Prune Brown

Head’s up: I’ll be starting to sell stuff again within the next week or so. The outdoor flea market season opens soon here, and I will need some walking-around-money for that.

The Special Run we thought would be a vintage model turned out to be the Croi Damsha in Dappled Sooty Palomino: it’s the very antithesis of a Vintage Model. Huh. I wasn’t expecting another release on that mold until the Fall.

You know, from a distance, in passing, and if I wasn’t wearing my glasses, a Palomino Croi Damsha could pass for a Palomino Family Arabian Stallion. There’s that, at least.

(Hmm. A Reissue Palomino FAS in Dappled Sooty Palomino. I had not considered that a possibility until now.)

The final model in the Ticket Special Lineup will be a Gloss Dappled Rose Gray Wixom, if the rotating banners on the Breyer web site are to be believed. (A Percheron, finally!) Unless it turns out to be a different kind of something, like a Store or Souvenir Special.

Regardless of what she is, I doubt her inclusion there is an accident. It feels more like a way to drum up interest for the last weekend of Early Bird Ticket sales: Let’s drop a previously unknown/unseen Gloss Special Run on the front page!

Back on topic. Here are a couple of actual Vintage Models: a pair of Western Ponies in Dark Brown and Black Beauty:

The Dark Brown variation is comparatively rare; it appears that it was only issued ca. 1956, or shortly after the discontinuation of the Davy Crockett Horse and Rider set. It really was listed as "Dark Brown" on at least one piece of ephemera from the era, so it was a genuine release, and not a variation.

My theory for its existence - and relative rarity - is that the #40 Dark Brown release was created to help use up the "Plum Brown" acetate that was purchased for the manufacture of the Davy Crockett Horse and Rider set. The Davy Crockett fad faded almost as quickly as it rose, and Breyer may have been stuck with a load or two of Plum Brown plastic.

But not too much: the Brown Western Ponies aren’t easy to find today, and (as far as I know) there aren’t any other Plum Brown models floating around, other than the Fury/Prancers. The "Brown and Gold" Western Horses that occasionally cause a stir on eBay are just early (and not very good) knockoffs.

The color of the Brown Western Pony is dark enough that in the right setting and the right lighting, it’s almost indistinguishable from the Star-faced Black Beauty, so it might be slightly more common than we actually think. And the Star-faced Black Beauty slightly more rare.

Through the 1950s and early 1960s, Breyer seemed to have an "as above, so below" policy when it came to the Western Horses and Ponies. Except for the Dark Brown - and the Star-faced Black Beauty Ponies, who share the same item number. That, and their decorative similarities lead us to the conclusion that the Star-faced Black Beauty Western Ponies were the variation - of the Dark Brown, created when the Plum Brown plastic finally ran out.  

Due to the ephemera gaps of the 1950s, we can’t be sure when the transition happened. It was somewhere between 1956 and 1958, since the No. 40 Western Pony is listed on a 1958 dated price list - and is shown in a ca. 1958 Dealer Catalog - as "Black Beauty". I tend to believe it was earlier rather than later, hence my "ca. 1956" dating.

On a final note, I have to admit that I snicker a little bit every time I see or hear the term "Plum Brown" used to describe this brown plastic we’ve been discussing today. "Plum Brown" has always struck me as a very pleasant euphemism for the word "Prune".

We’re very fond of describing horse colors using food words: Olive Bay, Mulberry Gray, and Peach Dun. But Prune Brown? It doesn't sound quite so yummy.

The Original Black Beauty

I have a small confession to make: I don’t like Anna Sewell’s Black Beauty. Most of my attempts to read it ended with me throwing my copy against the nearest wall. It’s not something I normally do with any book that displeases me, so I’ll just chalk it up to my low tolerance for Victorian sentimentality.

When you grow up in an environment encrusted with Victoriana, you either learn to love that particular aesthetic, or ignore it … and I don’t love it. I’m more of a gee-whiz, streamlined, hope-for-a-better-future Art Deco gal. (A bit of a contradiction for someone who researches history, I know.)

On the other hand, I do like Breyer’s early Black Beauties: not the seemingly endless reissues and reinterpretations of the horse from the book, but the color itself.

The color "Black Beauty" first appeared in the ca. 1953 catalog sheets, in reference to the Western Horse and Pony: the Western Horse is #58, and the Western Pony is #44. By 1958, the number on the Western Pony changes to #40, the Western Horse disappears completely, and the Fury/Prancer is now listed as being available in this color. From the 1958 price list:


The term is not used as a color descriptor, but as a proper name. Here’s another part of that 1958 price list that clarifies this point: the model doesn’t come in "Black Beauty," it is Black Beauty:


The Black Beauty terminology is dropped in the 1960 Dealer’s Catalog, and the color simply becomes "Black." The Western Horse reappears in this color, too, as #50. A Mission Supply House mailer from ca. 1961 still refers to all three as "Black Beauty," but Red Bird Sales pages from roughly the same time period call them "Black."

Confused yet? It gets worse: there are at least three different variations of this color!

The earliest "Black Beauties" - the #44 Pony, and the #58 Horse - were solid, glossy black plastic, with metallic gold hooves and trim. The Prancer never came in this variation, as far as I know. It may have been discontinued by 1955, but it’s difficult to tell precisely due to the lack of paper evidence.


