The Plancruiser Mystery

Woodsy,

One of the items in Museo Leikki exhibition is this uncut sheet to build a Plancruiser rocket ship, accompanied with some spacemen and alien life forms.

Published by Kuvataide in 1957, its name suggests that it is a Finnish issue of a foreign original, very likely a British one. However, searching the internet gives no results.

Any help in recognizing the origins of the Plancruiser would be greatly appreciated.

Arto

Helsinki Base

 

Post Count Off Punch-Out Space Models

I just found this old TV ad for Post Count Off breakfast cereal on You Tube. You could send away for a book of punch-out space models – all it took was two box-tops from Post Count Off.

This looks like a really nice set. I doubt many of them have survived since the 1960s.

What do you think?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OKSVBcv2j9g

Paul from NZ

 

Daily Express Model Book

I just found this very interesting video on You Tube. A look at a book of cardboard press-out models from the 1930s, published by the Daily Express newspaper.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W0-_CcBDsJk&t=13s

There are 21 models, and a flying model aeroplane called Quicksilver. Most of the models are printed in full colour, and the silver flying model aeroplane looks to use metallic ink.

This is a great book. I doubt many of them have survived intact, and there are very few sales listings for them on-line.

The Daily Express produced two of these Model Books in the late 1930s. Each contained a mix of aircraft, ships, railway locomotives, cars, Land and Water Speed record setters, model buildings, toys, and even furniture.

There is a copyright notice on the first page, for Rigby Designs. Meaning that the models themselves were designed by Wallis Rigby, who produced many such books from the 1930s up until at least the late 1960s.

I have a book on the work of Mr Rigby, Wallis Rigby - Paper Model Monarch, by Charles M. Province, CMP Publishing House, 2020. This is a paperback book, but only the cover is printed in colour, the contents are black and white only.

Two photographs from Worthpoint

Did you have anything like this?

Paul Adams from New Zealand

Ravensblight - Cliff House!

If memory serves me badly, I believe this was the very first Halloween themed paper house I made back in 2016 downloaded from http://ravensblight.com/

WELCOME To RavensBlight

Dark creations by Ray O'Bannon! Gothic art gallery, dark paintings and photography, over 300 works on display, Free haunted paper toys for you to print out, Free goth/rock music, free PC games, short horror fiction, short horror films, artist info, and horror links.

ravensblight.com

The downloads are free, and the builds are straightforward. I brace all of my paper builds with strip wood so they can take the punishment of moving from storage to display and back to storage again. This one includes the house atop a cliff but no way into it like a stairway. Stairs would be an easy enough build but really, ghosts don't need stairs do they?

From Vegas Spooky Town

Ed

USA

ED'S CUT-OUT 707 AIRLINER

For many years I was hot and heavy into paper/cardboard models but in all that time only ended up with one airplane. 

Here's a nice Boeing 707 Cheerios offered up back in the '60s. I scanned the artwork, printed it out on heavy cardstock, then made my own version. Hope you like it.

Cheers

Ed Berg

Las Vegas

THE ART OF PAPER PLANES

 

If you like paper planes you'll love this!

I mean, Wow!

I just folded!

Do you make paper planes?

TAILWIND GLIDER

Voyaging back on the Amsterdam ferry recently I saw a kid and his Dad on the outer deck with a paper plane. Intrigued I watched and they launched the plane into the tailwind at the back of the ship. I have to say it was dramatic, the plane zooming into the spray and spiralling out over the sea before gliding into the water.

I imagine that the Dad and boy knew it would be good. Have you ever launched a paper plane from somewhere exciting like this?

ARTO'S ASTRONAUTICS STAMPING SET

Sometimes, and not too often, there's more to a simple children's toy than meets the eye at first sight.

That is why I was so delighted with this Astronautics Stamping Set, made by an Italian company Multi Print of Milan.

The box top features six different space vehicles in a planetary landscape, seen through a circular window of another spacecraft steered by two astronauts. The illustration is signed by Gil. Box measures 22 x 14 cm.

Inside, there's a red plastic insert with six different rubber stamps, an illustrated ink pad, and three colour pencils.

The instructions are found printed on the inside of the box top, with alluring colour illustrations of the stamp motifs.

The motifs are also repeated underneath the stamps themselves, with yet another set of illustrations.

