Twentieth Five Year Old Mystery Figure Identified

Twentieth Five Year Old Mystery Figure Identified over the years we all have gotten figures which we do not know who made them. In my collection that happens more often. I collect figures I like instead of particular companies. One particular figure has been a mystery until now a soldier with a pill box hat.

Twentieth Five Year Old Mystery Figure Identified The Mystery Begins

I was over in England attending the Sandown Toy Fair. Walking around I found a dealer had a big box of loose plastic figures. I asked the price and the dealer responded ninety pounds. I looked through the box and realized that it had more than enough items to make it worthwhile so I bought it. Going through it the contents with my good friend Brian Carrick I discovered a semi flat figure. It was 60mm colonial soldier with rifle across his chest. He had a pillbox hat on his head so he was from the 19^th century. Brian asked if it was a Kellogg’s giveaway. I replied no.

I took it back to the states and photographed it for Plastic Warrior. They published photograph, but got no response. So I placed the figure in the collection.

Twentieth Five Year Old Mystery Figure Identified Discovery

In October of this year I was going through a web site I have bookmarked. The site is www.bestsellsbest.com. One of its features is the twenty five top items in each category. I usually look at for the action figures to get laugh at the high prices. I then went over to fast food cereal premiums and had a surprise. Down at the bottom of the list was the colonial soldier.

He was part of a group of eight figures from New Zealand. The figures are from a series call Maoris and Early Settlers done in 1962 by Sanitarium. Sanitarium is actually the Sanitarium Health and Well Being company. This company was started back 1898. They make cereal products for Australia and New Zealand. So Brian was close on them being a cereal premium. The original baker had worked for Kellogg’s.

The Maori were the native people to New Zealand. They and the Europeans got along at first but later had clashes in the 1860’s.

Here is a list of the eight figures.

#1. Top Hatted Gentleman

#2. miner of the Otago Gold Rush

#3. Miner’s Wife

#4. Colonial Soldier

#5. Maori Chief with Mere

#6. Maori Warrior (side facing with Tewhatewha)

#7. Maori Warrior (forward facing with Taiaha)

#8. Maori Girl with Poi

The taiaha, tewhatewha and mere are traditional weapons of Maori.

Twentieth Five Year Old Mystery Figure Identified Final thoughts

I purchased the figures and added them to the collection. The original figure will be kept and added to the group. The sellers Hollie and Lee responded to my question if they could give me any more information on the figures. They could only add that this set was only done for New Zealand unlike other offers done by Sanitarium.

They also said that buildings were done on the back of the cereal boxes for the set. These are extremely rare. One of the buildings was Maori native hut called a Pa I found this interesting as a cereal companies in the states had done the same. The most famous is Lone Ranger Frontier Town. Issued in 1948 it was complete it was used in conjunction with the radio show. Listeners could follow the Lone Ranger and Tonto as they did their adventure.

As to who made the figures David Frye through Craig Hill  identified them as made by Consolidated Plastics. (update  3/15/18)

With this mystery solved, what other mystery figure in my collection will be identified.