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BERGER HALL 1900 - VICTORIAN FIGURES
As Berger Hall was set in 1900 I had to find figures suitably dressed for the period. In particular, finding females dressed appropriately was an interesting exercise.
The first figures for Berger Hall 1900 were from the ICM Henry Ford & Co kit, built as intended. In the centre Sir Macintosh Berger, owner of Berger Hall, on the left Gari Biscuit, his chief mechanic, on the right Colonel Sanders from the War Office. Later on another set was used with bits and pieces of other figures to make new ones.
Arfur Biscuit, the Head Groom (and Gari's putative father) - the Colonel's legs and torso, with arms and head from the spares box; Nando Da Costa, an Italian visitor - Sir Macintosh's legs, plus the Colonel's cut-down overcoat, head from the spares box; 'Legger' Lamb, 2nd Mechanic - Gari's torso on legs from the spares box, and Sir Macintosh's head. Limbs can be repositioned, and hats built up. The sides of Arfur's breeches were built up with Green Stuff putty.
A key ring with a figure of one of the Thompson Twins from the Tintin books was used to make the vicar. It was found that brute force could separate the figure into legs, torso, head and hands, so the legs and torso were shortened and reunited, and a new head, hands and hat sourced from the bits box to produce the Reverend Duncan Donats, Vicar of St Arbux Church in the village of Much Bowsting.
St Arbux was one of the more obscure Celtic saints, sent to convert the obdurate pagans in the region. He was martyred by the local chieftain in a particularly gruesome fashion – he was thrown into a large iron cauldron, with his name daubed mockingly on the side, and the cauldron was then filled with boiling water mixed with bitter herbs. Legend has it that the local people then saved the resulting brew, and used it as a cure for tiredness, saying that the par-boiled remains of St Arbux gave it body.
When the area was finally converted to Christianity (at the point of a sword) the little church that was built was dedicated to St Arbux -the story of the drink with healing properties resulted in his canonisation. After the original church was repeatedly plundered and laid waste by the Vikings and other marauding armies, the present building was erected in the 12th century.
The vicar who had the living after the Restoration was a student at Oxford in the late 1640s and became an enthusiastic consumer of coffee when the ‘Angel’ coffeehouse was opened there in 1650. So great was his liking for this imported beverage that, when he was appointed to the living, he decided to bring it to the inhabitants of his parish as part of his ministry to them.
The first time coffee was inflicted on the luckless inhabitants of Much Bowsting was at the Patronal Feast of St Arbux. Over the years the tradition has grown up that, after the service is over on this day, the congregation is served coffee in special St Arbux cups, with their names written on the side in memory of his martyrdom.
St Arbux was a contemporary of that equally obscure Celtic saint, St Evenage.
The German firm of Preiser produce some figures which were a good match to the period, if rather expensive. I found 3 seated passengers and 2 standing couples.
Sir Macintosh and the Colonel watch the seated passengers - from the left, Madamoiselle Étoile Michelin, the governess; Sir Macintosh's cousin Letitia (Lettice) Berger-King; and Graf Heinz von Pitze-Hütt, sent over by the German Imperial General Staff to assess the suitability of 15" gauge railways for army use. Colonel Sanders has been sent down by the War Office to keep a quiet eye on the Graf.
Two standing couples.
Left - Sir Macintosh's sister Virginia 'Veggie' Berger, and Lady Frideswide's brother Wellington Wimpy. Watch that right hand, Wimpy ...
Right - Lady Frideswide, Sir Macintosh's wife and Sebastian Berger-King, Sir Macintosh's cousin.
Sebastian is a bit of a cad, though the ladies seem to like him. Lady Frideswide is suggesting that he knocks on her bedroom door tonight at half past midnight. Sebastian is thinking that he will have just enough time to visit Mme Étoile Michelin beforehand ...
All these figures have been repainted to a greater or lesser degree, and had subtle alterations to the clothes.
Another source of figures was a firm called Lemax. Many of their products are rather kitsch, and they are made of a hard, brittle form of resin, but some can be adapted and repainted to produce suitable Victorians.
