Corgi Toys at 60: Simon Snorkel, Police Minivan, Jaguar E Type, Mercedes-Benz and Land Rover

 

Lots of new models appeared in September 2024, after a quiet August.

First is the Simon Snorkel Fire Engine, a Corgi Major issue #1127. This was a remarkable model that stayed in the dealers' lists through to 1976, pretty much unchanged. The 1964 issue came in a thick card box with a lid, later replaced by a window box with shaped polystyrene holding the model inside. There were many, many sold and good models are easy to find today. The only early variations were the metal pipes which could be silver or gold. Later the wheels would be updated to the detailed commercial vehicle type.

Next is the first of two Public Address Land Rovers. This is the green one with red interior and 'Vote for Corgi' on the sides. In the back is a politician, fixed on a rotating base, with a microphone and there is a free-standing girl handing out leaflets. Amusingly, the politician gets changed for a clown in 1965 and the girl becomes a chimpanzee for the Chipperfields Circus version.

A nice variation can be found with a yellow interior and this can be found both with and without a tin hook at the back.

The next issue was quite a surprise and it's one that I missed as a child. I remember one of my first searches when starting to rebuild my collection in 2012 was for a blue Mercedes-Benz 220SE, using catalogue number #230. Only then did I realise that this edition was quite different. The obvious change is the lack of steering. That was such a shame as Corgi's steering was something I really liked but I have to assume that the intricate production necessary for the steering mechanism was making #230 an insufficiently profitable model. It is also possible that Mercedes-Benz had been in touch to tell them that they had the boot shape wrong as that gets revised.

 

In place of steering, we get two cases in the boot, one of the opening ones and one small flat case. The spare wheel is retained.

There is an interesting variation with either yellow or cream interior in the blue model.

The red model is a quite delightful metallic cerise and quite distinct from the flat colour of the previous model. This seems always to have the yellow interior but I guess it would be entirely feasible for some to have had cream - I just haven't seen or heard of any to date.

Whereas the #230 models can be found with window units that do and don't incorporate a centre pillar at the side, the #253 models do seem all to have this feature.

All the Mercedes-Benz 220SE models have small shaped wheels.

A lovely model that I didn't miss and was very pleased to own and play with was the E Type Jaguar, #312. This came in liquid pale gold. There are shades of more silver colour too. This was #307 given an extended life with the new finish, a driver, racing stripe and wire wheels. It was only the third model to get these nice wheels (following the Buick Riviera and Chevrolet Sting Ray).

I have heard of variations with some bases having one rivet whereas all I have ever seen have had two. I need more information about this as a variation.

The fifth new issue this month 60 years ago was the first Minivan from Corgi. This was nicely presented in a box containing a tray with illustration and with a police dog-handler and police dog on a lead. 

A few models were issued with a tray that did not have an illustration attached and the surface uncoloured.

There are many variations. Whilst all the early editions will have shaped wheels, later models get cast wheels. The base can have either AUSTIN MINI - VAN, AUSTIN MINI VAN or AUSTIN MINI COUNTRYMAN. Whereas the later plain van can be found with different treatment of the grille, this Police edition seems always to have the simple and unpainted grille.

with acknowledgements to Gerrit Leemburg for the image of a model found on Vinted for a song!

The interior window unit is slightly different to that fitted to the plain van which is issued a few months later and you may find these get interchanged, the police one having cross-hatching on the inside panel and the van doesn't have that section at all.

Corgi Toys @ 60 : Mercedes-Benz with steering and the Thames 'Airborne' Camper Van

One of my all-time favourites hit the toy shop shelves in February 1962. The Mercedes-Benz 220SE was available in three colours, all solid. Black and red with yellow interiors, cream with a red interior. It had the wonderful steering that we had first seen on the Bentley Continental. Small-size wheels diminished the model's appearance slightly and it was a bit too close to the ground for really effective control on a carpet but worked fine on a harder surface.

The boot also opened and contained a spare wheel housed in a dip on the right hand side. There wasn't a great deal one could do with the spare wheel but I always liked opening boots where odd bits and pieces could be placed and driven around the room.

There are two types of window unit, one with an indication of a pillar and quarterlight and one without. Many models have since lost the emblem on the bonnet now. This is a typical example of where the Great Book of Corgi gets things wrong, as it states that this model was available in metallic red and dark blue as well as cream and black. I spent ages looking for those two editions before realising that the metallic red and dark blue were the colours for the later 253 edition! 

The later edition loses the steering and gets a reshaped boot panel. To make up for the loss of steering, Corgi will add a suitcase but, contrary to may dealers' listings, the 230 model did not have a case when sold. More about that in September 2024!

The other new arrival at the shop would be the Thames 'Airborne' Camper Van.

