A Tale of Two Doggies

This was supposed to publish on July 12th - it was scheduled to anyway, but apparently blogspot thought otherwise, and the hotel wifi was spotty and I did not have time to check. See you all tomorrow.

Back in the old days of Breyer History Research, we didn’t have enough information to pinpoint the precise year many models debuted.

The original Breyer Master List that they sent out to collectors who asked for it listed two different dates 1958, and 1963 – as the starting date for the majority of early Breyer models: basically, all those seen in either the 1958 Price List, or the 1963 Dealer’s Catalog.

Those were the only two pieces of reference material we had back then that had any actual dates ascribed to them.

We’ve since made significant progress, and significant corrections. But the bad data of the past still crops up from time to time: the two that rub me the wrong way especially are the 1956 date ascribed to the Old Mold Mare and Foal (nope, 1958!), and 1958 for the Boxer (actually, 1953!)

Although we still have significant gaps in our knowledge base, we’re getting to the point where we can not just pinpoint the year a mold was released, but the month! Like the Davy Crockett: it’s listed as one of the “New Toys on parade” in the August 1955 issue of Toys and Novelties magazine:

(A month before Hartland’s version, by the way…)

Both Lassie and Rin Tin Tin made their “official” debuts at the 1956 Toy Fair, but I don’t think they were released simultaneously: I think Lassie was ready to go at least a couple of months before Rinty was.

The announcement of Breyer acquiring the license for Lassie was announced in the August 1955 issue of Toys and Novelties magazine, and a picture of the Lassie appears in the January 1956 issue.

Breyer is not listed as a licensee of Rin Tin Tin in the August 1955 issue, and his first official announcement as a Breyer product at all is in the March 1956 issue, in an ad placed by Krenzien, Krenzien & Dunlap, Breyer’s Midwest Sales Representatives.

In addition to all that, a few years ago someone in the Chicago area found a Lassie at an estate sale painted just like Rin Tin Tin – along with several other unusual pieces in a collection of someone who obviously had a professional connection to Breyer in the mid to late 1950s.

Exactly when the Rinty was available I still don’t know yet; my files may be good, but not that good. Yet.

And Now, the Collie

Sigh.

I’m not even sure where to begin with Maurice, the latest Micro Run on the old Lassie/Collie mold. I mean, I saw a Collie Special Run as an inevitability (I think I predicted it on page two of one of the Rodney discussion threads on Blab, back on April 22nd) but I wasn’t expecting another Micro Run so soon, and so close to BreyerFest.

As a somewhat avid collector of the dog molds, of course I want him. Those blue eyes, that sweet face? He’s adorable. He needed to join the rest of his family – Lassie, Jester, and Honey – here with me.

But yeah. No. Again.

The “tools” I rely on normally to compete in the collecting area – my timing, intuition, and deep knowledge base – are of no use or consequence with these Micro Run Purchase Raffles. It’s hard for me to get too excited about them now that acquiring them has become purely a matter of random luck, or money. Since I can’t rely on the former, and I have an uneven supply of the latter… I almost didn’t enter at all.

But hope springs eternal. So I tried. Every day, I tried.

I suppose it’s just the Universe balancing things out: I did get the four “pre-raffle” Micro Runs that came before – and assorted other Buried Treasures and surprises and stuff.

Still doesn’t make it any less of a bummer, though. Especially when it involves things you actively collect and campaign for. And when you actually have a little cash in the Paypal account, for once. (More money for NPOD?)

In the meantime, here’s a scan of a copy of the original sketch of the Lassie, prior to a few minor alterations suggested by Lassie’s licensing agency (Stone Associates – no relation to Sam and Peter Stone, as far as I know):

This sketch is also a useful corrective to some of the naysayers who tend to dismiss Chris Hess’s artistic skills.

Another corrective is that, contrary to Reeves’s copy on the web site, we do know when Lassie was introduced: 1956. Here she is, being featured in the January 1956 issue of Toys & Novelties magazine:

(Click to enlarge)

Rin Tin Tin was introduced at the same time, more or less. But I’ll cover that (and why it’s extremely unlikely we’ll be seeing a Rinty Micro Run) some other time.

