Felix…the Bad and the Ugly

Missing an ear and an arm!

Needs a lot of TLC…

Pam’s Pictorama Toy Post: One part of my toy collection that got packed earlier today was this stash of what I call Fraken-Felixes. Their sheer strangeness is what attracted me and I didn’t pay much for them. I don’t know what it is, but the stranger the Felix the stronger my affinity and these are certainly odd. There’s something wonderful about the blue eyes applied to the Felix at the top, and I contemplate (perhaps as a retirement project in years to come?) what I might do to bring these other two back to a semblance of respectability.

Sadly, I am not gifted in this area. Growing up I ruined every sewing machine bobbin I ever came near – to the extreme displeasure of many a Home Ec (and shop!) teacher. My sister, Loren, did teach herself to sew fairly well. (She was the exception however – I do not believe I ever saw my mother so much as sew a button on, although I have memories of my mother’s mother hemming the occasional thing.) If these are skills that are genetically passed I was bound to be challenged or at least limited. Other than an uncle who makes furniture and repairs electronics with skill (as did his father) we are a long line of artistic people who are somewhat inept in the areas of actual construction and repair.

Still, I do think that maybe even I can figure out an ear here or an eye there? New arms and tails will be more complicated though and I remain unsure where to start. I recently acquired a Mickey and a Minnie with severe condition issues as well and I have been contemplating what might be done to at least stabilize them. There’s a Popeye and Wimpy who are best if they stay immobile as well. We will see, but maybe I can challenge my grandfather and uncle and Deitch Studio Toy Hospital will emerge as my future calling.

Happy Ooloo to Me!

Posted by Pam's Pictorama

Pam’s Pictorama: Back in December of ’14 I wrote Blame It on the Blog 2 where I displayed and discussed the perfectly excellent Bonzo Kim had purchased me as a Christmas gift. That acquisition had in part come out of an earlier post devoted to Bonzo (Going to the Dogs – Bonzo) where I had discovered the Chad Valley Bonzo toys. Well, we can blame it on the blog again, because while I was researching those toys – and stumbling onto the lovely Bonzos made by Chad Valley, I found a very rarified toy indeed – Ooloo the Cat!

It seems that cartoon Ooloo, designed by the same artist George Studdy, knocked Bonzo right off center stage at Sketch Magazine where his full page strips and sight gag drawings had been featured on a regular basis. Bonzo had been working the Sketch Magazine gig since 1921, but his appearances had fallen off by 1927. On January 2, 1929, Ooloo made her first appearance in the mag and knocked Bonzo right out of the box. Bonzo made only occasional appearances after that and I read that an appearance five months later in May of that year may have been Bonzo’s last in the magazine. Below is her first, fluffy premiere in Sketch.

However, Bonzo got his revenge fully in the long afterlife of marketing. Bonzo seems to have launched items in his image, both licensed and clearly off-model, that rival Felix and Mickey Mouse both in breadth and sheer number. His longevity, considering the limited reissue of and interest in the actual strips, is extraordinary and reaches not only throughout Europe and the United States, but seems to reach as far as Japan. His ubiquitous, sleepy, dog face image plays out over Valentines, figurines, lamps, a band, toys – you name it! I have personally speculated on the possible influence of his image on the Japanese character Norakuro (featured here Norakuro – the Japanese Felix and also in an early post here, Pam’s Toy Post) but have never established a link.

Ooloo, by comparison, is little known today and sadly toys did not proliferate. As above, I discovered this outstanding Chad Valley Ooloo when researching the toys for the other post. They are indeed rare however and frankly I had little hope of ever acquiring one of these fine specimens. Therefore, I was over the moon when this one appeared on eBay just before my birthday this year! Kim generously stepped in and Ooloo, thanks to the considerate quick packing and shipping of the seller, arrived within days of my birthday. (As a bonus, the seller turned out to be the same wonderful woman in Belgium who sold me Bonzo! A shout out to Regine who certainly has an extraordinary collection of toys.) As I always say, I am one lucky toy collecting woman. Yay!

Ooloo is a truly outstanding addition to this woman’s toy cat collection and a very finely made toy. In the photos I have tried to show some of the touches and details that make this an especially wonderful toy: the bits of color in the ears and around the nose – the tiny stitches under the eyes. Ooloo retains her whiskers and these interesting thread bits on one paw that seem to be claws – I thought they were just pulls in the fabric in the photo but have determined that they were meant to be there. It is a thoughtfully made toy indeed.

Below is an image of an Ooloo perfume bottle, one of the few fairly available Ooloo pieces of merchandise. There may be one or two other toys out there – and be assured I will be ferreting them all out for your pleasure – and mine!

