Breyer's Davy Crockett, Part I

I had a monstrous migraine today, so I’m going to have to split the Davy Crockett piece into two parts, since I didn’t have the time or energy to edit it down to one.

There’s never been any doubt that the Davy Crockett was a Breyer release, but outside of the box the occasional set turns up in, there’s no official company document that specifically says so. The set appears in mail-order catalogs in 1955, but no mention of the manufacturer is made in the catalog description.

We have a 1956 sheet that mentions the Kit Carson - basically the same mold, with a new paint job and accessories - and Kit is also shown in the 1958 materials (Dealer Catalog, and Pricelist.) But poor old Davy is conspicuously absent. It’s almost as if he didn’t exist - except for the fact that he rather obviously does.

I finally found the "evidence:" the original announcement, in the "New Toys on Parade" section of the August 1955 issue of Toys and Novelties:


The August 1955 date is interesting. Most of the announcements I’ve found for Breyer’s new releases have been in the January through March range - right around Toy Fair time. Now it’s possible that the magazine might have had a backlog of pieces to run in the "New Toys on Parade" section, but I rather doubt there was a five or six month delay in this case. I think Davy really was a Mid-year release, and a rushed one, at that!

It had been long assumed - but not proven, until now - that Breyer’s Davy Crockett was a part of the onslaught of merchandise marketed during the infamous Davy Crockett fad of 1955. Here’s a pretty good summary of this brief, intense mania that caught everyone - even Disney, himself! - by surprise:

http://mercurie.blogspot.com/2010/03/davy-crockett-televisions-first-fad.html

(Warning: it’s gray text against a black background, and may be a bit hard on the eyes.)

Seeing the huge profits the "first responders" were making, just about every toy manufacturer rushed their own Davy Crockett-themed merchandise to the market. Licensing wasn’t really an issue - as an historical figure, Davy was essentially in the public domain. As long as you didn’t use anything specific to the Disney show itself - like the theme song, or Fess Parker’s likeness - you were free to make whatever Davy Crockett merchandise you saw fit. Such as this rather creepy vinyl doll, from the same page the Breyer Davy appeared:


The fad was well underway by February, when the third episode of Davy Crockett aired on ABC’s Disneyland. If Breyer’s announcement was printed in August, it had to have been sent in by July, and photographed by June - which means that it took them four months, five months tops, to get their Davy Crockett from concept to execution. Impressive!

If you needed anymore proof of the awesomeness of Breyer’s primary sculptor and moldmaker Chris Hess, there it is.

The Davy Crockett fad was pretty much dead by Christmas 1955. And so was, I believe, the production of Breyer’s Davy Crockett. I’ll discuss that, and a whole lot more, in my next post.

When Hobbies Collide

I totally forgot that I had to pick up and reassemble my Art Deco vanity set today. We had to take it in to our furniture guy to get it cleaned and reglued. Not refinished - good heavens, no. It has a beautiful, slightly worn patina, and I have a suspicion that it might actually be worth something. I doubt it’s actually a Donald Deskey piece, but whoever did design it was definitely familiar with his style.

I love it, regardless. I got it as a birthday present about 25 years ago, right when I was just getting into Art Deco. I still fantasize about owning a genuine Art Deco bungalow, with topiaries in the yard sculpted into strict geometric shapes and a mantle showcasing my Modernistic Bucks and Does.

Funny how my seemingly unconnected hobbies and interest tend to collide with one another like that. You wouldn’t think that you’d be able to link Breyer models with the Art Deco movement, but yes, you can.

It’s fairly well known that Breyer didn’t design the Modernistic Buck and Doe; they were originally designed for Nosco Plastics in Erie, Pennsylvania by a man named Don Manning. We’re not entirely sure how Breyer ended up with the molds, yet, but I did find another tantalizing lead during my last research trip.

