Antique Toy Cars

Friday, December 8, 2017
Cloudy with sunny periods
1C  34 F

Antique Toy Cars

Please click here to see these wonderful old toy cars

The upcoming auction on December 16-17, 2017 from Morphy Auctions is going to be very interesting in terms of how these old toy  cars are going to be bid upon. Already, some of these  cars have been bid in the 1000's of U.S. dollars. 

I've recently added a few posts about old toy cars from the New Cavendish Books book about 

The 1912 Bing Toy Catalogue.  The reason for those posts was to be able to cross-reference some of today's Bing toy cars with those from the book.

What's interesting to note recently, is that several toy auctioneers have changed their photography style. They've changed from  presenting their toys on a dark background to white. A few years ago, I started to take auctioneer's photos and remove dark backgrounds, and replace them with a white background. I found that this presented toys in their best way, without amy distractions. Bravo to the auctioneers who have refine their photography. 

Below:

German Marklin Hand Painted Open Two Seat Roadster

From the Collection of Investment Rarities Inc. Circa 1905. Blueish green enameled color with excellent accented striping. Open rear tool compartment and a leather-strapped-down rubber spare tire. Original nickel finished lamps and clockwork mechanism. Original driver has a broken and missing left hand. Some flattening and wear to tires. Provenance: Donald Kaufman Collection. A great addition for the serious collector.

Condition: (Excellent-Near Mint).

Below:

German Bing Hand Painted Taxi

From the Collection of Investment Rarities Inc. Very scarce car. Dark maroon coloring with red and black striping. Taxi meter on right side next to the original driver. Original side and front lamps. Nice roof rack and the Bing Bavaria mark on the back. Only the slightest minor wear. 
Condition: (Near Mint).
Item Dimensions: 12 -1/2" x 5 -1/4" (L x H)  /  318 mm x 313 mm

Below:

German Carette Tin Litho Wind up Limousine

From the Collection of Investment Rarities Inc. Circa 1910. Unusually large size variation. Opening doors, nickel head and side lamps, beautifully hand painted original chauffeur and ornate roof rack. Some slight paint loss to wheel spokes. Provenance: Donald Kaufman Collection. 
Condition: (Excellent-Near Mint).
Item Dimensions: 16"  /  405 L.

 Below:

German Bing Hand Painted Clockwork FOur-Seat Auto

From the Collection of Investment Rarities Inc. Circa 1904. Top of the line, deluxe Bing touring car. Hand painted, rubber tires, looks to have original nickel lamps. Extraordinary looking car with beautiful color combination. Some wear behind the front seat and minor wear to fenders. Provenance: Donald Kaufman Collection. 
Condition: (Excellent-Near Mint).
Item Dimensions: 10-3/4" L.

Below:

German Carette Hand Painted Auto in Original Box

From the Collection of Investment Rarities Inc. Beautifully done in cream with red seat, and spoked wheels with rubber tires. Original side and front lamps. The original box has a label on one side, marked "Made in Germany". Nice and crisp with two inside boxes that were for the composition figures. Figures are well detailed and in excellent condition. There is a cardboard trunk on the back which has been added. There is some alligatoring to paint on the floor board and seat. 
Condition: (Excellent-Near Mint).

Below:

German Bing Clockwork Phaeton Auto

From the Collection of Investment Rarities Inc. Four seater car. Hand painted in cream color with nice blue striping, rubber tires, original nickel lamps and lanterns, includes chauffeur. Original "GPN" mark behind rear of front seat. Very little wear. Provenance: Donald Kaufman Collection. 

Length:  13"  330 mm
Condition: (Near Mint).

The last 2 images are interesting from the point-of-view of their being similar in the 

design of both cars. However, the 2 cars were manufactured from 2 different companies. One was by  Carette, and the other by Bing.   You have to look at the 2 cars, and go back and forth in terms of looking for differences between the 2 cars.

1. In the above car, the front lanterns (headlights) 

are lower to the ground that the other car.

2. The above car has 1 driver, a chauffeur, 

while the top car has a driver and passenger.

3. The window frame of the windshield in the above car is 

square with straight lines, while the other car has a square

window frame with rounded corners.

