A toy that never made it to production

Wednesday, May 6, 2020
Sunny with clouds
9 C  48 F

A Toy That Never Made

it to the Production Line

During this week, I came across an interesting seller on ebay who was selling Mattel®  

Hot Wheels ® toys for $ 1000.00 plus U.S. dollars. Whoa, that's a fair amount of money, so naturally I had to investigate! I looked at the toys being presented on a signed certificate, and the name for each certificate was a Mr. Larry Wood. I didn't know who  Larry Wood was, so more investigation was necessary.

And when you visit the store Gottoyz4u where today's "special" car came from, 

you won't believe just

how many Mattel® Hot Wheels® that this store is selling.

So if you're a collector of these toys, or are curious like I was to check 

out this unique store, then by all means please go there. 

It turned out that Larry Wood is actually very famous. Initially he worked for 

GM (General Motors®), and later for Mattel® Hot Wheels®. He's been working for Mattel® since 1969, and he's famous. He designs Hot Wheels®  toys, and he's designed many, many of these toys.

For his having been with Hot Wheels® for 50 years, the company just honoured him by coming out with a special series of toy cars.

"The Larry Wood 50th Anniversary Series ("Larry Wood 50 Years of Design", or "Larry Wood 50") is the second mix of the 2019 Walmart-exclusive Premium Series. This commemorates Larry Wood's 50 years (1969-2019) at Hot Wheels. All cards have Base Code: M10 stamped on them and are made in Thailand." (Courtesy  Hot Wheels® Wiki)

Returning to that Hot Wheels® toy that I saw on  Gottoyz4u, there are many toys that have Larry Wood certificates. All of them have never been produced, but were prototypes that were presented to higher management for approval or rejection.

Please click here to visit this most amazing store 

And so now I understand why this toy and the others, with 

Larry Wood's signature on them are so valuable!

Please click here to visit this most amazing store

You might even have one of the toys that are not certified (the prototypes), 

and may be surprised at just how much your toys may be worth.

Now if my brother had saved those Mattel® Hot Wheels®!!!!!!!!

Thanks for dropping by,

and as always,

Have a great part of the 

day or night, wherever

you may be.

I can always be reached at my g-mail address below:

toysearcher@gmail.com

Stacey Bindman

Toyclaus - An Excellent ebay Seller

Friday, May 5, 2017
Cloud with Rain
8 C  46 F

Toyclaus

An Excellent ebay Seller

   Today's post id from last November (2016). I had worked on the post but never added it to my blog.

"Toyclaus" is a fine ebay seller whom I asked for permission to use his photos several years ago. What I wanted to write about is some of the factors that help bring success to ebay sellers. 

   If you look at the photos of Toyclaus, you'll notice several things:

  1. The photos are in focus.

  2. There are plenty of photos.

  3. The photos are exposed well, and

  4. Many different angles of the listings are used to present the toys in their best manner.

  I decided to covert the individual photos into a grouping of photos called a "montage".

As I mentioned a few days back, we've been having lots and lots of rain up here. April was almost a record for the month for the most rain in a month. Meanwhile, it's only May 5, and already 3 of the 5 days in the month have been overcast with rain. The next 6 days are projected to have rain again! 

Many of the citied around Montreal and elsewhere have been inundated with so much rain, that the rivers have overflowed their banks, and flooding of homes  has occurred.  

Hopefully, by mid-May, the rain will finally stop, and seasonal weather will prevail!

Thanks for dropping by,

And as always,

Have a great part of the day or night,

Wherever you may be.

Toysearcher@gmail.com

Stacey Bindman

More Nice Dinky Toys

Tuesday, December6, 2016
Cloudy with sun
-3 Celsius  26 Fahrenheit

More Nice Dinky Toys

Please click here to visit this fine ebay merchant

Dinky Toys, which were first known as Modelled Miniatures were first introduced by Meccan (British) at Christmas of 1933, and ended when the factory closed in 1979. During the 46 years that these toys were made, millions and millions were made for the enjoyment of children, and later on for the enjoyment of collectors. The idea for these small die-cast toys were from the inspiration of the Tootsietoy Toys that were already being made in the USA.