This was a fun model with opening rear doors and a very detailed interior. It came in three exterior finishes, all two-tone: creamy-white over a rich blue, pale olive over olive-green and pale lilac over lilac. Whilst colours for the olive green version were fairly stable, you'll find quite a few shades for the blues and lilacs. Furthermore, whilst the olive green had only a brown interior, off-white, yellow and red interiors can be also found in the other two with a red table in the off-white or yellow interior and a white table in the red. 

The Thames Camper Van would be the last model issued with fixed shaped wheels. Fixed wheels seem scarcer, particularly on the olive-green issue.

Models have blinds in three of the four side windows but this doesn't appear to be consistent as to which window is left open, with both smaller panes on each side with or without a blind.

So just two models but a remarkable number of editions if you are trying to collect each one!

 

New arrivals for June 2021.

Some nice new arrivals on my desk and shortly to appear in the store. 

This lovely 276 Oldsmobile Toronado has an original box too. 

The scarcer edition of the Fiat 1800 in mustard with a bright yellow interior.

A pretty reasonable example of the black edition of the 230 Mercedes-Benz 220SE with its emblem on the bonnet still present!

I was surprised at how long it has taken me to find a really good example of the plum red 307 Jaguar E Type. This one is excellent and had an original hard top. After taking so long to find I shall not be letting this go for a song! the last one I had (and sold) was my own from my childhood. Since then I have had several dark metallic grey editions which I do prefer and which also seem very much in demand but more plentiful.

Two nice Jaguar 2.4 models in 208S form. One has the later shaped fixed wheels ad is in super condition with lovely bright paintwork showing only very tiny marks on one or two raised body lines.

The earlier edition is not quite as smart but still a nice example for someone one day.

I took the opportunity to sort out all my other Jaguars - the 208M models, all now listed, including the rare grey base edition.

I always love the less common varieties of models and here is an excellent example of the Oldsmobile Toronado with plain shaped wheels, not the usual cast type. Only a few early editions had these fitted. It comes with a good box too. Splendid.

Maybe not particularly rare but the lovely old Rolls Royce didn't last long before Whizzwheels were fitted. This is the more common colour scheme but in very nice condition and undamaged emblem and chrome.

I found a yellow trailer and so have been able to put together a nice Gift Set 17. This is the better of two sets I now have available, the Ferrari being very fine and the nose not missing paint as most do! I have always thought it silly that there should be a driver in this set but as that's how it was sold I have to follow suit!

The farming vehicles have always had a fascination for me - as I was brought up on a farm and learnd to drive on a Fergie 20. I am really pleased with the old Massey Ferguson Tractor and have paired it with one of my better trailers and put Farmer George in place for a Gift Set 29. If you take out Farmer George then it's also a Gift Set 7!

Mercedes 220SE Coupé

 The 230 model is one of my favourites. I just loved the steering. OK, so you had to press down on the 'wrong' side to turn, compared to how cars actually would lurch, but this ability to go around bends in your layout or on the carpet, coupled with free spinning wheels, made driving it a pleasure.

What I hadn't realised until a few minutes ago was that the 230 model comes with different window units. Some have lines for pillars at the side, others don't. It also seems that every black model has the lines but you'll find cream and cerise editions with either.

My first thought was that the unit with the lines would have been the first. I say that because I remember getting a black model and thought that must have been pretty early in its production because a couple of years later it had collected quite a few chips and I went back to the shop in St. Albans and bought another one, this time in red. The 253 was still not issued and, indeed, it was only when I started creating this catalogue 50 years later that I appreciated why there wasn't a blue 230!

When it does appear, all the 253s seem to have the uits with lines (although the piece of plastic is a different design, incorporating an extension at the back to control the boot opening). One would be tempted to infer, therefore that the first 230s would have had a clear unit and later ones the one with lines. That still leaves the problem of all the black ones appearing to have lines, though.

I am inclined to conclude, therefore, that, because the units were actually different, the usual thing about transition models does not apply and, in fact, the first 230s had a lined unit and the later ones a clear unit. This ties in with the black model having the lines as it was available at the outset for not for long afterwards, the cream and red being the predominant colours sold. All the 253 models have the different lined unit which just happens, when fitted to look the same as the early 230 one.

Clearly, further research is required into this. A preliminary look through the models offered by QDT over the years shows that almost all of them are clear and a correspondent, who brought this to my attention initially, states that all his 230 models were clear. These findings contradict my initial conclusion so I hope someone can assist in this matter!

In the meantime I shall revise the text on my catalogue page which made no mention of this at all.

I have often wondered why the 253 model was issued. Maybe Mercedes-Benz were unhappy about the straight edge of the boot panel and insisted upon the casting being revised and, to save a few pounds, Corgi dropped the steering in the rebuild.

Memories (now better illustrated!)

Someone asked me this afternoon why and when I started what has become this Corgi Toys business. I say what has become because what I'm doing now is not what I had originally planned. I took her back to the mid-1960s and my first Corgis. That meant I had to try and recall just what my first model had been. As my father worked for an agricultural machinery depot, the first items may have been the Massey Ferguson tractor and trailer Gift Set 7. I know now that it must have been the early one as there was no Farmer George on the seat. I also had Gift Set 2 but, as that had a deep green Series II Land Rover it would most likely have been Christmas 1962 so that wasn't the first.

