Monday 5 November 2012

Collecting Project SWORD: The Annual

With Santa's miraculous chimney climbing just round the corner you may be thinking of starting your Project SWORD collection. But where should you start? For my money you couldn't do better than starting with the books. When I say books, I mean the two Annuals with SWORD connections.


First and foremost and the bedrock of any SWORD collection is the Project SWORD Annual from 1968. With its distinctive black covers this SWORD 'bible' covers most of the main vehicles with each one starring in its own colour strip: Saturn V, Moon Prospector, Scramble Bug, Moon Bus. They're all there, together with some surprises like the ANT, Snow Train and my personal favourite, the Moon Crawler, none of which made it into the toy factory of Century 21, so this is their spot in the limelight.
 
 
Unlike the toys their are lots of SWORD Annuals in circulation. You can normally find the Project SWORD Annual at good toy fairs, second hand bookshops, online stores like Star Trader and their is usually one or two on offer on Ebay. Their really is no better or cheaper way to start you off.
Front Cover

Spine
 
Rear Cover
 
Above and below: sample pages
 
I will take a look at the other SWORD-connected annual next time round in this look at SWORD books.

2 comments:

  1. I noticed a Thunderbirds annual from ca'92/'93 on fleaBay and was on the fence about gettining it.

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  2. I really do need to get a copy of this for my collection. The vehicle diagrams alone sell it for me.

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