Musical Wanderer

It started when I was a kid.  Probably 1971 or 1972.  I was in the toy section of Lowen's in Bethesda.  For anyone growing up in southern Montgomery County in the 60s and 70s, Lowen's was Mecca for toys.  The place had every toy a kid would ever want. The store had a glass case with toy figures made of painted plastic with metal bases to keep them upright, a line by Britains toy soldiers called Deetail.  They were about 2 inches tall or 1/35 scale.  Cowboys and Indians.  Knights on horses.   Arabs and Foreign Legion.   Union and Confederate soldiers with cavalry and cannons.  World War II soldiers with vehicles.  What caught my eye at the time were the German soldiers and American soldiers from World War II. German WWII Soldiers American WWII Soldiers I loved the devastated trees that came with the package so a couple soldiers could have "cover." My friends liked cars and motorcycles, so they also caught ...

I am an avowed day trader of toy soldiers, as can be seen in previous posts about stuff I've traded recently ( here and, oh my, here ) as well as my past history of day trading .  I have to crow about another great find, this time about toy army vehicles  Not sure which I like more, subsidizing my hobby, or discovering new stuff out there by accident. A week or so ago, I was cruising the ads of toys on ebay, looking for stuff the seller doesn't realize can sell with a little bit of research.  I found one called "Military Toy Lot."  A lot of stuff for an opening bid of five bucks plus shipping. Much of the time, the used toys for sale on ebay is crap, cheap soldiers or tanks recently manufactured in China.  Reviewing the picture I saw a couple things I recognized, Roco Minitanks as well as a Tootsie Toy vehicle and a Marx soldier.  I wanted one small item among the hodgepodge, so I bid for the lot and won, paying $16.50, including shipping.  I fi...

When my wife and I bought our house from our landlord, part of the agreement was everything he left in the house "conveyed."  Usually when you buy a house that just means appliances, but he still had some bookshelves plus a lot of assorted items in the basement--old housewares, some hardware, tools, mirrors, lamps, even a tiny guitar speaker and a fedora.  We didn't want most of it, plus we had some stuff each of us brought into the house when we moved in that we didn't need anymore.  Robin said we should call someone to come pick up the junk.  I thought we could just put it out on the curb and people would take stuff.  She didn't believe me, but went along with me.  We put out the stuff on Friday afternoon.  I sat out on the stoop with a beer to watch. Within 10 minutes the first people took some stuff.  By dinner time Sunday, everything was gone. My neighborhood is a model for recycling.  Some of it is silly, like people putting lamps out...

As can be seen by previous posts about toy soldiers and other toy vehicles, both  plastic and metal , I have become a bit of a collector of old army toys.  Not crazed such that I have glass cases of my prized collection.  All of them easily fit into a copier paper box.  But I have developed a couple interests.   I live near the Marine Barracks in DC, so I've accumulated some two inch toy soldiers of Marine and Army Bands in DC , below.  I've also started collecting Airfix HO scale toy soldiers. I played with Airfix HO soldiers when I was a kid. They came in sets of about 3 to 4 dozen one-inch figures.  A few years ago I was cleaning out my parents' closets when I found some boxes of these old soldiers.  I started to sell some on ebay, but then realized I wanted to keep them, and replace those that had disappeared over the years. I gradually started to buy some that I didn't have as a kid. When I was a kid, Airfix was it for plastic soldie...

Didn't think putting a picture on a the blog header would be that complicated, but you have to make the picture fit, there's no handy tool. What are those guys in the picture? They are  W. Britain's Eyes Right Band figures.  The top row are from the US Army Yellow Jacket band and the bottom row are from the Marine Band in red jackets.  They were made in the 80s, I think, and are available in various conditions on ebay.  The arms move and therefore fall off, the heads are replaceable and, yes, fall off, and the instruments tend to break.  On top of all that, the plastic is somewhat brittle after a few decades.   I have 13 Army bandsmen and 17 Marine bandsmen from the eyes right series.  Below is all the bandsmen in a little display box I found in the street.  My wife even thinks they're sorta cool. The Army uniforms have a strange history.  The Army Band in Washington, DC had to deal with the great red uniforms the Marine Band had been...

Today people buy and then resell houses, cars, and other items, a process commonly called flipping.  Some of us "flip" toys, including my former student and master flipper Will .  He hits garage sales and estate sales and sells his finds on his own website .   I just cruise ebay while watching tv.  I just had a great flip of toys I found on ebay.  I will pay homage to the master toy-flipper with this post. Two weeks ago I found a bunch of toy soldiers and vehicles for 18.88 including shipping.  It was described by the seller as "Large Lot of Old Junk Military Men Landscape & Vehicle Toys Small and Bigger sizes"   and the photograph shows a bunch of soldiers of different sizes, globs of plastic, and pile of plastic pieces.   Like a prospector in the Klondike, I saw gold in that pile.   I was happy it was Buy it Now on ebay so I didn't have to bid against other prospectors.  I've sold some of it in separate lots.   Let's see ...