Coco, Coeur de Lion, Swaps et al

Whew – made it through the holiday weekend without buying anything model horse hobby related! (I did buy some sewing supplies. Vita has acquired a taste for my leather thimbles, grr.)

Though those Web Special Classics, especially the Coeur de Lion, definitely gave me a lot to think about. And now he appears to be sold out, so that definitely helps…

With the Terrang Coeur de Lion, the Stablemates Club Thoroughbred Mare Coco, the 2017 Vintage Club releases of both the Classic Quarter Horse Family and the Stablemates Standing and Lying Down Foals, and that Classic Swaps Poll they had us voting on back in July, it’s fairly obvious that these aren’t all warehoused bodies, but totally new production.

Clearly something changed in regards to the Hagen-Renaker leases.

How so, exactly, I am not privy to. And you know what? I’m fine with that. The official story will come out eventually. The primary focus of my research is investigating the mysteries Reeves cannot answer for lack of time, resources, or even (gasp!) interest.

And even though they were the models I grew up with, truth be told I am not as wedded to the Hagen-Renaker molds as many hobbyists are.

I’m not ever giving up my Classic Racehorses or G1 Stablemates, heck no! But given the wider range of choices we now have in regards to Classics and Stablemates, the Hagen-Renaker molds are not always going to be my first choice.

While I may have hesitated on the Terrang mold Coeur de Lion, I’m definitely not skipping out on whatever Classics Swaps won the popular vote for release next year. I think Swaps was one of Maureen Love’s masterpieces, and he looks great in every color they put him in. Yes, even that totally weird gray one in the 1990s where they gave him rubber-cemented Chubari Spots:

http://www.identifyyourbreyer.com/images/00266.jpg

Gold, Silver and Chrome

My brother was way more into the Triple Crown coverage this year than I was, peppering me with trivia and questions; he was even bragging to people at work that he had met Affirmed.

(He did. With me, of course, at BreyerFest several years ago.)

It’s not that I didn’t care; I had far too many other things keeping me distracted this year, and I didn’t want to get caught up in the drama that follows. I have enough drama in my life right now. (Yesterday’s: Vita running around the house with a roll of pennies. How she got it, and what she had planned with it, we’re not sure…)

When the next Triple Crown winner comes around, we will know: it will be a foregone conclusion before the races are even run.

If there are more Breyer Thoroughbred molds to be made in the near future, I would rather they be on significant historical figures, rather than the hot or fashionable horses of the moment. They’re an easier sell in both the retail and the secondary market; people whose only interaction with horse racing is going to a Derby Day party once a year, for instance, are more likely to know Secretariat than Terrang.

(Even in his heyday, poor Terrang didn’t get as much respect as he deserved!)

In the rare cases when I will tell people about what constitutes a good investment, Breyer-wise, my first suggestion is the early Classics Racehorses. Especially if they’re New in Box pieces without the mold marks. But I'm digressing; I’ll talk about them more in my next post.

For a Stallion, I’d like a new Man o’ War. For a variety of reasons, the Classics Man o’ War mold is no longer available to us; the #47 Traditional Man o’ War, as much as I love him, is simply too old-fashioned and out-of-date for most buyers today.

And dang it, it’s Man o’ War: like Black Beauty, he is so iconic he should be a perpetual part of the Breyer line: Matte, Gloss, Special Editions with bases and tags, Woodgrain, Ageless Bronze…

For the Mare, the painfully obvious choice is Kincsem, only one of the greatest racehorses of all time.

To make her different from some of the more recent Thoroughbred and Warmblood molds, I’d want to see her in a simple standing pose.

Don’t get me wrong: all of these vigorous and more ambitious sculptures are great. I love the Nokota Horse in all his pure twirly awesomeness. But really, there’s nothing more beautiful than a classically-posed Thoroughbred in peak racing condition.

Terrang

Alas, this weekend’s trip to the flea market did not improve my mood. In spite of the nice weather and lack of competing local events, most of the regulars didn’t show up. And those that did were the crazy ones - not "will show up in a snowstorm" crazy, but "I bury my money in a coffee can in the backyard" crazy. Not a single Breyer, Hartland or H-R in sight, either. Bah!

On the positive side, I did manage to score some interesting new research materials, and track down a couple of new leads. I hope to have a little spare time next week to work on them; the rest of the family wants to take a field trip down to the library where some of material is located, coincidentally. (Not so odd: the main branch of the Detroit Public Library is pretty awesome, actually, and right across the street from the Detroit Institute of Arts. Which is one of the greatest public art museums in the world, people. Totally worth the trip, even if you’re not interested in model horses.)

In the meantime, here’s another little dip into the deeper end of my archives. It’s a real-life photo of the racehorse Terrang. I’ve published it before in my Sampler a couple years back, but it’s worth reprinting here. You don’t see photos of the actual horse very often - I haven’t found any other, but it’s been a while since I went looking.


This photo (credited to Allen F. Brewer, Jr.) is from the book American Race Horses 1957, published by the American Thoroughbred Breeders Association. This book is chock full of all sorts of Thoroughbredy goodness: you’ve got Gallant Man, Round Table, Bold Ruler - and look, Silky Sullivan as a two year old!


(Photo credit also to Allen F. Brewer, Jr. The caption reads "Already his was a come-from-behind style.")

Terrang’s half-brother Swaps makes an appearance, too, in the lengthy entry on Iron Liege, whose famous Sports Illustrated birth photo is the frontispiece. When Sports Illustrated was launched, one of their publicity stunts was to follow the career of a foal for three years, up to the Kentucky Derby. (Boy, did they get lucky!)

Three of the five Love Thoroughbreds in one book - it’s no surprise that this book has become a treasured part of my archives. (It’s also special because it was Dad who happened to spot it in a pile of books at the flea market. He was a big horseracing fan back in the 1950s, when he was a kid.)

Terrang’s not so well known today, at least on the level of a Man o’ War, Swaps or even Kelso. That’s too bad, because Terrang had a very respectable career as a handicapper and stud. I won’t go into the finer details of all that; his Wikipedia page is a decent place to start:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terrang

The 1950s were truly one of the great golden ages of the sport, and over time many very good horses have lost some of space in the spotlight to the great ones. Thank goodness Hagen-Renaker - and later, Breyer - saw fit to bring him back a little of his lost glory.