everyone else and go with something Beatle, Dr. Who, Harry Potter, or Royal-related. (Or, heaven forbid, Austin Powers. There’s something about Mike Myers that makes me want to hit things with a hammer.)

As far as the Costuming contest goes, I fear we might be seeing much of the same. We’re not as imaginative (or knowledgeable) a group of people as we think we are. (Just how many "Maid Mare-ians" are we going to see? Or boyfriends/husbands dressed as James Bond?)

All the ideas I have so far are potentially illegal, possibly immoral, or dreadfully obscure. I think, for instance, a Professor Quatermass costume - complete with a giant stuffed grasshopper tucked under my arm - would be brills, but everyone else? Would be clueless.

Neil Gaiman? Incredibly easy: black jeans, black leather jacket, black Lou Reed tee, sunglasses. Not sure anyone except a few of my friends would get the reference.

The Avengers? Benny Hill? Dame Edna? Gordon Ramsay? Ada Lovelace? Space:1999? See where I’m going here? I am not lacking ideas - just ideas that might be recognizable to more than a half-dozen people.

I could just go the easy route, and reuse last year’s costume, but I think I might be reusing part of it for the Fascinator contest. The same concept, for both costume contests? Seems a bit tacky, to me. On the plus side, it’ll save me time and money.

Forgettable

I can’t believe I forgot about the Llanarth True Briton model in my discussion of potential BreyerFest Pony specials. Again! What is it about that mold that sinks it down my own personal memory hole?

(Yeah, I also forgot about the Cantering Welsh Pony and Newsworthy, but the forgetfulness doesn’t sting as much with them, somehow.)

Another pony that seems to inspire forgetfulness is the Galiceno Pony. Here she is in her original release of Bay:


It’s easy to see why she’s overlooked: like a lot of Breyer molds from the late 1970s, she’s a little on the bland and generic side (Stud Spider, anyone?) The mold itself is competently done, with a rather nicely sculpted head, but it’s definitely not one that inspires collector passion.

The mold has come in a small, but not displeasing assortment of colors over the years. In addition to the Bay, there have been two shades of Dun - a lighter shade as the 743 Criollo Pony, and a more metallic one for the BreyerFest 2004 Maracas Contest Prize - and a masked Black Leopard Appaloosa, as the portrait model for the POA Foundation Sire Black Hand. (Very well done, in my opinion.)

Then there was Freckle Doll, another one of Reeves’ more inexplicable pinto paint jobs:


I know I wasn’t the only one who opened the box, flipped her around, and then proceeded to yell out loud "That’s it - one big white splotch? Are you serious?"

I like to imagine that the Powers-That-Be must have forgotten that the mold already came in Bay, rubberstamped it for production, only realizing a day or two later the magnitude of the mistake. Which some brilliant quick thinker "solved" with a bit of acetone and a cotton ball.

I have absolutely nothing to back me up on this hypothesis, other than the wealth of other crazy-but-true stories I’ve heard that would make it seem not-implausible, at least.

The one advantage to the mold’s generic nature is that you can dress it up any way you want, and turn it into almost anything you need. So it’s not out of the realm of possibility that the Galiceno could turn up as a BreyerFest special this year. I think she’d be rather fetching in some shade of gray, dappled or otherwise.

Holiday Shopping

I won’t be putting my name in for Vignette this time around. I got my JAH in time to mail it in, but I made a decision a few weeks ago to refocus the collection: fewer "ooh, pretty horsie" pieces and more "historical/significant" ones. Part of that refocus includes having at least one example of every mold: that was the rationale for my attempt at Alpine.

I love the CWP mold, I really do, but I have lots of Cantering Welshies already.

I’m thinking I’ll probably spring for a Grab Bag: based on the $350 estimated value, there seems to be a high likelihood of porcelains showing up. Party Time, Dances with Wolves, Romantico: we know those guys are cluttering up the warehouse. I don’t have many of the porcelains - because, you know, I’m a big clumsy Buffalo - and this would be a good way of getting one at a price that won’t make me hyperventilate when I do eventually break the poor thing.

Speaking of Buffaloes and Connoisseurs, I’m not sure what’s up with everyone’s insistence that there’s just going to be Connoisseurs this time around, specifically Taima. Wishing for them - nay, almost counting on them? Seems awfully cynical, if you ask me. There’s plenty of other stuff kicking around the warehouse: WEG, recent discontinues, old XMAS stock, Fest SRs, Treasure Hunt items, Fall Dealer SRs, old plushies…

With my luck, I’ll end up with the assortment with all the stuff I already have, like Red Carpet Royalty, the Pink Poodle, and Buttercream. Now that I think about it, that’s not necessarily a bad thing: my sales inventory is getting a bit low. But I wasn’t planning on doing any more selling until Spring, and I hate having too much money tied up in inventory.

