My first childhood memory of tin soldiers came from the storybook tale of the Grenadier with one missing leg who had taken a fancy for a miniature ballerina. This episode left him being swept down a flooded curbside drain in a paper boat. As older kids we took to sandlot battlefields with Marx plastic troops, tanks and cannons.
My most memorable Christmas was the year my Mom placed a surprise box of "Britians" under the tree in their shiney red box. To this day I cannot figure out what possessed her to make this extravagant purchase.
Growing up during WWII did instill at lot of interest in things military. Time passed and in the Summer of 1983 "Origins" came to Detroit. On the convention floor I saw my first 15mm ACW display game and my comment was "Where has this been all of my life". Hooked, I became an avid collector of ACW armies, accumulating large numbers of troops. Soon I expanded my periods of interest and finally I turned the hobby into an enjoyable business, brokering previously owned armies for resale within the gaming cammunity. Thus this odyssey began.
Odyssey
The mail order business flourished and grew, with shelves stacked high with cigar boxes laden with leaden figures. After much trial and error I finally developed the necessary expertise to allow shipping the little fellows with no in transit damage. This came about with the discovery that puffed rice is actually miniature styrofoam.
The inventory of both 15mm and 25mm troops continued to grow, with each new collection being carefully unwrapped and placed in cartons awaiting new owners. Who would suspect that at night, with the workshop wrapped in darkness, that trumpets would sound and drummers would beat the call to "fall in." The cigar box lids would rise mysteriously, lifted gingerly by the bayonet points of the tin soldiers. Out they came, parading up and down the workbench until the first hint of sunlight, causing a retreat to the boxed fortifications.
True believers will recall the amazement that Mr. Gepetto experienced when his carved wooden puppet sprang to life as "Pinocchio". Doubters would not be able to visualize these nightly movements by troops who only had been animated previously by the roll of dice and the push of a burly hand across a tabletop.
A "Rush" order for a Medevial castle found me hunkered over the painting table until the wee hours of the morning. At three AM I sat back to admire the finished product and in a satisfied state I closed my tired eyes to doze for just a moment. Awakening to the twitch of spiderlike threads across my face I discovered that I had been laid out on the floor and tied down from head to foot like "Gulliver."
I rolled my eyes from side to side, trying to see who my captors were. Then I spotted a 25mm French officer leading a platoon towards my ear with another coil of fishing line from my tacklebox. Squirming to free myself only caused the tethers to draw tighter. What's going on? What will be my fate? Hadn't I treated these miniatures with care? Would they dare harm me?
The floor was alive with colorful units moving to and fro. I could hear the cadence of minute drummers. Hadn't these same armies sat idly by, watching their neighbors being boxed up to be sent off to war again? During their nightly forays had the commanders formulated a plan to avenge the loss of neighboring units. I had become the unknowing target of their wrath.
Why Me?
Why had my family picked this weekend to go visit relatives? What was that clunking sound I just heard on the basement stairs? The shop door creaked open and there, raised on a thousand bayonet points, was the box the new refrigerator had arrived in on Tuesday. Trying to move my arms I soon discovered that I was also encircled by the same fine line which held me fast to the floor.
What was their plan for me? With a thump the box fell to the ground, its open maw facing me like the whale that had swallowed Jonah. They released the lines that held me to the floor, but I was still encased in the ones circling my body. By poking me with lances, flag staffs and swords they finally forced me to squirm into the carton to gain refuge from their assaults.
As a businessman I'd always tried to economize, to the point of buying cases of generic brand puffed rice for packing. I should have realized what was coming next when I heard the sound of plastic bags being ripped open. It came like falling snow, wave after wave of the puffy rice cereal, covering me in the belly of the whale. Finally fully encased in the puffed rice, there came a solid thump as the top of the box was closed, bringing darkness to my new domain. The sound of my tape dispenser let me know that these rascals were serious about shipping me someplace, but where?
The only saving grace was that I'd have something to nibble on while in transit. Accompanied by the blare of trumpets I was unceremoniously hauled up the basement stairs and out the side door where I was dumped at the UPS pick up site. The strength and determination of these little militants had surprised me no end.
The side door slammed shut and there I was in a boxed cavern, trying to keep from choking on the rice filler. Soon a distinct sound could be heard coming up the street. me whine and rumble of a UPS truck on the move. Creaking to a stop the driver approached our house dragging his hand cart, he tilts my box onto his handcart, while grumbling about the oversized army that must be inside.
Bouncing cross country from loading dock to conveyor belt and back again I'm finally deposited at my destination. The recipients first comment is "I can't believe that there are any armies this big!". As the tape is being cut from the top of the carton the thought crosses my mind that this might be a coconspirator in this fiendish plot.
Then a familiar voice "Barbara get me a flashlight." In the Land of Netherlead have I been delivered to the Major Domo of the hobby? While brushing aside cereal the fellow exclaims "It's the biggest soldier I've ever seen, and an old one considering the amount of hair loss". Peering through the snowflakes of rice it was then that I recognized the moustached presence of Hal. Checking his calendar he proclaimed "This is the best April's Fools Day joke I've ever seen."
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© Copyright 1991 Hal Thinglum
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