There are some other small differences between the 2 cars, 

but I'll leave  that for you to discover.

If you click on any photo, the photo will enlarge,

 and you will see small images at the bottom of the page. 

Clicking on any of these images will present you with a different and large-sized image.

Thanks for dropping by,

And as always,

Have a great part of the day or night,

Wherever you may be.

Toysesarcher@gmail.com

Stacey Bindman

Some Bing Motor Cars

Sunday, October 16, 2016
Overcast and Raining
16 Celcius 61 Fahrenheit

Some Bing Motor Cars

Please click here to visit this fine American toy auctioneer

This is  a post continuing from my previous post of today.This time, the post is about the Bing  motor cars or automobiles. The car photos are courtesy of Bertoia auctions, while  the scanned catalogue images are once again courtesy of New Cavendish Book (first printing 2001).

I purposely left out the written descriptions of the toy photos, so that you would look at the descriptions from the print catalogue of the 1912 edition of "The 1912 Bing Toy Catalogue".

    

THe photo below is not quite an exact match to its' catalogue scan above, but its' close. The 

photo below could be an earlier (pre-1912) or a later version of the catalogued toy.

The above photo matches the lower left scanned car. However, these is no chauffeur to be found in the car. Either there wasn't one in the toy, or perhaps the car is an earlier or later version simply did not have a chauffeur. Alternatively, the chauffeur could have been lost over the period of 100 years.

I was fortunate to find 2 Bertoia Auctions photos to match this catalogue 

page of the 1912 Bing catalogue. 

The Bertoia Auctions photo is once again lacking a chauffeur. The same reason that I previously mentioned for the top photo could apply to this car. As always, the excellent photography from Bertoia, certainly makes this toy stand out on the page.

So that's it for today.

I hope that you liked the Carrette and Bing catalogue match-ups.

Thanks for dropping by,

and as always,

hyave a great part of the day  or night,

wherever yopu may be.

Stacey Bindman

toysearcher@gmail.com

Beautiful Antique Toy Automobiles Coming to Auction

Wednesday, August 20,2014
    Sunny,seasonally cooler,but great!

Beautiful Antique Toy Automobiles

Coming to Auction

   One of the auction houses to first help me with my blog was Bertoia Auctions. Originally I bought and sold toys on ebay, and used the photos to start my blog. The  ebay was great, but I didn't make much money and probably lost some. Also, I maximum budget for any one toy was capped at about $ 200.00 US. Eventually, business slowed, and I decided to liquidate everything at "bargain-basement" prices and wait.  I came up with the idea to ask sellers and auction companies if I might be allowed to use their photos and that stated me to a new level of toys. Being able to access toys that I could never afford, nor could most of us, allowed me to see  the most wonderful toys that one could imagine. Of course, the toys that I purchased on my budget became the cornerstone for my writing "hobby". 

   I write about auctioneers, sellers, collectors,and museum toys, but I always like to return to several auctioneers, especially Bertoia Auctions. Excellent photography, a great knowledge of toys, and the reputation to match all make Bertoia what it is today - an exceptional toy auction company. However, it's the fine people in the family-run business that make the company such a success.

Please click here to visit Bertoia Auctions' auction for September 2014

The auction is titled the  "2014-09:Fall Festival Sale", 

and will take place on September 19th and 20th 2014.

What attracted me to these particular toys is the fact that the images were larger than I usually see.As such, the details are easier to see when I provide correspondingly larger-sized images.

What's great about larger-sized photos is that you see the detail easier.

In the image immediately below, you can see the brake on the right rear tire, a brass-coloured rack on the roof, a beautiful world country travelled and stickered labels on the piece of luggage,  with its handle. THen you can see the release lever for the handbrake to the right of the driver, who happens to be  driving a  right-handed steering automobile!

The windshield is probably glass!

The above photo illustrates the large centrally-positioned lantern (headlight), along with 2 more to the left and right of the windshield (windscreen). the door  behind the "chauffeur" actually has a beautiful handle that opens the door. Then there are the beautiful red-spoked wheels with the rubber tires.

What's interesting about the toy below are what I would assume are 2 small red lights 

just in front of the chauffeur.

