Wild horses / not so fast

Posted on by garbagefinds

I decided to do a Monday morning run for the first time in a while. It was real cold out, so I did my usual driving route which includes the Golden Square Mile, some Westmount adjacent, and a bit of Cote-des-Neiges. I didn’t have much luck til near the end of my run, when I spotted this horse near the UdM campus.

It was an old Tri-ang rocking horse, probably from the 1950s. The horse is metal, apparently tinplate which is steel or iron coated with tin. All in all it’s in pretty decent shape for its age, just missing the “hair” and the rubber saddle is all dried up (here’s a pic of a pretty similar horse).

As I was loading it in my car, the previous owner came out to talk to me. She was really happy to see that I was taking it, telling me that she’d bought it as a project 10 years ago but never got around to it. It’s always nice to have a positive encounter out on the curb. I brought this to the auction, and soon it will be someone else’s project.

At the same pile was this cute hand-made rocking horse. Apparently, when the neighbour of this woman saw her horse on the curb, he decided to bring over a horse of his own that he was looking to purge. Anyways, I took this guy as well and dropped him off at the auction.

Otherwise, here’s some pics from a spot I mostly wrote off, but ended up producing one more good haul. I picked up a few nice bits of glass and pottery, including those colourful ashtrays, two cute Mexican plates (signed by someone fairly known, but I forget who right now), and a promotional Continental tire ashtray. That style of ashtray has become fairly collectible, and I think this one ended up selling for around 40$ at auction.

Here’s a few more bits and bobs, like a vintage electronic blackjack game and some coins, including one of those 10% silver Mexicans pesos from the the 1960s.

I also found a neat old transferware plate with a copper frame. I’m not sure if the frame was there originally, or if it was added after because of that big crack in the middle (I read somewhere that you can make the stain go away using boiling milk, but there’s got to be a better way).

Here’s the production mark on the back for folks that are interested in such things. I’d like to know more about it, but I didn’t have any luck figuring this one out. Please let us know in the comments if you have any ideas!

Lastly, I found a box full of vials containing weird compounds like c25h34o4 aka Crispatene. I don’t actually know what that means and after googling it I still don’t, other than it’s probably used in organic chemistry. Anyways, I didn’t really want to mess around with this stuff so I brought them to the eco-centre for safe disposal.

Anyways, I’ve spent much of the last three days on the computer following this dang election which is hopefully over soon. I’ve still been doing my runs, and have continued my string of good luck. I found bit of gold today and Monday, which is always exciting and profitable. Anyways, I’m hoping to share more here soon now that I’ve gotten most of my big organizational / winter preparation projects done.

19 thoughts on “Wild horses / not so fast”

  1. In the photo of the ashtrays, the top two are the Soreno Pattern by Anchor Hocking and date between 1966 and 1970. Unfortunately, they are only worth $10-$15. Thank You for all of the great stories and photos you provide.

    1. Good to know. They’re quite pretty regardless. I brought them to the auction and I think they sold for 10$ or something, which I’m content with.

  2. My grandmother had a set of those Mexican dishes with the bird…nice to see them again.

    Your posts are always a tonic. Something to occupy my brain while waiting for your downstairs neighbor’s election to cross the line to the side of the angels.

  3. Thanks for the quick new post. The marking on the back of the copper plate stymied me. I could not even find another plate with a copper rim. I have turned my research skills to stainless flatware as I found a free box of mixed flatware at an estate sale. The stainless pieces were Danish and German and brought really decent $. Last week I bought a bag of Boda Nova flatware for $7. I have sold 3 lots of it for $200, $275 and $180 and still have 6 valuable dinner forks. Had great luck with with Dansk Tiva and Oneida Supreme. Flatware is easy to store and ship. It’s also easy to research at Replacements.com which sells china, flatware and crystal and has pages of pics of patterns. Happy you are on a gold streak, can’t wait to see your pics and post

    1. I couple find any other copper rimmed plates either, which makes me wonder if it was added after to add stability to the plate which has that crack down the middle. I’ll have to look at it closer.

      I’ll have to keep an eye out for that Boda Nova & those others. I’ve had luck finding silver cutlery at times, but often it’s beat up and best sold for scrap.

  5. Thank you, Martin, for the post and for keeping my mind off of the election for a few minutes. Great diversion. And a million thank you’d for diverting the weird chemicals from the landfill.

  7. Love those horses! And I use Bar Keepers Friend, a scouring powder, to clean stains from plates, dishes, mugs, anything ceramic. Use an old toothbrush and a bit of water and scrub it off. Usually an easy job.

  8. On the copper Framed plate, I had no luck finding the mark other than I believe it is a Vienna Shield mark “bindenschild”, upside down they look like a beehive and moderen collectors often describe it as such.

  9. I hope the auction house finds good homes (and big $$$) for your livestock. 🙂
    I remember that green ashtray, from back when I was a kid. They would make a pretty plant saucer for them that don’t smoke.
    That plate with the copper frame is quite pretty, and unusual. I’m having no luck with my Googling on this. 🙁 Could the plate have been hand-painted? (which was a common pastime for ladies back in the day, and “blank” porcelain dishes were sold for this purpose).

  10. RE: Mexican dishes, it’s Ken Edwards, Mexico Tonala – if it is marked K.E. Other desirable is Jorge Wilmot
    Nice finds- love the horse teeter-totter!

  12. I just purchased a horse identical to this one. I would like to work on restoring it to as close to original as possible. I am looking for pictures of this specific toy to try to figure out what the original mane, tail and ears looked like. I have done numerous searches but most of the horses with real mane hair are on wooden bases. I would appreciate any suggestions for where I might find original advertisements for this fellow.

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