Peter Reuss
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The Louis Badolato Collection (2 Viewers)
- Thread starter Peter Reuss
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Peter Reuss
2nd Lieutenant
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Peter Reuss
2nd Lieutenant
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Peter Reuss
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Peter Reuss
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Peter Reuss
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Peter Reuss
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Peter Reuss
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Whew! That's all for Louis' collection. I'll be posting Lawrence Lo's on a different thread.
aujj65
Colonel
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Louis.
An amazing sight! I didn't realise that K&C produced so many gloss painted figures in the early days. Even being a Napoleonic fan I must admit that the new Eighth Army sets look great, especially the Dingo scout car...might have to succumb... (only because a friend of mine has a real one!). Thank you for sharing your collection with us.
Jeff
An amazing sight! I didn't realise that K&C produced so many gloss painted figures in the early days. Even being a Napoleonic fan I must admit that the new Eighth Army sets look great, especially the Dingo scout car...might have to succumb... (only because a friend of mine has a real one!). Thank you for sharing your collection with us.
Jeff
S
sceic2
Guest
I don't like anything you've done. It all just looks horrible. I can't stand any of it. It is an abomination. Your collection should be trashed.
Oh, by-the-by, Louis, I will be there to pick up the garbage on your next trash day. I will HELP you to decide what you want to keep and what you should give to me, uh I mean "throw away."
Michael
Oh, by-the-by, Louis, I will be there to pick up the garbage on your next trash day. I will HELP you to decide what you want to keep and what you should give to me, uh I mean "throw away."
Michael
Last edited:
Louis Badolato
Lieutenant General
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Combat,
Here is an exerpt from the introduction to the book that answers your question about how I started collecting King & Country:
In the winter of 1993/1994, as I browsed through some toy soldier advertisements, I came across a photograph that changed my life, and launched me on the course that resulted in my writing this book. Up until this particular day I had been collecting only very static traditional toy soldiers, like those produced by William Britains for the last 100 years. They were shiny, pretty, looked good set up in marching order, and, frankly, were all I had ever seen up to that point. Everything I knew about toy soldiers was about to change.
The photograph was of a set of toy soldiers unlike anything I had seen up to that point: Teddy Roosevelt, mounted in his uniform as Lt. Colonel of the 1st U.S. Volunteer Cavalry, with two of his dismounted “Rough Riders” marching behind him. The sculpting of the figures was the first thing that caught my eye: they were more beefy and muscular, like real men rather than toys, and in natural, comfortable realistic poses, with Teddy slouching in the saddle, and the men marching with their bed rolls slung around them from shoulder to waist. Then I looked at the paint finish: it was glossy, like traditional toy soldiers, but had the shadowing, dry brushing techniques, and detailed outlining I had only previously seen in prohibitively expensive matt “connoisseur” figures. I had to have it, so I called the number of one of the dealers in the advertisement.
A week or so later, after I spent about fifteen minutes handling the figures (toy soldiers are so much more satisfying in person than in a photograph), I started to look through the King & Country color brochures that came with it. This company didn’t just make toy soldiers: there were wooden tanks, vehicles, aircraft, even buildings. There were soldiers from World War II, even a set of U.S. Marines from the recent Gulf War! Subjects I had never seen approached by the Toy Soldier companies I was familiar with up to this point.
I started purchasing all of the King & Country products I came across, as well as two other more innovative companies I discovered through the first King & Country dealer I had purchased from, Frontline and Trophy. Soon I had weeded out all but these three companies from my active collecting. By this time, my first wife, dismayed by the money and space (in our tiny apartment) I was dedicating to my collection, insisted I focus on only one company. I chose King & Country, not just because of the wide variety of available products, but because it was the most reliable of the three. Getting what you wanted from Frontline or Trophy was a chore. I once flew to London just to go the Guards Museum Toy Store (the only place Trophy was readily available) and the St. James Armory (ditto for Frontline). King & Country, on the other hand, actually filled your orders, even if it sometimes took three to six months for the custom wooden vehicles or diorama pieces like the Vietnam firebase (yes, by this time King & Country had even addressed the taboo subject of the Vietnam War!).
