More Forgotten Belgians: SR Dark Palomino

Finally found the Tenite brochure I was looking for, yay!

I was already halfway through my next post by the time I unearthed it, so Tenite is not tonight’s subject. Another nearly forgotten Belgian is: the 1984 SR Dark Palomino Belgian, made for the Riegeseckers.


He’s nearly identical to the regular run #94 Belgian, except for the white mane and tail. Estimates put the piece count at around 200 - rare today, but not an untypical run in 1984.

Man, I remember 1984 - that was a rough year to be a college student and a Breyer collector on a budget. That year saw the release of the Buckskin Adios, the Palomino, Dapple Gray and Red Chestnut Pacers, the 7-piece G1 SM Draft Horse Set, the MHC flaxen chestnut Midnight Sun, the Kansas City Sham, the Red Roan Belgian, the Light Palomino Belgian and the Dark Palomino Belgian. And an insane amount of Holiday Catalog stuff: enough to fill up nearly two pages in the J. C. Penney’s Catalog, alone!

The number of SRs don’t come anywhere near to rivaling today’s breakneck pace, but in some ways it was way worse: it was pre-Internet. If you weren’t lucky, or well-connected, you’d easily miss out on some of the choicer items, like I did with the Dark Palomino Belgian. And you wouldn’t even know you had missed out on it until you saw it at a live show four or six months after it sold out. Oh, the pain!

Because of his similarity to both the regular run Flaxen Chestnut, and the even harder to find Light Palomino, the Dark Palomino SR was quickly forgotten. I kept him on my want list for years, even though most hobbyists I talked to had no idea who or what I was talking about.

In some ways, I figured his anonymity would work in my favor: if and when I managed to find him, I’d be able to get him for a song.

I did. I lucked out twice, in fact: first on MH$P, and then not long after on eBay, in a box lot with a bunch of other mid-1980s horses. I contemplated doing a two-horse hitch, until a lack of space and money made the decision for me.

A few years ago, Reeves released a very similar and rather popular model, the 777 Belgian. How similar? He has the chestnut body color, 4 stockings, and white mane and tail. But put them side by side, and the similiarities fade in comparison to the differences: the 777 also has a masked blaze, dark shading on his muzzle and ears, a red tail ribbon, and his right front hoof is tan, not gray.

Because of the 777 Belgian, the SR Dark Palomino still doesn’t attract much attention, or much money on the secondary market. So if you’re a Belgian lover,looking for something special to add to your collection, take a second look at the Chestnut ones. They might not be what they seem.

Blank Slates

I’ve never really understood the fascination with unpainted models. Sure, they’re nice to have if you’re a fan of a particular model, and a few of them technically qualify as special runs. But laying out the extra cash for one - over and above body or retail price, I mean - has never made much sense to me. Because every model starts out as an unpainted. And some talented folks can turn them back into one.

Some unpainted models are interesting from a sculptural standpoint: many of the Hess molds look more like art than toy in their naked state. But for the most part, I regard unpainted models as blank canvases - one indistinguishable from another. It’s the paint job that makes a horse rare or stand out from its identically-shaped cohorts.

A few unpainted models technically qualify as special runs - such as the G1 Riegsecker Draft Horse that came with the multiple-piece SR set in the 1980s, and the 1980 JAH Special Offer Unpainteds. Even so, it’s difficult to impossible to tell those SR Unpainteds from a run of the mill factory escapees, unless you can provide the documentation (receipt, or in the Drafters' case, a complete unbroken set and/or history of ownership.)

Now, there are always some exceptions to the rule. There have been many subtle - and not so subtle - mold changes over the years, and an unpainted model of an earlier version of a mold will have some historical value. The Saddlebred Weanling is an obvious candidate - the pre-Rocking Horse, attached tail version will definitely have more value and cachet than later one with a detached tail. An unpainted unmuscled Clydesdale or a supermuscled Quarter Horse Gelding would be a major coup for almost any collector, too.

(What, you don’t know about the various different versions of the Quarter Horse Gelding mold? Another topic teaser, I know.)

Unpainted chalkies have some value, too - some of you probably familiar with the infamous Pinkie Proud Arabian Foals that have floated around the hobby for years now. One of the few unpainted models I have in my collection is a chalky G1 Saddlebred (she’s not basecoated: she’s actually an opaque white plastic one.) Sorry for the small pic - it’s a former Blab avatar:


The swirled-plastic and solid-colored Stablemate keychains also qualify as unpainted models, as do the Tortuga-style Decorators, but I would argue that in those cases, it’s the plastic itself that becomes the "surface" treatment, not the paint.

There are some unpainted models being sold by various dealers as samples - with rough seams, handwritten notations and tags and stuff like that - that may also have a slightly higher-than-nominal cash value, depending on how trustworthy you consider the dealer and the documentation he or she provides. (I’m going to assume that, being the conscientious hobbyists that you are, you probably already possess the slightly skeptical mind to be wary of anyone’s extraordinary claims of rarity or general awesomeness.)

I suspect in most cases where an unpainted model goes for an exceptional or seemingly unwarranted price, it’s just another case of someone’s (or a couple of someones’s) overwhelming need to have something special and unique. It’s just that in the case of unpainted models, there are very few true instances of uniqueness: underneath every painted model is an unpainted one.