It's full Marx to Wessex
Over 1,200 lots went through the Wessex Auction Rooms toy sale in February.
Retro gaming consoles did well (a Sega Mega Drive console with a good selection of games made £850) but it was the traditional stuff that still attracted the punters. Exhibiting some light scratches, a boxed SH Horikawa tinplate friction powered Space Capsule in red was delightful at £140, while five large boxed Marx figures (Odin The Viking Chieftain, General Custer, Sir Cedric the Black Knight, Sir Percival the Gold Knight and Sir Roland the Silver Knight) raised £300.
Just over 260 lots were devoted to railway items: a boxed Wrenn OO gauge W2260 4-6-0 Royal Scot LMS in maroon plus a Wrenn 2-6-4 GWR 8230 locomotive made £220; while a boxed Heljan O gauge 4301 43XX 2-60 GWR monogram locomotive realised £280.
The rail section was followed by a useful selection of Mamod and Wilesco steam models (one of the latter, an Old Smoky Steam Roller, sold for £100), before a good number of unmade plastic kits crossed the rostrum: an outstanding lot contained 16 Eagle ships, seven by Frog, a Lincoln helicopter, LS kits and an Inpact Flycatcher: they were knocked down for £180.
Amongst the oddities was a boxed Artin Speedtrax four lane slot racing set with all four slot cars; the set resembled Scalextric. This was sold with a boxed TM Modern Toys Junior Phone and a boxed Topper Shoe Shine Ding-a-Ling for just £18. You’d have needed £140, though, for the ten boxed Osbro Donny & Marie Osmond string puppets, which came with a quantity of Acorn Games Queen Elizabeth II Silver Jubilee puzzle games. Plenty of Lego was sold over the course of the auction (£200 was bid on the massive Technic 42100 Liebherr R 9800 Excavator) but surprise of the day had to be the £440 bid on 50 playworn Polly Pocket sets. ■