A Bone on the Range

 A trip to Smyth's toys and the Range today was interesting.

In Smyths, among countless amazing toys for Christmas, were Metroid carded figures going cheap. I've never heard of them. You?

I was blown away by this huge moving and talking Optimus. I mean Wow!

Here's a fantastic review of it by a superfan kid. It's hilarious and good.

https://youtu.be/ugCfz77QyHI?feature=shared

I also liked this mega chomp shark with the GI Joe style figure. The shark lights up when it eats!

Anything here for you?

Here's a few Halloween morsels I saw in the Range too.

A lovely animated haunted house with underground train. So cute! 

Life size corpse boney bride and groom. Blimey, they could be film props! 

Nurse Skeleton. She's been nursing for centuries! 

Quaint Haunted house bath soap made from real ectoplasm.

This shape reminded of the old and beautiful Marx tinplate Hootin Hollow haunted house.

It was a work of art with mechanical keys at the side to operate sounds and effects. I'd have loved one!

Here's a collectors short showing the keys.

https://youtu.be/MCeenBc-c18?si=VIJ2mdA-pj6U-Nft

Have you a haunted house?

Brian H's Tudor Rose Rarity

Hello Woodsy

I've been quiet online for some time but have been busy collecting. I visit Moonbase Central regularly and it's just about the only place I can find new information about some of my Interests. 

I've been concentrating on early English space toys: Kleeware, Selcol, Tudor Rose and, especially, Dan Dare. 

I thought you might like to see an interesting acquisition I made recently.

It's a battery powered Tudor Rose shop display featuring two of those spectacular Atomic Space Ships along with a batch of motorbikes and sidecars. 

One ship has a motor connected to a battery pack. The other has a lead counterweight. 

The whole thing spins around in an alarming manner. 

If you can use it on your site please feel free. If you'd like more Tudor Rose, Dan Dare or similar stuff, I have plenty of novelties! 

Here's a Youtube video of it in action:

 

https://youtu.be/GnwtVm5FjRg?si=nXJiFNCr_N4JeiL-

All the best

Brian H.

UK

Vintage Otley Outing

 With the Missus and a mate, visiting my favourite vintage toy shop round here, in Kirkham Arcade in Otley, I was really pleased to bag a few great collectables for the Moonbase collection.

The haul comprised of a smart loose JR21 FAB1, a neat re-issue Corgi Black Beauty and an Action Man Rifle Rack along with the golden grenade launcher. I had all of these as a kid and it was great to get them back and a snip at £30 the lot.

In the town's charity shops I bagged an old hardback copy of Brave New World, a paperback horror by Shaun Huston and a hardback Adventure Annual with Pyro toy designs on the cover. 

My final item was a cool multi-rotational tin globe. It rotates on two axes! 

All in all a great day out.

What do you reckon? 

More on all of them to follow.

A Project SWORD Toy Shop Shelf?

I wondered what a Project SWORD shop counter might look like. Culled from my old attic shots, here goes.

Rack Toy Recess

 With the Missus happy gardening, I've taken a break to bag up my latest mini monster creations for safe-keeping.

Not good enough for the full packaging effort, I've placed the Cronos bug and the Lifeforce ship in simple cellophane bags.

Then I added small 'movie' labels,  which we can print at home and a custom Zodiac price tag each courtesy of Bill. The missus's stamp set provided the price!

Complete and punched, here they are hung on my kitchen 'shop' rack! 

What do you think readers? Mom and Pop store material? 

LOST TOY SHOPS

 These are in my foto archive. I must have saved them ages ago from somewhere online.

This old toy shop is Jeans in Lowestoft.

and this is an old Woolworths window display.

See anything you recognise?

MONK BAR MODEL SHOP

 A few snaps of York's Monk Bar Model Shop here in the UK.

and a snap of brass ornamental cannons in a charity shop, which we had at home when I was a kid! Did your parents have brasses round the house?

Das Toy Shop

 It's always interesting visiting shops abroad, especially the toy aisles! 

Here's a few Dinge ( German for things) I've seen among the Spielzeuge ( German for toys)

A gorgeous long plastic oil tanker, about 18 inches, that could easily be a prop in a Thunderbirds episode.

A water and soft dart gun, that totally recalls Hellboy's pistol, the name of which I forget!

Bags of plastic shurikens or throwing stars. The Kwai Chang Caine in me wants them so badly! 

Water soakers seem to be getting bigger, almost to Johnny Seven sizes! 

A Woolworths brand doll in Woolworths! Yes, it's still around ... In Germany!

Knockoff Bionicles

Replacement Zeroid Robot arms!

Hot Wheels.

Weapons. The huge plastic hunting knife top middle is going to lead to trouble for some kid. Can't believe it's for sale.

Having said that the nunchakus and shurikens would have been right up my Shaolin temple back in 1972!

This I couldn't believe! A huge plastic airliner named ARJ21! It's a dead ringer for the Century 21 Moon Ship too, so one will be joining me at Moonbase! 

Today's car boot or Flohmarkt (flea market), which despite being tiny on account of terrible weather, the Missus and me sold virtually everything we'd taken!  Back there standing again on Saturday! 

Creatures from the Lost Message

 I was sent these pics by a reader but alas I've lost the email, so I can't say who from!

Thanks anyway, what a marvellously monstrous store! I wonder if you bought anything?

Is this your kind of shop readers?

KITS, CARS, TEA AND TOAST

We had some very sad close family news yesterday, a bereavement, but so as not to dwell on it until I can do something practical I need to keep busy, so here's a new post.

As I said, the Missus and me went to Hornsea on the Yorkshire coast. A lovely quaint seaside town full of charm and character. We also visited a very wet Bridlington up the shore too, a much bigger and commercialised seaside town and its sister village of Old Town Bridlington, again a picturesque Yorkshire spot.

Here are a few things we saw in charity shops and antique centres. Taking reader Yorkie's advice we visited Cropper's Model Shop in Bridlington. Talk about timing, its more or less closing for good after this Easter weekend! 50 years of trading done.

This is what was left on Cropper's shelves.

I offered Mr. Cropper a tenner for some old loose Triang Space carriages but no deal. Ah well.

In other shops we saw:

These Matchbox rack cars caught my eye in a proper shop. I hadn't realised they were still going!

Anything you fancy or had as a kid?