The Astronautics set came also with a blank notebook with a glossy new take of the cover illustration.

Finally, the box side repeats once more those six stamp motifs.

And all this could have been just a colourful box with six cheap stamps inside. Well done, Multi Print!

Arto

Finland

'ORRIBLE ORIGAMI: PAPER, BOGEYS AND SHEER BOREDOM

It always amazes me what kids get up to with a piece of paper. Powered by boredom its almost alchemy what adroit creations rise from the sheet.

When I was a kid we used to create opening and shutting paper thingies. These had different stuff written on the insides of what were a bit like petals. Stuff like You Stink or Go Out with Me or Nice Legs! It was a bit like a folded bird's beak that your fingers opened and closed. If it had a name I can't recall it.

Another thing we did was to tear a piece out of an A4 sheet and create a ragged hole. That became a hole in the back of someone's trousers, which you drew. You then drew a dog with a similar piece in its mouth. To complete the picture you then formed a crease in your index finger and held this crease behind the hole. It looked remarkably like a bare butt!

A similar effect was achieved using a five or ten pound note, when they weren't plastic. A couple of folds were made in the Queen's neck and voila! The royal bottom!

Obviously paper planes were essential origami and they still are. I often find a foolcsap jet whizzing past my face!

A new fad, at least to me, is kids making bang flaps out of paper. Various folds are made to create a sort of 2-ply triangle. When forcibly flicked forward it creates a loud bang and is really quite annoying if you're an adult. Kids love it!

Last but not least there are paper boats. I imagine readers will be masters of the maritime fold.

Did you do anything else with paper?

THE EAGLE BOOK OF SPACECRAFT MODELS

Hello Woodsy,

A while ago when I sent scans of space art from Eagle Annuals from the 50's I said I remembered Eagle having plans for a model spaceship. After going through my annuals I was mystified at not finding it. 

Then I went on line and found that in 1960 there was an Eagle Book of Spacecraft Models.

I obtained a copy and this indeed was what I remembered. The models need the wonderful JETEX motor which I had great fun with back then though the plans in this book were unintelligible to me then and they still are!

As we get to the anniversary of the first men on the moon, how about this MAN IN SPACE?

Regards,

Teranova47

USA

MORE SPANISH PAPER SPACE MODELS

STARCARGO: SPANISH PAPER MODEL

Starcargo!

This looks like one big hunk of space junk!

Its another Spanish paper space model. From 1993.

VEHICULO LUNAR: SPANISH PAPER MODEL

One of a number of paper models from Spain I've liked online.

This is a great looking Space Ranger moon bus!

INTERPLANETARY SPACELINER MODEL

Hello Woodsy

If you liked the Man in Space here is the last model in the book.

It's a display model and reflects the worst of 50's wood models. To explain:

Maybe 1954 or so I was taken to the cinema and saw a colourful pirate movie. I was so thrilled by the galleon models that for the next birthday I was given a Keil Kraft Wood Kit.

My memory may be slightly off but there was a brick sized block of balsa wood, a small sheet of balsa and some wooden dowels for masts. Carve your own hull! I think the construction instructions were follow the illustration on the box lid.

Talk about basics. On seeing how disappointed I was the 'kit' was returned and I became the proud owner of one of the first AIRFIX plastic kits, either The Revenge or The Mayflower. It was only about 4" long but brilliant as my parents could glue it together.

The Inter Planetary Spaceliner is another start with a brick of balsa wood and whittle.

Regards,

Terranova47

NYC

EAGLE BOOK OF SPACECRAFT MODELS: MAN IN SPACE!

Hello Woodsy,

A while ago when I sent scans of space art from Eagle Annuals from the 50's I said I remembered Eagle having plans for a model spaceship. After going through my annuals I was mystified at not finding it. 

Then I went on line and found that in 1960 there was an Eagle Book of Spacecraft Models.

I obtained a copy and this indeed was what I remembered. The models need the wonderful JETEX motor which I had great fun with back then though the plans in this book were unintelligable to me then and they still are!

Regards,

Terranova47

PAPER PLANES, BOATS AND FLYING SAUCERS

I recently had to fold a piece of paper 8 times.

I remembered that its impossible but a flood of memories came back about folding paper as a kid.

I was never a black belt at origami but loved to do the classic stuff, making paper planes and boats.