But we’re not going to talk about the Buck and Doe today. Nope, I’m just going to show you another example of my hobbies colliding. Notice anything familiar with last Sunday’s Prince Valiant? (Click to enlarge.)


Did Andalusians even exist as a breed during King Arthur’s time? Hmm.

A lot of comic illustrators have issues with the equine form, but thankfully Gary Gianni’s not one of them.

Coping Strategies

Yesterday, my brother heard me yelling in my office, and promptly told me to walk away from the computer. The WEG Specials? Yeah, it was the WEG Specials.

I couldn’t, of course. Last week’s work schedule really messed me up (gone from home for two days, slept through most of a third) and while the limited Internet access was probably as good a coping strategy as any for dealing with the WEG specials, it’s not something I could avoid forever.

And boy howdy, did it hurt like heck. The exclusive SRs are nice - I wouldn’t mind the Gold Raven, or that Palomino Roxy - but it’s the premium reissues that are really killing me, especially the matte POA Toby and the (cry-sob-whimper) Traditional Man o’ War.

Stab me in the heart, why don’t you Reeves?

Yeah, and real smart move, not limiting the low quantity SRs to one per person, or so many per day. Were they really expecting all those SRs to last for the bulk of 16 days, without any purchase limits? If most of the advertised - and unadvertised - exclusives are gone by now, there’s gonna be a lot of unhappy campers over the next two weeks. (Unless they pull more "surprises" out later in the week.)

My current coping strategy for the rest of the duration of WEG? I’m treating it like every other recent acronymic event (LSE, VRE): ignore, then mope. It’s too far away for a day trip, and I don’t have the money anyway. Might as well be another LSE or VRE, without the formality of a ticket raffle.

At this point I really can’t say any more about the event that wouldn’t involve the heavy, repeated use of expletives. So I won’t.

The flea market was adequate today. The weather was clear, if a tad cold. There seemed to be fewer crazy/creepy people milling about, but more outright tourists - you know, the kind that buy ornamental corn, painted pumpkins, and trivets made out of bottlecaps.

Lots models, but not much worth buying - everything was either body quality, or slightly overpriced. I found that odd, since prices usually start going down near the end of the season. I did find an okay Horned Hereford Bull that’s now sunning in the window, and a few neat old books (nothing horsey.) I also found the Swinging Girl part of a Mastercrafters Swinger Clock - not the clock, just the girl on the swing. It's just my luck, though, that I’m still missing a part to install it in the one clock incomplete clock that I have.

I do have a couple of research-intensive posts in the pipeline, including a little something about the Davy Crockett that I’m hoping to have ready by tomorrow. My schedule is a little less strenuous this week, or at least it appears to be so from first glance.

Working the Reps

This manufacturer rep ad from the June, 1952 issue of Toys and Novelties cracks me up: I just love how “plastics banks” and “plastic horses” have been added to the bottom of the list of “Timely Items,” almost as an afterthought:


This was 1952, though, not long after Breyer had decided to enter the toy market in the first place. The Krenziens had been representing Breyer since the very beginning – a mere year or so earlier – but they were not yet seen as a “name” brand, like Slinky.

From the research I've done so far, however, it appears that the Krenziens were definitely working on that problem. Breyer was prominently featured in Krenzien ads a few years later, and Breyer returned the favor in 1955. It was grouped with similar ads from other Krenzien clients, so it may have served as a branding exercise on the reps' part:

Did the Krenziens provide services above and beyond aggressive representation? Whether it went as far as product development – as seems to be the case with Breyer's West Coat representatives, the Ungers - I can't say for sure. I haven't seen anything to suggest that … yet. The fact that the Krenziens' home office was in Chicago does make me wonder about the closeness of the business relationship.

I'm not sure when the Krenziens stopped representing Breyer; I know it was quite some time ago, but I haven't gotten far enough along in my research to even put a rough guess on the date. Breyer didn't start listing their reps in their Dealer Catalogs until the 1970s, and they seem to have been long gone by then.