Just look at that beautiful front grill made of nickel! What I always like, as in the original real cars are those oversized springs on the front of the toy.

Then have a look at those textured seats of the car!

I'll let you look at this fine Karl Bub limousine below. Lots and lots of beautiful detaiul

The final toy for today's post is a German-made American taxi.

It was made by the famous German toymaker - Bing.

What is interesting is that ornament to the front of the driver's door. It's a sign that American taxis would have to show to potential riders on the street if the taxi (cab) was available or was occupied.

You can better see the occupied/unoccupied sign in the above photo. I would assume that the red flag meant occupied and no sign meant available - of course  I could be wrong.

Thanks for dropping by to visit,

and as always,

have a great part of the day or night,

wherever you may be.

Stacey

toysearcher@gmail.com

An Interesting Discovery of the Converse Cars

Thursday, October 24, 2013
             (Start preparing for winter!)

An Interesting Discovery of the 

Converse Cars

   It was cold on Tuesday and Wednesday evenings,and my car had frost on its windows. Winter is coming - ugh! So yesterday I decided to attach the cocoa mats to our riverbed (hard stone) stairs).  The mats are firmer on your boots when walking up the stairs, and  act as a modest barrier when salt has to be added to the stairs when ice forms. For those of you living in warm climates, please invite me for a visit!  While on the subject, cars back in the early years did not have winter tires, nor tubeless tires. I think chains had to be attached to the wheels, and they had inner tubes. This sounds like more complications that my stairs!

   While perusing through Liveauctioneers, I saw some nice Converse automobiles. Converse was an American toy company in the early 20th century teens. They made some very nice trollies (streetcars), trucks, and cars. As I looked at one of the Converse cars, I noticed that one  interesting characteristic of them was the fact that their headlights and side lanterns were made from wood. That certainly was a deviation from the norm of the time, when most of these parts were made of pressed steel. And if you looked at my previous posts on the European cars, you'd have noticed extremely elaborate and ornate headlights and lamps. I don't know why this decision was made, but it would be most interesting to know. What's more interesting is the fact that the parts have stayed with the cars for all these years. Another question that I'd like to have answered was what type of wood was used?

Please click here to visit Bertoia Auctions fine website

Notice how the windup key goes through the canvas roof. You can;t see it, but there is a round grommet (rivet) that the long shafted key goes through. I added the toy below to show you that the canvas roof could be turned down .

THe fine example above was professionally restored and certainly presents itself beautifully.

I kept the name of Gottshalk in the Bertoia description. Mrs. Gottshalk was an outstanding collector and author of antique toys, who also had a fabulous collection of toys. I like how the front headlights are drooping! The description indicate that the above car was a non key wind version (I added pull toy). However, I wonder what that round hole is in the front of the grill.

There's that small hole in the grill again. What is that? 

Questions, questions!

Thanks for dropping by,

and as always, have a great part of the day or night,

wherever you may be.

Stacey

toysearcher@gmail.com

INGAP

Monday, May 6, 2013
    (10th Day in a Row of Sun)

INGAP

    The INGAP toy company was an acronym (abbreviated set of letters) representing Industia Nationale Gicattoli Automatici Padova. The company was founded in 1920 in Padova, Padua, Italy.

They produced many fine toys of lithographed tip with clockwork (wind-up) mechanisms for movement.  In the 1950's, production changed from metal to plastic and the toys became smaller  in size. When I find more info on this great company, I will add it.

Please click to be redirected to Bertoia's fine Website

The orange coupe (above) is the most-expense (winning bid) of this toys posted today.

It'snot my favourite,but it probably is the rarest of the group.

 We've see the perforated side vents in other manufacturers of this era. The same can be said for the external side exhaust pipe. But what makes this toy interesting is the helmeted driver, who just "peeks" over the front part of the seated area.

The logo of INGAP can be seen in the lower right corner, but the image size and DPI (Dots/inch) prevents me from showing it better. Basically it's the INGAP letters inside a diamond shape.

The Great Gadsby movie opens in North America (May 10) and in Europe (May 10-17). I like Leonardo DiCaprio, but I don't know if he was the right person for this part.  I'm sure the American-made movie will be extravagant, as many reviewers so far have said. As usual, the  movie publicity industry is busy working into the night to grind out plenty of reviews and publicity.