This is the Lemax 'Posting a letter to Santa'. The two figures were cut from the base and repainted to make little Ambrosia, Sir Macintosh's daughter, and her nurse, Agnes Ramsden, nee Lamb, sister of Legger.
This is the Lemax 'Fashionable Lady'. Again, cut from the base and repainted to produce Miss Su B. Way, diminutive American songstress. She is shocking polite society with her short dresses - you can see her ankles, for goodness sake! She is made very welcome at Berger Hall by Sir Macintosh - and Sebastian ...
This is the Lemax 'Feeding the Pigeons' figure. Wrenched from the seat, given a driver's hat from Green Stuff and a repaint he becomes Driver J.D. Wetherspoon.
In fact, I bought another to make a second driver when the loco stud expanded, and did the same thing, but lengthened his legs.
The seat came in useful, too - repainted and placed around the layout for other figures to use. The birds also got used - repainted and strategically placed around the scenes - children at exhibitions were asked to see how many they could find.
I found some cheap, Chinese-made figures which can be used as a basis for suitable characters. This sitting figure had his briefcase removed, hat modified with Green Stuff putty, and collar and tie added from the same material. A repaint, and we have driver Harry Ramsden.
Another of the same Chinese-made figures was chopped up and mixed with legs from the bits box, Gari's head, and the Colonel's hat to produce this sitting figure - Dr Atkins, local medicine man and antiquarian.
A group portrait of most of the Victorian figures from Berger Hall 1900.
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BERGER HALL 2020 - MODERN FIGURES
On the face of it, finding modern figures should be easy, but it proved rather harder than I expected to find figures that would fit into a miniature railway scene like Berger Hall.
On Amazon I found an American series of 1:24 figures called 'American Diorama' that included some mechanics which I could use.
I bought these 5. The front right figure turned out to be 1:18 scale, despite the packaging saying 1:24, so was discarded. After some adjustment and painting these are:
rear right - Stackpole Berger-King (known as Stackers), current owner of Berger Hall, who wanted to resurrect the railway; rear left - Sir Huntley Palmer, a rich railway enthusiast and backer of Stackers; and the other two are volunteer mechanics, so far un-named. Centre-rear had his hat modified to something more British.
Also on Amazon I found figure kits in 1:24 scale by a company called Master Box. I found a truck driver and a pair of female hitch-hikers that I could use as a suitable basis. Many of the female figure kits depicted them in very skimpy outfits, which I'm sure would have attracted adverse comment from my wife.
The kits were not built as intended, instead, the parts were mixed with other kits and parts from the bits box to produce the figures I needed. Other figures came from the Italeri 'Truck Accesories' kit and the Fujimi 'Mechanic' kit.
Left - three of the Mechanic kit in new poses; centre - the Hitch-hiker standing figure with new sitting legs becomes a driver - Stackers' girlfriend Selina Smith-Crisp; right - the truck driver with new legs and hat becomes another loco driver.
The fourth Mechanics figure was rebuilt to be the driver of 'Sir Macintosh'. He goes by the name of Peter Monjay.
The three figures from the Italeri Truck Accessories kits were mixed with parts from the bits box to make Left - a photographer, centre - a seated passenger, and right - another driver.
More of those cheap Chinese 1;24 scale figures were cleaned up and repainted, and used as passengers in the coaches. With a little juggling they were arranged in pairs that just fit into the available space, as the view below shows.
Two more of the cheap Chinese figures, which just required new hats and a repaint to become more railway staff. The one on the right seems to be very worried about the transformation ...
I found a couple of suitable female figures on Shapeways which just required painting to fit in.
There is an album of photos covering the Victorian figures here www.flickr.com/photos/149926300@N07/albums/72157688655274124/with/38070814421/
I had a big collection of 1:24 body parts, which came in very useful for producing these figures. However, the stash is much depleted now, and it's got more difficult to produce believeable figures.
Page created 20 December 2020 Last edited 4 January 2021
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