Within a short period of years, these toys were the most popular in the world, and the name "Dinky Toys" entered the lexicon of the English language being defined as any small toy vehicle - car or truck alike. There were hundreds upon hundreds of different car and truck models made during the timespan of the company. There were even airplanes and farm machinery toys.*

* Citation:  Dinky Toys and Modelled Miniatures By Mike and Sue Richardson

New Cavendish Books, 

London, England, 1986

(revised edition)

I've taken a cross-section of 10 Dinky Toys from Vintage-Toymasters on ebay,  and there is no direct correlation between the age of the Dinky Toy and its' value as a collectible. In other words, the oldest toys are not necessarily the rarest or the most-costly, were you to but them on the open  marketplace. In all cases, these toys have appreciated in value over the years, and their prices to purchase are relatively high compared to their original costs.  As usual, having the original boix that the toy came with, appreciates the value of the toy.

Most of the toys are between 3"- 4" (76 mm-101 mm) approximately.

If you carefully look at the above toy, you'll notice some hairline cracks at the front hood area. Early die-cast molds had some problems due to the nature of the metallic composition of the toys. 

In later years, the  metallic composition of the different metals was improved, 

so that the cracks were no longer a problem. Nevertheless, the toys do sell for their

 asking price due to their value as collectible toys.

A Different Wyandotte Toy

Saturday, December 3, 2016
Snow & Rain
2 C  36 F

A Different Wyandotte Toy

Please click here to visit this fine American ebay seller

I saw this Wyandotte toy a day ago on ebay, so I decided to post it on my blog. 

What's different about this toy is that it is a wind-up toy of ducks that move. 

It's probably a toy that is much later than the 1930's toys which seemed to be

mostly trucks and cars of pressed steel.

If you examine the cardboard, you will see that there is no ZIP code of any kind on the box.

Large American city ZIP Codes (Zone Improvement Plan)first appeared in 1943 , and they were

 2-digit codes.  In July of 1963, 5-digit ZIP Codes were announced for the whole country.

So, I assume that this toy is from the late 1930's or 1940's , excluding the war years, since metal was limited in the manufacture of toys during the war years.

A Bit of History:

Initially, All Metal Products Company specialized in toy guns, including pop guns, water pistols, and air rifles. Their slogan in the 1920s was "Every Boy Wants a Pop Gun." By 1927 they had become the world's largest manufacturer of toy guns. Wyandotte Toys stopped manufacturing air rifles in 1929, but continued to dominate the toy gun market throughout the remainder of their history by producing pop guns, clicker pistols, dart guns and pistols, cap guns and a variety of plastic pistols. In 1929 the company added girls' toys and toy vehicles, as well as lithographed novelty toys in 1936. Metal toys were banned during World War II because the metals were needed for the war effort. The company survived by producing wooden toys and die-cut cardboard "build your own" play sets during the war. All Metal Products also manufactured en bloc clips for the M1 Garand rifle. Clips of this nature will be stamped with "AMP1" on the rear of the clip.*

* Courtesy: Wikipedia

Vintage  Wyandotte Ducky Ducklings Wind-up Tin Toy # 850

Lithographed tin with wooden wheels and wind-up key.

Entire duck train Length: 15" 380 mm

Height of large duck:  L x H 6 1/4" x 5 1/2"  158 mm x 140 mm

Height of small ducks: L x H: 3 1/4" x 3"  91 mm x 64 mm

By the way, this toy was won by someone on ebay for # 249.95 USA.

Thanks for dropping by,

and as always,

Have a great part of the day or night,

Wherever you may be.

Stacey Bindman

toysearcher@gmail.com

An Excellent E-Bayer Revisited

Monday, February 22, 2016

An Excellent E-Bayer Revisited

   A while back, I was perusing ebay when I was attracted to some nice photography. As I expanded my search, I came across excellent photography, even for low-priced items. Naturally, this had to be a post, and so I wrote Malinda Trollinger for permission.  As it turned out, Malinda was helping sell her father's toy collection and other collectibles that he had amassed over a wide span of time.

   If you've been following me recently, I've been doing a "retrospective", and have been researching old posts to revisit old friends and to write about them. And so for today, I present to you Malinda Trollinger.

Please click here to visit Malinda Trollinger's ebay page

Below:

1934 Tootsietoy Ford Sedan.

Length:  3"  ( 76 mm)

Tootsietoy was a company that rivalled the British Dinky toy company. It was an American company that produced small-sized die cast toys for the market. Cars were especially popular, and with a low price, children could collect many cars to play with. The company existed from the 1920's - 1960's and eventually succumbed to the times, higher labour costs in the USA, and to the Aisian marketplace.