Rin Tin Tin

Did you hear about the new book about Rin Tin Tin? It’s Rin Tin Tin: The Life and the Legend, by Susan Orlean, author of The Orchid Thief. I was doing a little research on the book itself (to wit: was it worth putting on my holiday gift list?) when I ran across this text on the author’s website:

When I was very young, my grandfather kept a Rin Tin Tin figurine sitting on his desk. I wanted desperately to play with it, and even more desperately I wanted to have a German shepherd dog of my own, a dog just like the star of "The Adventures of Rin-Tin-Tin", which debuted on television in 1954. I knew nothing about Rin Tin Tin other than that he was the perfect dog, and that he was a character on television. When by chance I learned that Rin Tin Tin was a real dog, not just a television character—a real dog with a real life that was extraordinary—I was drawn into the story and eventually to the idea of writing this book.

http://susanorlean.com/books/rin-tin-tin.php

So I’m guessing that you’re thinking what I’m thinking - that’s the Breyer figurine she’s talking about! I guess the book is worth my time, though I will have to wait until Christmas or thereabouts before I get my hands on a copy. (No room in the budget for fun stuff until then!)

You’d think it’d be logical for Reeves to re-release the Rin Tin Tin figurine, wouldn’t it? You have a well-reviewed biography by a noted author, who just mentions in passing that a Rin Tin Tin figurine partially inspired her to write the book in the first place?


Nice idea, but I’m not counting on it. For one, he’s a dog, not a horse. While Reeves has not been averse to re-releasing the older dog molds, they’re not big sellers. They’ve seemed particularly averse to re-releasing the Rin Tin Tin mold: we haven’t seen it since 1973, when they discontinued the #327 German Shepherd after a brief two-year-ish run. (Like the Proud Arabian Mare, he was prereleased in late 1971 to/for hobbyists.)

His absence is something of a mystery to me, since the German Shepherd has consistently been one of the most popular dog breeds in the United States, far outpacing both the Collie and the Saint Bernard in terms of registrations.

http://www.akc.org/reg/dogreg_stats.cfm

Yet both the Lassie/Collie and the Saint Bernard molds have seen a couple of re-releases in the not-too-distant past! Hmm. (Also puzzling: Wire Fox Terriers are only 97th on the list? Our little brat certainly doesn't act like it.)

Second: just because I think it’s such an obvious idea doesn’t mean Reeves does. I thought a Pancreatic Cancer benefit horse was a far better - and more appropriate - idea than a Breast Cancer benefit horse (hello, Patrick Swayze!) but the more conventional idea won out.

It could be that Reeves got caught a bit flat-footed about the book; I only found out about it a couple months ago myself. It’s not too late to time a re-release of the mold with the inevitable paperback release of the book sometime next year, though. Could be a nice addition to one of their various "horse and book" series, like the Breyer Horse Collection. (One of the lamest names for a series ever, BTW. Isn’t every series basically a "Breyer horse collection"?)

Going to the Dogs

She was especially naughty today, but here’s a picture of the little maniac anyway:


There’s no story behind the contender for World’s Ugliest Afghan on the couch. It’s just a huge, hideous conversation piece that came in an auction box lot several years ago. (How huge? We sometimes use it as a slipcover - for the couch!)

Work took me within a couple blocks of the main branch of the Detroit Public Library yesterday, so I took advantage of the proximity to do a little research. Six hours of hardcore page turning, and I barely made a dent in the stacks!

I found tons of stuff: most of it was confirmation of facts we had already intuited from other known sources, but it’s good to have dated materials to back up your conclusions. One of the first things I found was Lassie, featured here in the "New Toys on Parade" section of the January, 1956 issue of Toys and Novelties:


The fact that it’s the January issue, and not the March suggests that Breyer might have Lassie on the shelves by Christmas (March = Toy Fair.) Absent any concrete evidence of that, I’m completely fine with assigning a 1956 release date for the mold.

Another interesting piece of information comes out of an article in the August 1955 issue of the same magazine. In it, they list several licensors and their respective licensees. The entry for Lassie lists Breyer as one of that property’s licensees, but the entry for Rin Tin Tin does not.


(As far as I know, there’s no familial relationship between the Stones of Stone Associates, and the Stones of Breyer.)

But we’re pretty sure that Rin Tin Tin came out by 1956, too. It had been assumed from the 1955 copyight date on the original Rin Tin Tin box that he may have even predated the Lassie. The earliest mention I’ve been able to find of Rinty, though, is in a full-page ad for Breyer’s manufacturer representative, Krenzien, Krenzien & Dunlap, in the March 1956 issue of Toys & Novelties (i.e. their "Toy Fair" issue.) So, what’s up with that?

It could have been a simple omission, or perhaps an issue with the license came up. The date on the box could be referring to the show itself. (Complicating that assumption is the fact that the show premiered in late 1954, not 1955.) Or, I’m just missing some data, somewhere.

It might be a little while before I get back to the DPL and find out for sure - time and money are the issue here, not safety. I have plenty of fresh material to process in the meantime, and you’ll get to see a good portion of it over the next few weeks.