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

Handy Felix

Posted by Pam's Pictorama

1d1f5c4e-8d81-4dbf-8b6b-2c0a455bb821

Pam’s Pictorama Toy Post: I have done much blogging about some of my more obscure Felix items (with more to come!) and this puppet is another. There are many items I pay up for, but my constant combing occasionally pays dividends with an item that is great and that no one else seems to want. This was one of those. I have never seen another puppet exactly like this it, and I bought it for a nominal amount uncontested on eBay many years ago. It interests me that the Steiff Felix puppet goes for a fortune and this little guy didn’t even earn a nibble. My good fortune.

I assume this is mostly likely one of those East London Toy Factory Felix toys that I wrote about last year. He most definitely has a handmade, slightly less than professional appeal. He is awkward to use – I realized this when trying to take his photo on my hand – and isn’t balanced quite right for ease of movement.

He is very endearing however and he instantly became a favorite of mine. I have not found an optimum way to display him. He hangs out with the other Felix dolls on the shelves, just folded in half. I like to take him down one in a while though – he looks well loved, and despite his flaws he was clearly a much loved and well used toy, which in turn was well preserved these many, many years. Thank you British child somewhere!

Felix as Cat

Posted by Pam's Pictorama

Pam’s Pictorama Toy Post: Oh Merry Christmas to me! This extraordinary Felix was a gift from Kim this Christmas. In truth, I picked him out on eBay months ago and Kim purchased him and tucked him away. Christmas morning was my first good look at him though – and wowza!

I have only ever seen one or two Felix dolls posed on all fours, but never this model. Felix walking (upright) was part of his whole appeal – and schtick. His humpbacked thinking manner is recreated in two and three dimensions – often with the hump in his back exaggerated, as he walks, pondering something, which his hand/paws behind his back. I have a plate which bears the much used motto Felix Keep on Walking which is a play on this. (See my prior post Living the Felix Life which features this item.) As Mickey Mouse and countless others would ape later, the anthropomorphic charm is all about being upright and therefore more human.

Christmas night Kim and I stumbled home after our annual trip to my folks in NJ and curled up on the couch to take a look at another of my Christmas gifts – the superb DVD Cartoon Roots. (I know, I am a very lucky woman!) This outstandingly curated DVD put together by Tom Stathes deserves a shout out. Instead of the usual entries in the early animation stakes, this disk manages to have the one or two outstanding examples of each that you’re pretty sure you have never seen. I have not yet viewed the whole thing (why rush?) but already have seen a few excellent Terry Aesop Fables, a strange and interesting Krazy Kat (where he seems to be trying to morph into Felix…) and Felix Comes Back, a splendid example from 1922.

I have been known to opine on how Felix started out drawn more squarely (pointier I like to say) and both more feline and a tad bit doggy. According to Kim, Bill Nolan was responsible for this subtle neutering of Felix which Messmer passively allowed. Anyway, I was reminded that back in ’22 Felix spent a good portion of his time on all fours – running away fast from things most frequently – but sportier and a bit wilder.

However, all this to say, Felix spent the majority of his career walking on two legs and virtually all the toys and merchandising reflect this. In all the many hours (days, years) I have spent combing through Felix toy offerings I have, as I said above, only seen him portrayed on all fours a few times so this toy is very unusual. I originally thought of the subject of another post, East London Toy Factory due to the almost hand-made, individual aspect of this and was going to attribute that company as his maker. I lean now instead toward thinking this was made by the folks at Chad Valley. I have not devoted much time writing about the company, they appear to have been the biggest makers of stuffed Felix toys, a company that still makes some toys today. I am, however, open and raring for discussion.

Cookie and Felix Christmas Morning

****

For those of you who have an Amazon gift card burning a hole in your pocket post-Christmas, the DVD above can be found at: Cartoon Roots

The eBay seller who sold us Felix did not seem to know much about the origin, but she was lovely. She is Mme Regine Beghin of Belgium and this is a nod to her.

Greetings from Felix in Kuala Lumpur

Posted by Pam's Pictorama

Pam’s Pictorama Photo Post: Although I detoured slightly last week from my Felix fiesta, I am putting a cap on it (this edition anyway) with this really interesting series of photographs. One of the things that makes these unusual is that I purchased them as negatives. I was not able to purchase the entire lot – they were sold separately and went for a fair amount of money. However, with the exception of the one below, I feel I got the best of them. (Note the two small Felix dolls at the base of the huge one!)

The One That Got Away

I do not know what the story is here. At first I thought it was a family album of negatives, but after I saw the images of the large Felix that seemed less likely. Not surprisingly they were sold by a person in Great Britain. Then, after considering the whole collection I have developed the theory that perhaps they came from a photographer’s collection of negs. They are old, large format negatives and if I were able to print them by hand (which I would love to do someday when I have access to a darkroom again) I would be interested in seeing them as contact prints – perhaps even done as platinum prints. For now we send our thanks to our good friend, Eileen Travell, for scanning these and creating these positives.

