2023 Allentown Toy Show Fun Time, this show is one of my oldest shows. Last year, due to health issues I did a limited visitation of the sow. This year I am feeling better despite being back in AB Fib so I decided to full press on the show. It ended up being a fun time.
2023 Allentown Toy Show My Report
The Allentown Toy Show is a two-day affair. The first day is to allow the dealers to set up. Nondealers can buy early rights which is not cheap. I bought early rights so I could see what I could find early. Once in I went to Kerry to see what he had. I bought from him parts and a few expensive figures for resale. Kerry had a set of the light blue coated cavalry mounted for $200.00.
Going from Kerry I went through the tables. Someone had gotten a Zorro Playset. The same dealer had a Rifleman’s Ranch Playset which I passed. I found a few pieces here and there including the Marx three-inch Fireman with an ax. Just as I was going to call it a day I found a dealer with an out-of-the-box Marx Airport playset. It was missing the planes but everything else was there. As I dragged the set out another man was kind to help me take the large box to the car.
Day Two
I decided to go back to the show instead of doing a toy show that was at a flea market. As I started walking the floor I spotted a box with bags of figures. In the box were Stuart horses complete with accessories. You rarely find them with their accessories. Also, there were bags of figures that contained surprises like the Lido Japanese. I purchased the lot and went looking. Somewhere I found a bag of figures that I thought were gas station attendants. When I got the bag home, I discovered that they were the Marx racetrack figures. I made a few more purchases and relaxed. Sitting down I saw a number of people I knew including Allan and Betty Ford, Bob Mulero, and Tim Ecks. Normally I would have headed home, but this time I was waiting for some old friends to go out to eat.
Good finds, Paul! Thanks for sharing!
I like the race track figures.
Are they rare?
I was not aware of any of these figures. Good finds and good post!
Gary
I have been doing this so long and see so many figures. I never know what will pop up. At York, it was the Starlux space figures as i had them I knew what they were.
The Lido Japanese are a particularly great find IMO. I didn’t even know they made them until I was well into my middle age. Thanks for sharing the pix.
I learn of these before the internet. I never know what will turn up. This is the fun of the hunt.
Great finds!!!
LIDO japanese are extremely difficult find in good condition ,their plastic ,least in apparently some productions years was bad quality and become crumble today easy ,same issue had affected some many figures around ,specially the 1960 decades made .
Recently i sold several full set batches of my collection i acquired from Italy .In Italy a company (which i will share history) made commercial business with LIDO and imported/distributed them from Lido ,not copied it ,while other did copied then in smaller scale in different plastic and partial painted them .HK copies were made of both germans and japanese ,some copies are good while most are bad copies .
I’ve got the Japanese in decent numbers, hoarder that I am. I have a set and a half of the Italian, slightly smaller figures. I’ve never seen HK produced ones.
I had these guys as a kid. I remember they were in little bags of 3 or so at a dime store and I loaded up.
Never knew about them or the German Lidos till I found the Internet,all I had were the Lido GIs whose main enemy were the Timmee GIs.I always thought that some of the Lido GIs had a Japanese look to them.
I agree in some of semi flat LIDO GIs have the japanese look,specially with odd made helmet and faces .As a child the one pose firing a m3 LSMG- Grease Gun,i thought was a MP 40 too and used as german paras too .
That probably worked well, with the Lidos as ‘the bad guys’. Since the Lido GIs and Germans were my very first toy soldiers, I couldn’t see them that way. Next I got the ‘webhead’ MPC GIs and they fit pretty well with the Lido GIs, them being thicker, they were usually character figures for me. A bag of MPC Germans, Japanese and Russians was next and it was on!
Some of the younger folks might not realize what a breakthrough it was for those of us kids in the 60s when the toy companies like Marx and MPC (and I discovered Lido) actually started manufacturing actual GERMAN and JAPANESE figures for our GIs to fight. The Russians were icing on the cake.
Up to that time even Marx’s Battleground had different color US GIs (if you were fortunate enough to find one under your tree) and we had to “make do.”