Yes, the firm itself still around, though it has since changed its name to Krenzien, Krenzien and Associates, and now focuses more on sporting goods. I suppose one of these days I should call them up and see if they can provide anything useful.

Melanges and Marmalades

I’m so conflicted about Melange. I don’t really have the money or the space for her, but I don’t know if I’ll have the luxury of leftovers in the NPOD next year, judging by the full-on freak outs occurring online over the late-as-usual JAHs.

Unfortunately, I have a lot of debt to pay off over the next few months - mainly stemming from that emergency dental appointment - and most of my spare change has to go towards that, plain and simple. My recent sales listings have been helping a little bit but not enough to justify Melange.

The fact that customizers are confessing a willingness to pay almost double RR price to use Melange purely as a body - regardless of the quality of the model they receive - is also weighing heavily in my mind. I’m sorry, but that’s just flat out nuts. That, and the hobbyists who are trying to sell the ones they haven’t even mailed away for yet, are almost motivation enough to throw my order in the mail. (And shout "No Melange for you!" as I do it. No harm done - the mail ladies already know I’m a little daft.)

The flea market was rather quiet today: not a lot of vendors - or merchandise. Even though the weather was as perfect as a September morning could be, it had rained almost perpetually for the three days previous. The sky was blue and almost cloudless, but apparently not cloudless enough for a lot of people. (Pansies!)

One thing there was a lot of were kittens there - the real-life puffballs, not the plastic kind. Oh, I was tempted: Vita was raised with cats and would probably be fine with one in the house, but I’m not authorized to bring home anything that eats, so there they had to stay. I did spend an inordinate amount of time admiring the fiesty little monsters, who were the spitting image of our favorite "creepy meow," the #336 "Calico" Kitten:


While this particular Kitten was referred to as a "Calico" in the Breyer catalogs throughout its entire run (1966 through 1973) it’s not actually a Calico, it’s a Tabby. To be more precise, it’s a Red Mackerel Tabby. "Mackerel" Tabbies have stripes, as opposed to "Classic" Tabbies, which have swirls and splotches. If you need visuals, there’s an excellent chart on top of this page:

http://www.messybeast.com/spotted-cats.html

(It’s also a useful link to help you impress, annoy or disturb your friends with your knowledge of cat color genetics.)

So the Kitten is painted in a real cat color, more or less. They just gave it the wrong name. (Something they did with the horses, too. "Bay" Racehorse, anyone?) It’d be several years before they’d release an actual "Calico" Kitten - the 2000 BreyerFest SR Patches. And to give props where it’s due, they did a pretty good job on her, too.

Back to the Kitten above: I found him at the very same flea market, years and years ago. He was an upgrade: my first "Calico" Kitten only had a handful of stripes, while this has more than your average zebra. Since these stripes had to be hand-airbrushed, fewer stripes tend to be closer to the norm on this release. I don’t know how to explain mine. In my imagination, I see a couple of bored painters having a stripe-painting contest, but it’s probably something more boring than that.

A Third Company?

According to my work schedule, it looks like I might be taking another trip to happy fun researchland in another week or so. I won’t have the same amount of time to plow the stacks, but I’ll be able to make a little bit more progress, at least. Every little bit helps.

One thing I found rather distracting in my previous research excursion was the non-Breyer horse stuff. It wasn’t just the Hartland material, it was all of the other model horsey things I was running across, like this ad for Lido:


Lido wasn’t exclusively a model horse manufacturer; model horses were just something they added to their toy line in the 1950s. Most of the secondary manufacturers from the 1950s and 1960s were like that: Westerns were "hot," and it made good business sense to add a few horse and/or cowboy pieces to their toy lines.

What made Lido a little bit different from the others is that the other companies were, by and large, copying Breyer and Hartland. Lido was one of the few who was forging ahead with original molds and concepts.