What I can say with certainty without even seen the movie yet (as 99.9999% of the world hasn't either), is that it will be beautifully photographed, have great period costumes, and lots of pomp, such as lavish cars.

THat's what the 2 limousines above remind me of - the era of the 1920's (The roaring 20's (1920's),

even  though the toy cars were made in the 1930's. 

A beautiful single-propeller airplane toy.

Umm!

Simply outstanding!

The mouse charter above is called Topo Lino. The history behind this character is very interesting. Apparently,  an Italian editor by the name of Mr. Mario Nerbini, decided to produce a weekly children;s newspaper with interesting comic characters.One of these was Mickey Mouse. The cartoonist was an Italian by the name of Mr. Giove Toppi. 

A problem arose when it was discovered that the editor, Mr. Nerbini, had not properly purchased the publication rights.  As a result, the name of the mouse character was changed to Topo Lino. Nevertheless, this character turned out to be a big success without the Disney name of Mickey Mouse. Eventually Disney and Mr. Nerbini renegotiated, and Mickey Mouse was back,but the name of the mouse was changed to TopoLino.**

**http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Topolino

If you go to the Wikipedia address above, the story is even more interesting.

Please go there - you will not be disappointed!

Happy Hooligan was a popular and influential early American comic strip, the first major strip by the already celebrated cartoonist Frederick Burr Opper. It debuted with a Sunday strip on March 11, 1900 in the William Randolph Hearst newspapers, and was one of the first popular comics with

King Features Syndicate.** 

**http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Happy_Hooligan

   That's it for today - another great find of period toys form the 1930's. It's amazing how I can still find great toys that I've never knew before.

Thanks for dropping by,

and as always, 

have a great part of the day,

wherever you may be.

Stacey

Outstanding all Around!

Wednesday, May 1, 2013

Outstanding All Around!

The Story Behind the Story

   I wasn't able to post yesterday, as I want to get back into shape.  I like to cycle, and I've been doing that off and on. For my 60th birthday, my wife bought me (I asked) a fine road bike from a local store. I told her that I'd use it, but  I haven't used it as much in the last year. It's an Allez  from Specialized with the Shimano 105 gear set. It sounds fancy, and it is, but it's the basic model. Nevertheless, I should be using it! SO yesterday, even though it was my second time out this season,without any winter indoor cycling on a "trainer", I went out for  a ride, and ended up doing about 36 kilometres (25 miles). Of course, that's a lot if you are not a cyclist, but there are people who manage to cycle 20,000 kilometers or about 12,000 during the "extended season". That means that they'll cycle unless there's 1 foot of snow on the ground!

    Returning to the topic of toys, I wanted to come up with a title to catch your attention and your curiosity, and I hope I did. I've been fortunate to have the pleasure and permission to use some of the finest auctioneers, toy-sellers, and people who love toys allow me the "privilege" of being able to use their fine photography, as well as the toys. Bertoia Auctions is one of them. The company is  owned by Jeanne Bertoia, the wife of the late Mr. Bill Bertoia.  Bill's brother Rich Bertoia is the auction cataloguer and  coordinator, which Jeanne's son Michael is the one manages the new digital  technology that allows us to view the great site,and find the toys that I write about in an instant. 

     The company that I'm writing about today is the Distler Toy Company that started out in the early 1900's and closed in 1962. Almost all, if not all of today's toy's came from 1 collector and collection called the Donald Kaufmann, after the late Mr. Donald Kaufmann. Mr. Kaufmann, and also his wife were toy collectors for almost 55 years. The collection took an amazing  number of days to sell in 2009, by Bertoia Auctions. Sadly. Mr. Kaufmann did not live to a nice old age, but passed away in 2009.  His name lives on through the collection, as well as the many children and grandchildren that he has. If you simply do a search for the 

"Donald Kaufmann  Toy Collection", or simply "Donald Kaufmann", you will find his bio, and of course the fabulous collection of toys.  If you also go to the Bertoia Auction site, you can see all the collection . Of course, it will take you days, to look at the fine photography, and the toys. You can even maybe still purchase some catalogues.