Maybe I should take my recent lack of horsebuying success as a hint, and blow my teeny-tiny year-end surplus on something more practical, like socks or antibiotics. (If I don’t have whooping cough, then whatever I do have is doing a darn good impression of it.)

In other news, I’m still being kept somewhat preoccupied by the Tack/Accessories Project. I made another discovery today: the Wood Corral was a mid-year or Holiday 1982 release, not a 1983 one. Something didn’t quite seem right with that date, so I skimmed through my Christmas Catalog binders, and voila, there it was in the 1982 Aldens Christmas Book:


As most hobbyists know, the Aldens company ceased operations in December 1982: the company itself didn’t "go bankrupt," but its parent company Wickes did. They sold off as many of the divisions as they could while reorganizing, but a buyer couldn’t be found for Aldens:

http://www.nytimes.com/1982/12/18/business/wickes-closing-its-aldens-unit.html

The infamous Black Pacer - and I assume, all of the other Breyer merchandise - was shipped back to Breyer, who then passed it to other mail-order companies, most notably Bentley Sales.

Compensation Packages

Been feeling a little down for the past couple of days - rejected as a BreyerFest volunteer, again. Man, it’s a big enough blow to the ego to get turned down for jobs that pay cash money, but for one that doesn’t? Ouch.

Of course, that’s not quite true - it does "pay" to be a volunteer. Everyone goes out of their way to say that oh goodness, no, I’m volunteering for the honor of it all - but let’s face it, the gratuity you get for that honor - an SR horse - is a very strong motivator for many. I rather doubt so many people would be as eager to apply if all Reeves offered was the standard convention volunteer package: t-shirt, hat, lunch, and free admission.

That’s not going to happen, of course. Those of us trolling Blab a few weeks back saw the carnage that ensued when the possibility of Reeves scaling back the Youth show prizes to something a little less financially rewarding was brought up. The sense of entitlement was … well, rather depressing. I didn't realize that fabulous rare prize models were now a live show necessity.

Maybe it’s because I grew up in the hobby before it was about the money - or less so, anyway. You showed for the glory of it all, for the big, giant rosettes and having your picture taken and possibly featured in Just About Horses or the Model Horse Gazette. If you volunteered in some capacity - to hold a show, or judge one - it was just because the activity itself was so fun and rewarding in and of itself.

You did it because you loved it, and your compensation was the boost it gave to your reputation - and admittedly, your ego. There’d be financial compensation, indirectly, in the form of name recognition, especially if you had a secondary talent like customizing or tackmaking, but that was not your primary motivation.

There were some early experiments with volunteer, gift and prize models in the pre-BreyerFest days. Some of those 5 to 7 piece Test Runs/Special Runs that originated with Marney in the 1970s were a part of that experimentation: most of those were raffle pieces, presumably for fundraising and local show promotion. (Ah, if only I could have had a few for the Swap Meet! I’m getting to that post, I promise.)

Then came the Black Proud Arabian Mare. Oh, boy.

The story goes that they were created as a gratuity to a series of Breyer-sponsored liveshows - presumably as fundraisers and for local show promotion - but that’s not exactly what happened. Rumor has it that some showholders kept some of the models for themselves. Let me emphasize that that’s what I heard, and not what I know: it might have been the intent all along to allow these showholders to keep a piece as compensation, and the griping I heard was just the usual sour grapes.

The following year there were a handful of Red Bay Cantering Welsh Ponies made, and the 1987 Congress program specifically stated that the showholders would be receiving some as gifts. I have no idea if that was included to help dispel the rumors, or just coincidentally convenient phrasing. (And as I’ve brought up before, Marney’s writing skills were less than helpful.)

And that was it, until they instituted the live show at BreyerFest some years later. I have no idea if the rumors played a part in the discontinuation of the original program, or if other factors played a greater part, like complaints from "ungifted" showholders. Or was it the creation of BreyerFest itself, just a couple years later? Another question without an answer.

I’ll still do what I normally do for BreyerFest this year, with the camaraderie of my cohobbyists as my only compensation. It would have been nice to have been able to tell people behave themselves in the NPOD line, and have some small authority to back me up on that. An authority that only comes to those among the gifted, in some hobbyists’ eyes.

(I would have done it for a t-shirt and a footlong tuna sub. Any maybe a bullhorn. Heck, I'd still do it for that.)