They were taken in Kuala Lumpur and the larger than life Felix is in front of the Whiteaway Laidlaw department store in the one photo. Whiteaway Laidlaw was a British chain throughout India and the British empire of the East, undoubtedly supplying the British nabobs and wealthy locals with the necessities of European life away from home. It’s nickname was Right-away and Paid-for as it operated, not surprisingly, on a cash only basis. (Not unlike our Whole Foods-Whole Paycheck of today?)

So many questions remain. Was the photographer one of those who traveled around with his Felix doll props, much like the many I have shown with Felix on the beach throughout Britain, Australia and New Zealand? It is notable that the big Felix in these photos is very reminiscent of a postcard I treasure that was featured in an early post, Felix for a Cause. I would dare say the very same model. Enough to say, the sun never set on the British empire – nor on Felix evidently.

In addition to thanking my co-worker and friend Eileen Travell, Photographer for the Metropolitan Museum for making these “prints” for me, a very special thanks to Nora Kennedy and her colleagues in the Photograph Conservation area of the Museum who looked at the negatives and told me how to store them.

Just In – a New Aesop’s Fable Doll!

Posted by Pam's Pictorama

Which doll is this?

Pam’s Pictorama Toy Post: I have a deep relationship with both the Aesop’s Fable cartoons and these splendid toys. (For another post on the subject and my collecting mania in general see my earlier post, Mine, all mine…at long last.) When I discovered the cartoons, well into adulthood, I felt as though these were finally the long lost cartoons I had always been looking for. Reel after reel of endless black cats and mice – chasing, charmingly anthropomorphic. I share an example that somehow is a high water mark for me Makin’ ’em Move, In a Cartoon Studio. It is, of course, animator cats, dogs and pigs, slaving away at the drawing table – just like something out of Boulevard of Broken Dreams…one of my favorite Kim Deitch books!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2dVnF_wjh4E

The existence of the toys came to me even later, but I fell hard for them. The promotional photo below was my introduction to them. Not surprisingly, the cat in the polka dot skirt was my first acquisition – The Countess. I bought her in a Hake’s auction (I believe Kim helped on that one – in fact I believe he’s had a hand in helping to purchase virtually all of these. He’s very nice about supporting my habit.) We really paid up. She is pretty pristine. The dog in the red pants (Don the Dog) came off of eBay and I got a pretty good deal. The very hurt one on the lower right (another version of The Countess?) Kim picked up during a visit to San Francisco a few years back. The slightly grimy one in the maroon corduroy, I frankly don’t remember acquiring, although I am thinking it must have also been on eBay – he seems to have been altered and I am not sure who he is – Raffles is my guess.

The good news and the bad news it seems is since people don’t know what these dolls are so one most often just stumbles upon them.

The question I pose for today is – which doll is this new one? It is generally thought that these six were it. But careful study shows he just isn’t one of them – and he’s in pretty pristine condition so I don’t think he’s been altered either. Any thoughts out there in cartoon land?

Lastly, this tidbit I turned up while searching for the new doll. This is an old advertisement for a theater contest giveaway of Aesop’s Fables dolls! Oh lucky people of the past. Evidently the outsized Countess was four feet high and a replica of the doll! Would love to find that some day. As I’m sure you know, I will just keep looking.

A Surprising Tiny Felix

Posted by Pam's Pictorama

Pam’s Pictorama Toy Post: In my collecting experience this little gem is about as weird as it gets. A Facebook friend, Chuck Sycamore, emailed the photo below as a response to an unrelated post, announcing that a friend of his had “found these in his house” and was selling them. Well, wow. Who could resist that?

So, the friend (who lives in Chicago) was contacted and after a bit of to and fro I purchased one – the fellow on the far left end. My size ration dysmorphia (see yesterday’s post Surprise – It’s Felix Again) kicked in and I was stunned to find this guy no more than four inches high! The scooter is fully functional and the Felix is completely articulated. I have never seen these any place else for sale. The small articulated Felix dolls seem to be a size smaller or a size bigger than any version I know. The scooter seems loosely based on this toy I own (mine is a no-name, not Felix variation – I like it, but for some reason the one that is marked Felix sells for about ten times more) – or perhaps that is entirely in my own mind.

Whether these were somehow one of a kind pieces made in a small quantity, or for some reason have just eluded me in my years of Felix collecting I do not know. There is no maker’s mark and the execution is very thoughtful. If anyone knows more than I do on the subject please weigh in. I am very curious to know more! And a big shout out to Chuck for giving us the heads up. And what kind of whacky house did the friend move into anyway? What else was in that house?