The Distler Toy Company

      Distler was started in 1900 by Johan Distler in Nurenburg, Germany in 1895. The company stayed in Business until 1968,and was called Johann Distler KG. Initially, the company produced what are called "penny toys",which were lower-cost toys for the market.  However, these toys, as many other penny toy companies of the time, produced fine-quality toys.  Eventually after getting larger and partnering with other people, the company began to specialize in lithographed tin toys with many of them being able to move through a wind-up mechanism.

      For toy aficionados (fans) who like to learn and see toys, the combination of the names Distler, Kaufmann, and Bertoia has helped myself and others to be able to see the fine toys that once were a big success and please many, many children in Europe and the world over time.

    I'm only presenting 12 cars today, since at one time, Distler produced about 500 toys during this "golden age of toys". I will present other Distler toys in the future.

Please click this sentence to be redirected to the fine Bertoia Auction website

When a antique or in this case an old toy is described by a writer or auctioneer as being "attributed to" a specific company, that means that they cannot with 100% certainty attribute the creation to that specific person or company. However, it most-likely is. If you look at the yellow  # 27 racer (third from the top), you can see that "Alligator texture" on the side pipes or exhausts.  Bertoia had written in their listing of this toy - "Very scarce, probably due to limited unsuccessful production span".

I guess Mr. Distler and company were allowed  to veer of the "regular, regular" type of toy form time to time!

Collectors of all kinds of collectibles like to have the "original box" or packaging come with the item.  The only boxes that I ever collected were for my Meccano and Minibrix sets of construction toys. Where else would I put 500 parts of a kit but keep them in the original box?  Of course, all of my other toys could be kept out of the box, so my toy guns, and other toys were used as is, and stored in the cupboard.

I remember in the early 1990's when the "New Boomers" children of Generation X children started to purchase cases and cases of playing cards. Those are the cards that sometimes came with gum. This was for investment rather than for playing.  What exact pleasure would a young child get out of having 1000 packs of these cards that had to stay in their cases?

For those who still don't know (myself included) what generation you are named:*

1925-1945                                                Silent Generation

1946-1964                                                     Baby Boomers

1965-1979                                                       Generation X

1980-2000                                  Millenials or Generation Y

2000-Present       New Silent Generation or Generation Z 

*http://geography.about.com/od/populationgeography/qt/generations.htm

The above names are attributed to demographers. These are people who study populations in terms of age, sex, profession, place of residence, country of origin (Immigration), health and disease, and so forth.

Just look at that raised texture on the running boards of the touring car above.

What also noteworthy is the lithographed tin and colour of the drivers and chauffeurs.

That cracking effect on the side of the car between the door and the hood is called crazing. Sometimes, the paint does not dry or age properly due to imperfections,and as a result you get that effect.

    As you can see, many of the toys are in excellent condition. Most of the toys are large-sized,have wind-up mechanisms to allow them to roll on the floor or road,and some even have battery-operated headlights. Today's selection are also lithographed tin. When this process was perfected, it moved toy production into a new state of technology. Now, toy makers could  mass-produce high-quality colour exteriors of their toys that could show beautiful detail, at less cost that what was originally done by hand. As well, the tin toy process allowed for massive machines (cutters and presses) to shape and form toy parts and toys also at a faster pace. Of course, the assembly still required the hands of people with fine coordination and skills to assemble these toys.

   It's already 5:50 A.M., and I've been up since about 4:30 A.M. It's time to go for an early coffees and start my day. The Dunkin Donuts where I went closed down in order to have a condominium project built on the land. I now go to Tim Horton's - a hugely successful Canadian Company story!

   ** If you read this, can you please help me? I asked my borhter how he liked my new way of presenting the toy photos. His opinion was that the white background was too stark (harsh) for the toys. He liked my early photos (when I bought and sold toys). At that time, I used different fabric colours, shiny silver or even textures such as burlap. I can;t "modify" the photos too much, but I probably can place the toys against a darker colour or shade of grey. Have you an opinion? If you do, please send your suggestions to toysearcher@gmail.com

Thanks for dropping by,

and have a great part of the day, 

wherever you may be.

Stacey