Most of these secondary lines of horses died out by the end of the 1960s, and so did Hartland, before it was revived a short time later (and later, and later again.) Breyer almost gave up the ghost itself around that time too, but fortunately for us they did not.

Other known manufacturers from that time period included Pressman, Ohio Plastics, and Kroll. They turn up from time to time, usually as unidentified knockoffs. Like this odd, but not bad Pressman version of the Stretched Morgan, in Alabaster:

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&Item=160481717242&Category=35999&_trkparms=algo%3DLVI%26its%3DI%26otn%3D2

That one’s managed to fool me more than once, at the flea market! He has probably played a part in those "Alabaster Stretched Morgan" rumors that crop up from time to time. The actual existence of a few true Alabaster Stretched Morgans does, too:


(Marney’s album, again.)

Among my favorites are the "textured tack" horses by an otherwise unidentified maker, an example of which is seen here on, of all things, a knockoff of the original Breyer Western Horse Clock!


They’re referred to as "textured tack" models because the Western Horse and Pony copies that they made have an odd, wire mesh texture to their tack. They’re otherwise remarkably good reproductions. They even "feel" right: they’re either made of some type of Cellulose Acetate, or a similarly sturdy plastic.

Oddly enough, the clock case and the base seem to be made of a different type of plastic; it feels like ABS (Styrene) to me. (BTW, the plumber’s chain reins are original, but the saddle probably isn’t.)

The fact that the entire Breyer Clock was knocked off - not just the horse, but all the "trimmings" - fascinates me. Was the original Breyer Clock itself so popular that it inspired its own knockoff? Who was this third company that made these horses - and what happened to them? Why did they decide to go with Cellulose Acetate, when many of the other secondary manufacturers didn’t? Did they have bigger plans?

What a different landscape we could be living in, if only we had a third serious contender in the model horse market back then!

More Discoveries from the Stacks

Here’s another nice little tidbit of information I gleaned from my research last week. You’ve seen this little stack ad before, right? (My apologies on the quality of the copy; it was the end of the day, and I was starting to run low of spare change to pop in the copier.)


I’ve written about it before, and even made a t-shirt out of it, I loved it so much. There’s nothing particularly noteworthy about the ad in and of itself: it’s the same ad that Breyer ran in both Toys and Novelties and Playthings through most of 1952. What’s important is the dating: the copy above came from the February 1953 issue of Toys and Novelties. In the March 1953 issue, a new version of the ad appeared in the same magazine:


The Boxer replaces the Money Manager!

This was around the same time the Boxer made his debut at Toy Fair; in fact, it was in the "Toy Fair" issue that included the full page, full color ad for the Boxer. There was at least one other version of this ad, with Breyer’s street address crammed into the lower right hand corner box, that started appearing in 1954. The library was getting ready to close by the time I cracked open that volume, and I didn’t have the time to get a copy of it.

Is there’s some historical significance to the street address? Well yeah, a little. We’ll get to that topic some other time.

This ad doesn’t offer much from a research standpoint: it doesn’t really add much to our knowledge of Breyer History. We’ve already established that the Boxer came out in early 1953. All it does, at most, is visually signify the end of Breyer’s Money Manager era.

One thing these stack ads do "do" for me is make me wish Reeves would do something with these neat old graphics. Don’t you think the Boxer ad would make an awesome iron-on patch, or dress up a tote bag real nice?

Most of Reeves’s current ad and graphic work is competent, but not particularly inspiring or evocative. (I really don’t like the bumper sticker/badge logo with the dropped R, but I’ve learned to live with it.) There are probably some legal hurdles that would prevent the reuse of some of that older material, but some of the powers-that-be at Reeves could at least try to incorporate some of the aesthetics of the older advertising into their newer material to spice things up a bit.

It might make good business sense, too: Breyers aren’t quite as iconic as Barbie or Tonka, but going a little retro on some of the ad campaigns might help boost their status a bit. And you can’t tell me that Breyer History isn’t any less interesting than Barbie’s or Tonka’s.