I did have a 216 Austin A40 but I only bought that at a later stage because I wanted to paint it red as my father's was an A40 Countryman version, red all over. (There were no 216Ms available at that time or I'm sure I would have spent the extra 3d and just painted the roof!)

I am pretty certain that my first car will have been the Jaguar E Type. It was the plum red version which, coincidentally, I have been looking for for some time now. Back then everyone had the plum red version and I didn't even know the pretty metallic dark grey existed. That, as it happens, was also one of the very first models I acquired when I did start this business. Now all that is see for sale are the metallic dark grey versions. Odd, but probably just one of those things. Mine had the matching plastic removable roof and both survived intact and more or less unmarked for more than 50 years.

Second would have been a gold and white Triumph Herald with its little removable black air filter on the engine accessed by folding forward the whole of the upper front body section.

I know that the Bentley Continental was available but it was expensive at 7/7d. (That strange looking price construction means 7 shillings and 7 pence. In 1961 there were 20 shillings in a pound and 12 pence in a shilling. 7 and 7 pence as we would have said then is about 38p in today's decimal currency.) I did get a two tone green model but suspect that came as a present in 1962. What I did get next was the Mercedes 220SE. I had a black one and think I still have it too. The paintwork did suffer a bit but that wonderful steering meant that it was played with a great deal.

Apart from the Austin A40, which I don't really count as I didn't play with that, the only model I had with fixed wheels was the Austin Seven. I remember how much better it was to play with the Morris Mini Minor which I bought later. I also didn't have any models without suspension and was completely unaware of the early models and certainly knew little of their Mechanical cousins.

By 1963 I was in the first form at school and getting enough pocket money from odd jobs and saving dinner money to buy almost every new car that came out. I say car because I had little interest then in the commercial vehicles. My father bought me a Bedford Machinery Carrier, to which I applied an Agricastrol transfer, and I also had a Carrimore Car Transporter but that was pretty much the extent of my trucks or vans. Just one exception - an Austin Mini Van, which I found great fun to play with as you could put a finger or two through the rear doors and kind of drive it and push the back out round corners!

Just as these memories flood back now, so they had done in 2013 sometime when, having retired from lecturing and helping to introduce technology in education, Corgi Toys were one of the first things that came to mind when I thought about starting a new business. My plan was then to buy wrecks and restore them. I bought all sorts of equipment which I thought would be useful but it wasn't long before I realised that collectors were not very interested in restored models. They much preferred an original, even if it was not in great condition. I had hoped to get £20 or more for decent restorations but you could buy played-with but still decent originals of the more common editions for that amount.

So the restoration plan was binned and I carried on the other part of the plan which was to build a nice web site that could be a useful and genuinely comprehensive catalogue too. That took shape in 2014 and I bought lots of models with money inherited when my mother died. Once I'd taken some photographs and studied the models I began to sell them so that I could have funds for the next ones required. It just carried on from there.

I never expected it to be much of a business. I hoped people would enjoy reading my news from time to time and I tended to write about whatever came in as and when it occurred to me. It still tends to be that way although the Corgi Toys @ 60 series I started in 2016 has provided some structure. The rest is rather random as anyone who is still reading this will have appreciated!

I have since had a look at Ebay and there are models I've had for sale there for over 5 years! Clearly I am either asking too much or the photos are bad or the descriptions are poor. Maybe all three. Now there's a job for the next few weeks - to try and revive interest in these. I get a number of models listed free but, as my total number of items is well in excess of that, these listings have effectively been costing me a few pence every month and 60 times x pence means I've probably spent more listing them than some are worth! Expect to see some 'special offers' soon!

For those who may also have played with Corgi Toys in the 1960s, my layout was a piece of hardboard that my father had cut to fit nicely over the metal frame of a single bed in the spare room at the first house I lived in. I had made roads using thin strips of masking tape with additional edges from various pieces of Floral Garden and Bayko. Bayko provided a few nice buildings and garages that cars could actually be driven into. The Floral Garden stuff was quite delightful too. I would love to get some again but prices are even higher now than Corgis!

The one Corgi building that I had was a BP Filling Station. Well, it was the shop part and some sort of panelled bit at the side. No pumps but I may have had a BP sign. As I recall I could choose between BP and Shell logos (although the box image I've found just refers to Shell. Were there two?) I still have this tucked away somewhere. I should get it out and use it for some of the photos in future if it is respectable still. I have been looking to buy some kits but they are mostly very expensive. In fact, I'd be happy with a made-up kit rather than the unopened bag of pieces.

Looking to add pictures, I couldn't find any of the Filling Station building, which I had. I shall have to dig out my own - and seemingly take good care of it!

So that was a pleasant trip down memory lane.