Seasons Greetings from The Cellar

Seasons' Greetings to all readers and followers of Down to The Cellar. Thanks to everyone who contributed this year, either with comments, or help and even those who just stopped by. Hope you have a Happy Holiday, eat well and stay warm over the festive period!

Kohner Pop-O-Matic Bingo 1973

Two lovely plastic, push up Bingo cards from the Kohner Bros. Marked 1973. Apparently the dice for the game was enclosed in a sprung plastic dome, (just like the game Frustration) You popped the dome down, and the dice spun. Hence pop-o-matic!

The Kohner Bros Toy company started life in 1874 making wooden toys.They hit the big time when they obtained the rights from a Swiss inventor, Marty Meinard to the line of toys known as Push Button Toys.

Mark Boutavant’s Mouk

Mark Boutavant’s book Around the World with Mouk (pictured above) was a real high point of last year. Boutavant's brilliantly coloured pictures seem to have captured the spirit of Richard Scarry & Otto Seibold, and in doing so created his own beautiful world. How wonderful to see all the new exciting merchandise released by Djeco.

There are some brilliant wooden pull along toys for toddlers that we saw up in town yesterday, that are featured below. Thankfully the toys are available in the UK , but Roulapic the rabbit seems to have sold out everywhere already!










If the toys arent exciting enough, it appears Mouk is set to have his own TV show. You can view the pilot, here!

Ferelith Eccles Williams Marmaduke books

A while back I posted several dolls from the one two three away series, illustrated by Ferelith Eccles Williams. Born in 1920, Ferelith was a pretty prolific illustrator, but I didnt know she taught Ian Beck!

Back in the Fifties, before The Village with Three Corners, Ferelith produced a lot of splendid work for Elizabeth Chapman's Marmaduke, a series of tales about a red car. Shown above are two copies, that turned up locally. While the covers are pretty sumptuous, what really grabbed me, were the interior spots, a few of which are shown below.

Invicta plastic animals

From the company that gave us the game Mastermind, come these fabulous plastic animal moulds. Invicta was established in 1946 with an RAF war gratuity of just £100.
They continue to produce plastic dinosaurs, as well as other plastic point of sale materials.

Todays post features a set of fantastic animals, that came in a various colourways. Below are some vehicles from the same range.

Heavy weight Baggage labels

Sorting through an old folder of ephemera I found these three luggage labels. The top two both date from the eighties and are from airlines. The bottom one is from a cruise ship and dates from the sixties.

M & S Routemaster Biscuit tin

Marks and Spencers has had some interesting packaging recently. I picked up quite a bit of their kids confectionery for Halloween, which seemed to take its inspiration from the Fifties.

This weekend we popped into the Cardiff store and were surprised to see they had already discounted these Sasek inspired Biscuit tins. They say imitation is the sincerest form of flattery?

Betram Mills' Circus 1935

Complimentary ticket for Betram Mills' 16th Season at The Grand Hall Olympia, London. The season ran from December 20th 1935- January 25th 1936.

The ticket was for entrance to the funfair only, not the circus!

Coin money bank bags

On a recent trip back to London, we popped up to the Market at Covent Garden. Monday was the antiques market, and was always interesting and occasionally there were some good finds. I used to go a lot when I was touting my folder around.

I was surprised that unlike so much of London, it was relatively unchanged. The stall holders were still chatty and were happy to talk about their finds and share their stories.

These pre plastic coin bags came from one of the stalls, and include some bank tags. They come from the British banks, Lloyds and The Midland, (now HSBC). Made from a heavyweight paper, with serrated edges, they come in some attractive colours. Most un-bank like!

Fantastic Four Mega Bloks

Three of The Fantastic Four as created by Mega Bloks. Mr Fantastic, The Thing, and The Human Torch, and their nemesis Dr. Doom.