Surprise – it’s Felix Again!

Posted by Pam's Pictorama

Pam’s Pictorama Toy Post: I really wasn’t in the market for another Felix, especially not such a large one. Finding a spot for them in our tiny apartment is becoming difficult. Yet when this one failed to sell and was re-listed at a much lower purchase price, I could not ignore the opportunity to purchase it. At the time I was thinking that it was an upgrade for one in my collection, but when it showed up I realized that it is actually a different model. Just as well, I have not yet begun to see myself in the role of seller – I am still accumulating. I gather from the eBay seller that she bought it on a recent Morphy’s auction for considerably more (I do remember it being listed there) and she didn’t have room for it once it arrived!

In terms of size I admit to a certain dysmorphia on occasion when it comes to purchasing toys. It isn’t that I don’t pay attention to the sizes, virtually always listed nicely in inches, feet or centimeters. However, things frequently arrive much smaller than I envisioned. However, on occasion, at least one notable one, I completely misjudge a very large toy. There is a Dean’s Rag Company Mickey Mouse that was a store display which I won in a Hake’s auction several years back – Kim bought it for me as a Christmas gift. It arrived in what can only be described as a small refrigerator box! I was a bit overwhelmed. It took some doing but Mickey resides, hulking in a corner of the bedroom, at the foot of our bed, the size of a small child, watching over us as we sleep.

Below, new Felix with the one I thought he was the same as. Silly me! What was I thinking?

Two of a Kind

Posted by Pam's Pictorama

Pam’s Pictorama Toy Post: As we continue on with our Halloween theme, I present two splendid kitties from my collection. The first of these cats was among my very first purchases in the world of black cat toy collecting, and it is still among my very favorites. He, along with another excellent, much earlier cat (a future post) were scored in an antique store in Red Bank, New Jersey – near my ancestral home, while on a weekend junket to visit my parents. The second was purchased on eBay. That seller told me that it had been a prize his or her grandmother had won on a push pin board game in a store, and that it was from the 1930’s, which seems about right. This seemingly appropriate example of one of these prize boards is below, grabbed off of the internet.

There was great excitement from Blackie and Cookie when I took these cats down to be photographed! The arched back, tail and ears is enough for them to read angry feline and react in-kind. In addition, these cats in particular, still carry the irresistible smell of attic and mysterious old things. The combination really wound these guys up this morning.

Both toys are in pretty superb condition – one maintains his bow – and sport magnificent fluffy tails, and virtually no bald spots on their plushy fur. The eBay one has a few condition issues – he does not really stand on his own any longer and his tail lists permanently to one side. Pretty good for a couple of elderly fellows though. They are the cheerful guardians of my cat shelf. I admit, I couldn’t pass one up and would contentedly buy additional ones if I found them. I mean, who wouldn’t?

Felix the Poser

Posted by Pam's Pictorama

Pam’s Pictorama Toy Post: This Schoenhut Felix is very common, but I like the size and heft of mine. He is about eight inches high, and he came to me in an unusual way. I received a call from an acquaintance of Kim’s who was traveling, in Florida I believe, who said he saw an old Felix in a store and asked if he should buy it for me. I have never taken a chance on such a blind acquisition before, but on that day I rolled the dice and I got this guy for a great price.

Even all these years after his heyday, this Felix toy is virtually ubiquitous as old toys go. They frequently appear in photos with children, often with babies. I do not have any in my collection, because I prefer the more idiosyncratic stuffed toys. The wooden ones are widely available, although not especially inexpensive, in a variety of sizes and some variation. Felix is posable, although this one has started to grow fragile and like so many you see, the twine that holds him together is threatening to break. I believe that somewhere, for a large sum of money, you can have them restrung. I imagine new they were relatively indestructible however.

The extreme popularity of this toy is somewhat mystifying for me. He is a hard wooden toy, not cuddly. While he is nicely posable, it is hard to imagine that explaining his fascination for kids. Frankly, this fellow mostly looks good on a shelf like mine – among his kind and ken – dozens of different variations. In fact, Felix’s vast allure over many decades is hard to explain – even for devoted fans like myself. However, the ongoing appeal of Felix cannot be denied. Below is a photo of a small toy of more recent vintage (I believe I acquired him in the 1980’s, long, long before my collection was even a twinkle in my eye) which is also very popular. A small variation on the Schoenhut theme which I give for your consideration.

M	T	W	T	F	S	S
			1	2	3	4
5	6	7	8	9	10	11
12	13	14	15	16	17	18
19	20	21	22	23	24	25
26	27	28	29	30	31