#770 UNKNOWN MANUFACTURER - UNIDENTIFIED DICHTER QUARTET (Around 1955)

MONTH OF THE UNKNOWN

I have a few interesting toys that I have been collecting over the years from which I know nothing at all. They cannot be identified since they have no manufacture marking. Despite searching the internet, I couldn´t find anything about them, so I changed my mind, and thought it may be better if I publish them now, and people reading this could help me identifying them.

There will be 11 toys (all 11 entries from January 2017), but I warn you: it is not an easy task to identify them. Are you ready for this challenge?

If I get hints and information, I´ll be updating the posts to add information about them. Thanks!

 

If you like the challenge, there are other toys in this blog waiting to be identified, click here to see all unidentified toys.

 

 

After so many years writing this blog, I think I don´t have to say I love all card decks. I found this for very little money and I think it was a great buy.

 

 

The deck is a classic quartet game with no indications at all, although it is 99% sure made in Austria (there are many Austrian authors in) and also from the mid to late 50s (for the style of the box, the colouring and the cut of the cards.

 

 

 

 

It seems to be a low quality product, typical from the post-war times. I would say it has never been played, since the cars still have nice edges.

 

The beautiful illustrations in each card represent the portrait of the author plus some small scene of one of the four selected works they wrote.

 

 

FACTS AND FIGURES:

• Name: DICHTER QUARTETT
• Year: Around 1955
• Company: Unknown (Austria)

#565 LESNEY TOYS - VARIOUS MODELS I (1955, 1957 and 1958)

I have collected my oldest Matchbox/Lesney to finally write the story of the origins of Matchbox.

Lesney was founded in 1947 by Leslie and Rodney Smith. Despite their names, these men were not family. LESlie and rodNEY gave name to the company. Shortly after their foundation the engineer John "Jack" Odell joined the company. He was a friend of Rodney, both had worked previously at DCMT (Die Cast Machine Tools Ltd.), the die-cast company famous for "Lone Star" die-cast models.
Initially, Lesney facilites were an old pub called The Riflemen. They changed location several times until they finally moved to a factory in Hackney. In 1947 they recevied a request for toy gun parts, and they started considering toys as a new alternative to the other items they produced. In 1948 they started producing toys themselves. That first toy was a die-cast road roller similar to another one made by Dinky, followed by similar toys including a cowboy wagon and a soap box racer (from 1949, probably the most sought-after model ever in the history of Lesney/Matchbox).

Rodney left the company in 1951 because he thought there was no future in producing toys.
Only two years later, in 1953, Lesney produced the Royal Stage Coach used in the coronation of Elizabeth II in two different scales. This was an amazing success and provided capital for future expansions. This success plus a bit of luck would definitely determine the brilliant future of the company. Jack Odell built a miniature road-roller in 2 to 3 inches size for his daughter, who was only allowed to take with her to school toys in the size of a matchbox or smaller. This scale was somehow revolutionary, and we all know how successful this "scale" has been. Opposed to the classic 1:43, 1:87... scales, this new scale is sometimes referred as 1:box, because all models are around 2-3 inches long, independently of the size of the real vehicle.
That road roller would later become Nr.1 of the Matchbox 1-75 series.

Until the late 50s, Lesney toys were distributed by Moko. Moko was founded by MOses KOhnstam, and from there its name. Toys distributed by Moko were marked Lesney/Moko in the boxes. At one point, Lesney bought Moko, and started distributing their own toys.

From there on, a great expansion would follow until the first bankruptcy and receivership in 1982. Then, the company was reformed as Matchbox International Ltd. (a division of Universal Holdings/ universal Toys) and started producing in Macau. Jack Odell founded then Lledo (the surname spelled backwards).

Nr. 1c - Aveling Barford Road Roller (1958-1962)
Nr. 2b - Muir Hill Site Dumper (1957-1961) - Probably Reedition
Nr. 18a - Caterpillar Bulldozer (1955-1958) - Reedition

More Information:
www.hgm-matchbox.de/default.htm

FACTS AND FIGURES:

• Name: Aveling Barford Road Roller (Nr. 1c), Muir Hill Site Dumper (Nr. 2b), Caterpillar Bulldozer (Nr. 18c)
• Scale: Unknown
• Year: 1958, 1957, 1955
• Company: Lesney (Great Britain)
• Size: approx. 6 cm

#556 FX SCHMID - WUNDER DER TECHNIK (Around 1955)

This deck of cards was manufactured by Schmid (today FX Schmid) in the 50s, maybe 1955, although it is quite difficult to give an exact year...

Similarly to the deck by JSJW shown in a previous entry, the box simulates a small book with leather covers, although it is made of cardboard. I bought both decks from the same seller, so I guess that both are have more or less the same age. It belongs to the series "Quartett Bibliothek der Unterhaltung und das Wissen" (Quartett-Library of Entertainment and Knowledge).

The quartet has 9 families, each of them represents one category in the “wonders of technology” or “wonders of engineering”, like: roads, canals, bridges, trains, high buildings, shipbuilding or telecommunications.

 

 

I love the theme of the deck and the pictures are great. Despite being so old, the deck is still quite modern, in most categories, the works shown are still considered very advanced 60 years later… the only category in which the “wonders” have been clearly exceeded are maybe telecommunications.

FACTS AND FIGURES:

• Name: WUNDER DER TECHNIK
• Alternate Names: WONDERS OF ENGINEERING (English)
• Year: Around 1955
• Company: FX Schmid (Germany)

#508 PIATNIK - DICHTER-QUARTETT and MÄRCHEN-QUARTETT (Nr. 284 and 285) (1955)

I collected two more Piatnik sets from the 50s, those that came in a carboard box, like for example these ones or these ones. I have decided to put these two together, since their themes are related. The first set is a collection of poets from Europe (and their works), while the second one is based on the tales by the Grimm brothers, so both are literature based.

These are especially nostalgic decks, since today such quartetts would be unthinkable for boys and girls. I think most children today wouldn't be able to mention one work from each of these poets, taken that they know who these people are. Even the tales from the Grimm Brothers are now somehow challeged and out of fashion, because they include violent or politically-incorrect situations or characters. What I want to say, is that this toys belong to another "era", which is not very likely to return.

The poet's quartet includes 9 families, each devoted to one poet. The first card of each family is a portrait, while the other three are scenes of three of their plays. This schema is similar to the one used in the Famous Operas Quartett (Opern-Quartett, Nr. 286).   

Goethe and Molière

Shakespeare and Goldoni

Tolstoi and Ibsen

Grillparzer and Schiller

Calderón de la B

The Märchen-Quartett has again 9 families, each one is a famous tale divided in 4 parts, one on each card.

 This set still includes the instructions, that were printed in a separate piece of paper.

Sorry for the quality of the pictures, some are blurry and sometimes you can see the flash reflected on the card.

UPDATE: Alternative Cover for Dichter-Quartett with Shakespeare's bust.

FACTS AND FIGURES

• Name: DICHTER QUARTETT and MÄRCHEN QUARTETT (Nr. 284 and 285)
• Alternative Names: „POETS QUARTET“ and "TALES QUARTETT"
• Year: 1955
• Company: Piatnik Wien (Austria)