Old Dinky toy tank
A couple months ago, I bought a toy that's over 70 years old on ebay. It's a metal toy model of a tank the British army used between the two world wars. The raised lettering on the bottom reads "Dinky Toys Made in Britain." The turret turns around and the tracks made of small chains move, so that you can move the tank on the ground or a table.
It definitely looks like something from a different time. The body of the vehicle has lots of rivets and rigid shapes that recalls the appearance of a steamship. Which would make sense as the tank was thought of as a land battleship, which would stand at the edge of a battlefield and engage enemy land battleships while smaller tanks raced around the battlefield. Its turret resembles that of a battleship, while two guns extending from the sides of the chassis that resemble the secondary guns of a battleship for defending against smaller ships. It was a familiar vision to Britain after decades as a supreme sea power, with war conducted far from home with minimal loss of life (well, minimal British loss of life) by stately ships intimidating any foe.
Whe war came, the whole theory for vehicles like this was invalidated, at first by planes with bombs and later by rockets. Tanks that the toy resembled were quickly destroyed in bloody battles that were anything but stately duels of land battleships. Destruction of whole cities and nations was the pattern that evolved during the war. And technology lept forward in the following decades such that vehicles of war look like huge behemoths from science fiction rather than steamships of old. Though there are still foot soldiers and tanks, there are guided missiles, remote control planes, nuclear weapons and vans and buildings full of electronics to control it all.
Toys too have changed dramatically since this toy was assembled in Britain long ago. First, hardly any toys are made in Britain or anywhere in Europe today. Instead they are made in China or the former colonies of Europe. Second, they are made of plastic, a much easier and less expensive material to mold toys from than metal. Toys modeling the same subject are simplified for manufacture. The old toy has fourteen parts: the turret and a pin to secure it to the top chassis, the top chassis itself, the bottom chassis, two rivets to secure the two chassis together, the four wheels, two pins for the wheels to spin around, and the two chains that form the tracks. A modern plastic toy could have as few as four: the hollow top chassis, the turret that snaps into the chassis, and two axle and wheel pieces to snap to the chassis. Thus more toys are built for a fraction of the cost of my old toy. The only difficulty is plastic brakes easier than metal, so the toys do not last as long. If not pulverised in play, the plastic becomes brittle over time.
Most toys are broken or lost by kids or thrown out by families after the kids have grown. My toy tank managed to survive a long time. The boy that played with it is probably dead. He may have lived a long life, keeping his childhood toys in a box in the basement to be found by his children after he died. He may have died in the war and the toy was saved by a sad father as a momento of his lost son, to be found later by a relative. Either there was no interest in keeping it or a quick search on ebay revealed the cash that could be had for it. Bids for it frequently reach a hundreed dollars--I bought it in combined lot of toys and sold the rest to recoup much of the cost. So the tank survives now in my basement as a sort of monument to a different time.
It definitely looks like something from a different time. The body of the vehicle has lots of rivets and rigid shapes that recalls the appearance of a steamship. Which would make sense as the tank was thought of as a land battleship, which would stand at the edge of a battlefield and engage enemy land battleships while smaller tanks raced around the battlefield. Its turret resembles that of a battleship, while two guns extending from the sides of the chassis that resemble the secondary guns of a battleship for defending against smaller ships. It was a familiar vision to Britain after decades as a supreme sea power, with war conducted far from home with minimal loss of life (well, minimal British loss of life) by stately ships intimidating any foe.
Whe war came, the whole theory for vehicles like this was invalidated, at first by planes with bombs and later by rockets. Tanks that the toy resembled were quickly destroyed in bloody battles that were anything but stately duels of land battleships. Destruction of whole cities and nations was the pattern that evolved during the war. And technology lept forward in the following decades such that vehicles of war look like huge behemoths from science fiction rather than steamships of old. Though there are still foot soldiers and tanks, there are guided missiles, remote control planes, nuclear weapons and vans and buildings full of electronics to control it all.
Toys too have changed dramatically since this toy was assembled in Britain long ago. First, hardly any toys are made in Britain or anywhere in Europe today. Instead they are made in China or the former colonies of Europe. Second, they are made of plastic, a much easier and less expensive material to mold toys from than metal. Toys modeling the same subject are simplified for manufacture. The old toy has fourteen parts: the turret and a pin to secure it to the top chassis, the top chassis itself, the bottom chassis, two rivets to secure the two chassis together, the four wheels, two pins for the wheels to spin around, and the two chains that form the tracks. A modern plastic toy could have as few as four: the hollow top chassis, the turret that snaps into the chassis, and two axle and wheel pieces to snap to the chassis. Thus more toys are built for a fraction of the cost of my old toy. The only difficulty is plastic brakes easier than metal, so the toys do not last as long. If not pulverised in play, the plastic becomes brittle over time.
Most toys are broken or lost by kids or thrown out by families after the kids have grown. My toy tank managed to survive a long time. The boy that played with it is probably dead. He may have lived a long life, keeping his childhood toys in a box in the basement to be found by his children after he died. He may have died in the war and the toy was saved by a sad father as a momento of his lost son, to be found later by a relative. Either there was no interest in keeping it or a quick search on ebay revealed the cash that could be had for it. Bids for it frequently reach a hundreed dollars--I bought it in combined lot of toys and sold the rest to recoup much of the cost. So the tank survives now in my basement as a sort of monument to a different time.
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