Paper Planes were a joy and flight competitions with my mates were a staple pastime. My planes were always the same, four folds to create an arrowhead. My mates experimented with wings and tails and even paper clips. I was never sure what the best fold was for distance but gave it a good go. Even Status Quo gave us a rock song to boot, Paper Plane!

I did see a more Sci-Fi version of the paper plane in a science lesson. It was a drogue, which was a new word on me. A drogue is a paper circle sliced along the radius and made into a very shallow cone, a sort of saucer, by way of a paper clip. If made correctly a drogue should float to the floor like an inverted parachute.

Less frequent but no less enjoyable were paper boats. Much harder to make, I adored watching them float down rivers and streams like something out of a Winnie the Pooh story. There's something quintessentially childish about paper boats, a sort of gentle vessel in which long summer days sail away until its time for tea.

I'm not sure I could fold a boat anymore though. Like Peter Pan, its something I've forgotten growing up, which is quite sad. Can you still fold a paper boat?

A much simpler version of basic sailing was pooh sticks. Not what it sounded, this involved mates chucking twigs into a stream to see which would the fastest or the furthest. Great fun as well and something I'm still partial to!

Did you fold paper much readers?

CARD BOAC COMET MODEL

Hello, 

Attached is a picture including a ruler for scale for the Comet. 

It's interesting that the 707 is referred to as the Rolls Royce 707, no mention of Boeing at a time when national pride was still put out by the initial crashes developing the Comet that kept it back for Boeing to sweep the market for world wide sales. 

Terranova47

USA

BOAC COMET 4 JETLINER PAPER TOY

Hello woodsy, 

In looking at your blog and being amazed at the quality of model building by your contributors, and I exclude my own clumsy efforts, I am reminded of how building models was once considered a suitable hobby for kids. 

Back in 1959 I made my first cross Atlantic flight from NYC to London in a BOAC DC7C prop aircraft, a grueling 11 hours. To pass the hours BOAC gave the attached to kids to entertain themselves. 

How this was to be done without tools, glue etc didn't concern BOAC they provided them and that was it. 

British Airways carries on this indifference to passengers, luckily flight time is less now. 

So for your in flight entertainment, pre SST, try making these models with your bare hands! 

REMEMBER: You are someone special to BOAC (Edward Scissorhands with a glue pot for starters) 

Regards, 

Terranova47

NYC

Small Paper Accessories That Came With Vintage Toys

Some of the coolest and most memorable nik-naks from my childhood were miniature paper items.

What I mean are those paper accessories that came with toys.

One that springs to mind was the map that Action Man had. I think it came on a small plastic clipboard that his gripping hands could hold onto in the thick of battle. I can't recall what was on that map but I imagine it was about advancing his position against his arch rival Tommy Gunn!

Palitoy's Fighting Man must have had more bits of paperwork but I've filed them away in the top secret drawer!

Major Matt Mason came with lots of paper and plasticy decals sheets which were just ace too. I adored taking off the stickers and gently placing them on the multitude of gizmos that the Major had. 

Some of the best stickers went on decorating his fab wedding-cake space station. As they're paper based I've seen many of these decals being reproduced for modern collectors. 

My love of petite paperwork didn't stop there. Another great juvenile collection I had on the go for years were key rings. I had loads of them and one favourite was a small metal book with a concertina style set of paper photos inside. I think they were from one of my Mum's trips to Spain in the Sixties. I can see it now and can almost feel the satisfaction I had closing the metal clasp to keep the two covers fastened!

There may have been a miniature Bible too but I could be getting mixed up with tiny plastic Bibles that you peered into. Remember them?

Talking of small books has totally jogged my noodle about a toy I had. It was a clockwork monkey and when wound up he would flick the pages of a book he was holding! Now the book wasn't paper I admit. It was metal but there were paper pictures stuck on each page. It was a gorgeous old toy and I had a version of the monkey banging cymbals too.

I can't finish without mentioning the wonderful feeling I got sticking down Action Man stars onto my free gift coupon that came with Palitoy's fighting doll. The only downside was having to cut the stars out of boxes but that won't have worried me in 1967!

Which miniature papers from toys can you recall readers?

paper toys anyone?

Hi Woodsy,

just found an intriguing paper model site, 

ravensblight.com/papertoys.html. 

Lots of gothic bits and pieces to make, which I suspect might appeal to you!

Andy B.