I would like to take this opportunity to thank Andy, Gordon, Pearl and the other members of the K&C family for their reliability. With Trophy all but out of business, and Frontline still a bear to obtain, not to mention the appreciation in value of King & Country products on the secondary market, this decision turned out to be not just the best, but the only choice.
A few years later, in 1999, I went to my first Toy Soldier show, the Valley Forge/King of Prussia Show, with one purpose in mind: to put a face to the voice of Andy Neilson. For something else about King & Country set them apart from the other companies I had dealt with: Andy’s accessibility. Before there was a website there were faxes, then e-mails. Finally, one night I was pleasantly surprised by this odd Scottish brogue on the phone. This very funny, knowledgeable, gregarious person was more than willing to answer his collectors’ questions, he actually seemed to enjoy talking their ears off, pumping them for ideas. He would even make special, custom products at a good client’s request, faxing or later e-mailing me his own drawings bringing my requests to life. When I got to the show that day, his first words to me as I approached the King & Country table were “so you must be the famous Louis Badolato.” From that moment forward I have been honored to call Andy my friend.
Here is an exerpt from the introduction to the book that answers your question about how I started collecting King & Country:
In the winter of 1993/1994, as I browsed through some toy soldier advertisements, I came across a photograph that changed my life, and launched me on the course that resulted in my writing this book. Up until this particular day I had been collecting only very static traditional toy soldiers, like those produced by William Britains for the last 100 years. They were shiny, pretty, looked good set up in marching order, and, frankly, were all I had ever seen up to that point. Everything I knew about toy soldiers was about to change.
The photograph was of a set of toy soldiers unlike anything I had seen up to that point: Teddy Roosevelt, mounted in his uniform as Lt. Colonel of the 1st U.S. Volunteer Cavalry, with two of his dismounted “Rough Riders” marching behind him. The sculpting of the figures was the first thing that caught my eye: they were more beefy and muscular, like real men rather than toys, and in natural, comfortable realistic poses, with Teddy slouching in the saddle, and the men marching with their bed rolls slung around them from shoulder to waist. Then I looked at the paint finish: it was glossy, like traditional toy soldiers, but had the shadowing, dry brushing techniques, and detailed outlining I had only previously seen in prohibitively expensive matt “connoisseur” figures. I had to have it, so I called the number of one of the dealers in the advertisement.
A week or so later, after I spent about fifteen minutes handling the figures (toy soldiers are so much more satisfying in person than in a photograph), I started to look through the King & Country color brochures that came with it. This company didn’t just make toy soldiers: there were wooden tanks, vehicles, aircraft, even buildings. There were soldiers from World War II, even a set of U.S. Marines from the recent Gulf War! Subjects I had never seen approached by the Toy Soldier companies I was familiar with up to this point.
I started purchasing all of the King & Country products I came across, as well as two other more innovative companies I discovered through the first King & Country dealer I had purchased from, Frontline and Trophy. Soon I had weeded out all but these three companies from my active collecting. By this time, my first wife, dismayed by the money and space (in our tiny apartment) I was dedicating to my collection, insisted I focus on only one company. I chose King & Country, not just because of the wide variety of available products, but because it was the most reliable of the three. Getting what you wanted from Frontline or Trophy was a chore. I once flew to London just to go the Guards Museum Toy Store (the only place Trophy was readily available) and the St. James Armory (ditto for Frontline). King & Country, on the other hand, actually filled your orders, even if it sometimes took three to six months for the custom wooden vehicles or diorama pieces like the Vietnam firebase (yes, by this time King & Country had even addressed the taboo subject of the Vietnam War!).
I would like to take this opportunity to thank Andy, Gordon, Pearl and the other members of the K&C family for their reliability. With Trophy all but out of business, and Frontline still a bear to obtain, not to mention the appreciation in value of King & Country products on the secondary market, this decision turned out to be not just the best, but the only choice.
