Military Toy Soldiers

One hobby that I only recently have been involved in (and I am only now getting to after almost eighty posts), is that of military miniatures.  I literally stumbled onto this hobby as one of the very few stores in the country that specializes in this sort of thing is located in my home town of Los Gatos, California.  If you are ever downtown, drop by Sierra Toy Soldier Company, and you'll find that (at a minimum) it is interesting, and you may find that you want to buy a figure or two to place on your desk at work, or perhaps more!  A few years ago...that is precisely what I did when I bought a figure of Napoleon in his dress uniform made by William Britain.

There are many manufacturers of figures, and today I feature the low end and the high end of the hobby.  Plastic figures are still being produced, and today when my kids and I were in the store, my boy wanted this Indian warrior toting a rifle.  It's an anonymous plastic figure by Britains, but for what it is, it's pretty good, with multiple colors and the like.

On the other end of the spectrum are figures that are hand painted in Russia by expert craftsmen.  This particular figure is the Dauphin Charles of France from the battle of Poitiers in 1356.  It is beautifully executed with details that can really only be appreciated when looked at it under a magnifying glass.  You cannot look at these figures and not think about the history they represent.  And that's the intriguing part of this hobby.  In this case, the battle of Poitiers was one of three important English victories in the Hundred Years War; a war that reverberates even today in French and English national identity.

I am in the midst of building a WWII diorama with King and Country 8th Air Force figures.  I will show that in a future post.

Until next time...