The second version of "Black Beauty" was the version I discussed in my last post, with four white stockings, gray hooves, and a masked star or blaze. Only the Western Pony and the Fury/Prancer came in this color. Since the #27 Fury has nearly the same paint job as the #P40 Black Beauty Prancer, it can be hard to distinguish between the two. Black Fury/Prancers are usually only identified as #P40 Prancers if they still have their original chain reins and western saddles.

Both the Western Pony and the Fury/Prancer were used in Horse and Rider sets in this color, adding to the confusion. Some of the Horse and Rider set Fury/Prancers had the wider, Davy Crockett Horse blazes, but not all. This variation appears in the 1958 Dealer’s Catalog.

Dating this color variation is very difficult, especially since they share the same issue number - and markings - as the Plum Browns. The Plum Browns predate the Blacks, and probably "evolved" into the Black Beauties once they ran out of the colored acetate: all they had to do was change the name on the pricelist, and carry on.

All three models came in the third and final version of "Black Beauty." This color is quite distinctive, and in my opinion is the most attractive of the three: bald face, 4 stockings, a white tail tip, and silver trim on the saddle and molded on tack:


This color also varies the most of the three: the markings can be white plastic, or overpainted, or some combination of the two; handpainted eyewhites are also sometimes seen.

A Western Horse in this variation appears in the 1960 Montgomery Wards catalog; it’s possible that they may have started manufacturing it up to a year earlier, but until more evidence shows up, we can never really know for sure.

The same can be said for their discontinuation dates: all we have are rough boundaries here. They all appear in the ca. 1960 Dealer’s Catalog, and are all gone from the 1963 Dealer’s Catalog. I’m pretty sure the Fury/Prancer mold, with the exception of Fury himself, was discontinued in 1961. But according to the Red Bird Sales pages, the Western Horse was still available in 1962.

All three variations are fairly rare; I’ve been told that the solid blacks are the rarest of the three, but it’s hard for me to judge. I purchased a primo pair back in 1980 (one of my earliest "hobby" purchases) and consequently haven’t paid too much attention to their market prices.

I’ve had the most trouble finding the silver-tipped third version, but I think that’s mostly an issue of condition, not availability. Since most third version models were molded in white plastic, and not black, rubs are just more prevalent - or noticeable.

Plum Brown

I’m still suffering from a motivational deficit. I tried to brush it off with a marathon of paper shredding yesterday, but the enthusiam didn’t stick. I think it’s the weather: not the lack of sun, but the lack of heat. I don’t get a lot of projects done in the wintertime, because it’s incredibly difficult to get anything done when your swaddled in a half dozen blankets and quilts (unless what you're working on is actually a quilt!)

Laugh if you must, but I was secretly hoping I’d get a zebra-print Snuggie from Santa this year. Nope, just a peachy keen new laptop and some fancy chocolates. And speaking of chocolate…

Here are two different pre-1960 Western Ponies. Notice anything different between the two?


It's a little hard to tell, but the one with darker hooves is dark brown. It’s a color hobbyists call "Plum Brown" because it often comes with purplish undertones, though mine is more dark chocolate-colored. The base color is colored plastic that, as we’ve discussed before, was not an uncommon Breyer painting shortcut in the 1950s.

There are only two models known that came in this brown color: Davy Crockett’s Fury/Prancer horse from the Horse and Rider set, and the Western Pony. Both are painted with masked facial markings, 4 stockings and dark gray hooves.

For the longest time, we didn’t know anything at all about these Plum Brown models, and just assumed that they were a color variation of the Black. We didn’t learn that they were separate and distinct releases until copies of an undated catalog page/flier started circulating among collectors. From the reverse:


It was widely presumed that Breyer also made a Brown Western Horse. It was a logical presumption to make: they did make a brown Fury/Prancer and Western Pony, and our fragmentary documentation from the 1950s didn't rule out the possibility. Why not a Western Horse? Some collectors even claimed that they had one in their herds.

Then I saw one of those alleged Western Horses in person and realized it was just a copy, and not a very good one at that. The plastic was wrong, the color was wrong, the hooves were poorly sculpted - even the reins were wrong! They also have metallic gold shading that’s not seen on either the Plum Brown Fury/Prancer or Western Pony. It’s as if they were actually trying to imitate a bronze finish; I believe the manufacturer of these odd and early knock-offs was probably taking its design cues more from pot metal carnival horses than the plastic Breyer versions.

The Fury/Prancer is far more common than the Western Pony in this color, possibly because the Plum Brown Fury/Prancer was not only used with another Horse and Rider set - the Canadian Mountie - it was also sold separately. The Western Pony mold was used on a few Horse and Rider sets, such as the Indian, the Cowboy, and Kit Carson, but I can’t recall ever seeing an original set with the Plum Brown Pony.

Not much is known about the Plum Brown Western Pony, other than its appearance on that single, undated (ca. 1956) catalog page and his hasty retreat: he was gone from the 1958 catalog and price list. Maybe, as I hypothesized with the Pink and Blue Elephants, he was designed to use up the colored acetate they had lying around the factory.

It may be that the Plum Brown Western Pony’s rarity isn’t as profound as we perceive it: in low light, and at first glance, they can be indistinguishable from the somewhat more common Black Beauty version. None of the Black Beauties are really "common" either, but I’ll discuss that in my next post.