A few years later, in 1999, I went to my first Toy Soldier show, the Valley Forge/King of Prussia Show, with one purpose in mind: to put a face to the voice of Andy Neilson. For something else about King & Country set them apart from the other companies I had dealt with: Andy’s accessibility. Before there was a website there were faxes, then e-mails. Finally, one night I was pleasantly surprised by this odd Scottish brogue on the phone. This very funny, knowledgeable, gregarious person was more than willing to answer his collectors’ questions, he actually seemed to enjoy talking their ears off, pumping them for ideas. He would even make special, custom products at a good client’s request, faxing or later e-mailing me his own drawings bringing my requests to life. When I got to the show that day, his first words to me as I approached the King & Country table were “so you must be the famous Louis Badolato.” From that moment forward I have been honored to call Andy my friend.
Njja
1st Lieutenant
- Joined
- May 20, 2005
- Messages
- 4,566
I am aware of this, I believe however that Gideon should recieve just a little
teeny, tiny, bit of credit for the part he played in helping collectors
discover King & Country.
It seems to me he has been lost in the shuffle. Doesn't he deserve in Louis's
opening monologue even a mention?
Maybe I'm wrong? Did Louis introduce Andy to Gideon? or did Louis meet
Andy through Gideon, and if so why not mention that?
I'm happy to have been introduced to King & Country by Gideon on my 1st
visit to his lovely shop "Classic Toys" and was quite sad to learn it closed.
I think at the very least he deserves some recoginition, just my opinion.
Njja
teeny, tiny, bit of credit for the part he played in helping collectors
discover King & Country.
It seems to me he has been lost in the shuffle. Doesn't he deserve in Louis's
opening monologue even a mention?
Maybe I'm wrong? Did Louis introduce Andy to Gideon? or did Louis meet
Andy through Gideon, and if so why not mention that?
I'm happy to have been introduced to King & Country by Gideon on my 1st
visit to his lovely shop "Classic Toys" and was quite sad to learn it closed.
I think at the very least he deserves some recoginition, just my opinion.
Njja
Last edited:
Louis Badolato
Lieutenant General
- Joined
- Apr 25, 2005
- Messages
- 17,328
NJJA,
Gideon is one of my best friends, and certainly deserves a ton of credit for the job he did promoting King & Country once he became a K&C dealer in about 1998 or 1999. He is certainly mentioned in the book, along with many of the other dealers, new and old.
However, that being said, it was me who convinced Gideon and John to carry King & Country. When I was collecting, there were only about 15 K&C dealers. The one from whom I purchased my first K&C set was Joan Smith of Kings X in San Antonio, Texas. The dealers I dealt with early on (pre-internet days) were the original K&C dealer, Tony Ciccarello of The Toy Soldier Gallery in Highland Falls, New York and Rich Dutkins of Dutkins Collectables in Cherry Hill, New Jersey.
Upon the advent of the internet, I have dealt with many wonderful K&C dealers, including our host Shannon Reuss, Tim Tyler, Bill Sager, George Guerrero, Bob Fisher and his successor Craig McClean, Pam Brunton, Mike & Sue Neville, Gideon & his dad John Rettich, Matt Murphy and countless others, all of whom have been fantastic.
Gideon is one of my best friends, and certainly deserves a ton of credit for the job he did promoting King & Country once he became a K&C dealer in about 1998 or 1999. He is certainly mentioned in the book, along with many of the other dealers, new and old.
However, that being said, it was me who convinced Gideon and John to carry King & Country. When I was collecting, there were only about 15 K&C dealers. The one from whom I purchased my first K&C set was Joan Smith of Kings X in San Antonio, Texas. The dealers I dealt with early on (pre-internet days) were the original K&C dealer, Tony Ciccarello of The Toy Soldier Gallery in Highland Falls, New York and Rich Dutkins of Dutkins Collectables in Cherry Hill, New Jersey.
Upon the advent of the internet, I have dealt with many wonderful K&C dealers, including our host Shannon Reuss, Tim Tyler, Bill Sager, George Guerrero, Bob Fisher and his successor Craig McClean, Pam Brunton, Mike & Sue Neville, Gideon & his dad John Rettich, Matt Murphy and countless others, all of whom have been fantastic.