What I like about Malinda's photography jus that even for a lower-priced item, she takes the time and makes the effort to present the toy in its best manner, and to illustrate the features of the toy. 

That's dedication, and  "setting the bar high" 

(an American expression meaning high standards are set).

Thanks for dropping by,

and as always,

have a great part of the day or night,

wherever you may be.

Stacey Bindman

toysearcher@gmail.com

A Friend Helps me Out

Friday, May 23, 2014
            Cloudy with rain

A Friend Helps Me Out

I check my email several times a day, and so I was surprised to receive a letter from Mr. Clifford Olsen of Gotham City Toys on ebay. I had made an error (now corrected) in matching up a Hubley catalogue photo with the actual toy. He also sent me 2 interesting photos to compare (please see below) that  are great interest to collectors and sellers alike.

Please click here to visit Clifford Olsen's fine ebay items for sale

The great thing about the Hubley Take-Apart toys was that you could dismantle them and rearrange different top body parts with the respective bottom part. If you go to the link below for m McHoe, another fine seller from Wyoming, USA.

Please click here to visit my previous post about Mr. Red McHoe

The 2 cars above are Hubley cast iron Studebaker roadsters from the 1930's.

Hubley made these toys in 2 sizes - the Stream Model and the Midget Line.

The lengths are 6 3/4" and  5"  ( 172 mm and 127 mm).

Cliff  also sent me the 2 images below which is something I might have known about, but never thought about using the technique with regard to old toys. It's the technique of using "black light" to check for paint retouching of nicks. I believe the technique is one of several used by museums to check for forgeries or a painting redone over another painting. Rembrandt sometimes did this when he didm;t like a painting and simply replanted over it.

The red marks over the violet truck body (above)

are the indicators as to where the retouching or paint over was done to the toy.The person who did the repainting did a very good job, as it's very hard to see the work in the regular photo  (below).

The final great news from Cliff was the fact that he mentioned that he just purchase a nice collection of Tootsietoys that was he will be selling on ebay. 

I can't wait to see what Cliff has for sale!

Thanks for dropping by,

and as always,

have a great part of the day or night, 

wherever you may be,

Stacey

toysearcher@gmail.com

Superb Condition Chinese Toys Circa 1950's-1960's

Friday, December 6, 2013

Superb Condition Chinese Toys

(Circa 1950's-1960's)

  A few days ago, I added a post about Pieterjan Van Den Berg.a fine Dutch seller.  I had started to ask European and British people if I might use their photos, since they of course, had more European toys than could be found here in North America.  Pieterjan's post was on December 3, 2013. He had a fine collection of items for sale, but what also caught my attention was a fabulous more-recnet collection of Chinese toys from the 1950's-1960's. I don't know  if the USA was allowing Chinese merchandise into their country, and I don't know about Canada,,who is of course, more was more liberal at the time with its international relations under our Prime Minister at the time - Mr Pierre Elliot Trudeau. 

   Anyway, I'm very please to present to you today a fine collection of 1950's-1960's Chinese toys. I changed the blue background to white, but you may see some occasional tints of blue in some of the photos. Nevertheless, these photos were excellently photographed and lit by  Pieterjan and he saved me lots of time in having to improve the images in Photoshop.

Please click here to see what Pieterjan has for sale on ebay

I like all of the lithography that has been added to these Chinese toys.

What's also interesting is the many pieces of shiny metal. This certainly requires lots of labour to attach the parts to the car body.

Once again, look at all of that lithographed tin!

Not all of the toys are lithographed, but they are certainly in superb condition! 

This toy waas not identified as a Volkswagen bus,but if you were around in the early 1960's, you'd have certainly seen a VW bus!

Now here's a nice toy that you can actually play with.

And the pièce de résistance (masterpiece) - a Cadillac fire chief's car.

Did any city in the USA or Canada ever have a Cadillac for a fire chief's car?

As you can see, Pieterjan's toys are quite interesting, and in this condition I would guess rarer.

He's selling off some of his collection, and he certainly kept them if great shape.

Thanks for visiting,

and have a great part of the day or night,

wherever you may be.

Stacey

toysearcher@gmail.com