One of the interesting things about going abroad is finding out about their pop culture.
On the European mainland their are many pop culture icons that we simply never had in Britain.
Continental Europeans have always been comics mad for decades. You just need to go into any magazine shop or railway station shop to see what I mean with countless home-grown titles on the shelves.
These comic characters are a rich source of vintage and modern popular European culture and whilst strolling round the Salzberg Toy Museum in Austria I saw two such icons of the German speaking countries, Fix und Foxi.
Fix und Foxi are basically two small cheeky foxes and have been released many many times in toy form for more than half a century - like these two soft plastic vintage figures I saw online. I'd never heard of them before until meeting them in Salzberg.
Lauritz.com
Fix und Foxi began their life in comics in the early Fifties. They were created by Ralf Kauka, a sort of German Stan Lee , first appearing in his comic Till Eulenspeigel and first debuting on the cover of issue 6 in 1953.
They have lasted in some form ever since: a website, TV series, collectables and of course comics. I can well imagine their being passionate collectors of toys and merchandise for such a vintage comic pair.
There is an English Wikipedia page on the characters and a much more detailed Kaukapedia site showcasing every Fix and Foxi comic cover over the line's 64 years which you can see here.
My Missus Moonbase read Fix und Foxi comics as a nipper and like some of the comic characters from my own tender years such as Caspar and Sad Sack they have receded to the far reaches of our memories only really remembered when we see them again like this.
Do you know Fix and Foxi readers? Who were and are your favorite comic characters?
