I hope everyone is doing well. We continue the review of the Midwest Toy Soldier Show. In my last post I did a review of the room trading, The Latest News!! 03/19/2025 ~ Midwest Toy Show Review Part 1 ~ Room Trading.
Here are some pictures of the showroom the day before. I like to study the room if possible before the show to see where my tables are located.
We started setting up in the showroom at 7am. The setup was faster than usual because we had the shelves put together and the display miniatures were unboxed already.
We start the review with John Atherton’s tables. He had some medieval buildings, bridges, colonial, and native Indian houses. Plus, modern structures that could be used for World War II. His foam buildings bring displays alive. Plus, they are great for wargaming.
Joe Baker’s tables had a bunch of the Speira 3d printed models and a lot of Conte toy soldiers. Plus, some foam buildings.
Steve Connell had more on his tables than this, but I forgot to get back to him.
David & Kim Cook of MicShaun’s Closet had a bunch of plastic toy soldiers from different brands. Plus, a lot of foam buildings.
Curtis Cousinea had a bunch of items from his collection for sale.
Karl Deiner had some nice Vintage plastic toy soldiers for sale. I will start collecting some old Marx toy soldiers when I retire.
Rick Eber always has some pristine vintage Marx playsets and a lot of loose & bagged toy soldiers for sale. If you are searching for some rare items, ask Rick.
Rich Egan also had some nice Marx toys and usually has a nice selection of Conte & Barzso products.
Handley & Pitman had some storage bins of vintage plastic to sort through.
Rob Hornung was setup for the show with his hand-crafted miniatures. He had skipped the room trading and it was not sure that he would setup because he had hurt his thumb. But he is a trooper.
Rick Keller & Rick Lipp had a lot of vintage Marx playsets & toy soldiers.
Mike Knutick had all kinds of toy products. He usually has a nice selection of Barzso soldiers and accessories to pick through, but most of them were sold during the room trading.
Larry Lovely has taken over the top spot in promoting the Midwest show. Steve & Rick are still helping out. Larry’s tables had storage containers full of vintage plastic toys to search through. He had some good prices.
Todd Nace had some storage bins of Marx toys to search through too.
Nate’s Garage had their hand crafted creations for sale. He is always working on something new.
Ed Nelson had some vintage toys with him.
It was the first time that we met Papa Joe. His foam creations are really nice. His western buildings would look really nice for a western town display. Both plastic & painted metal toy soldiers fit in really nice.
Here are some random pictures of the show.
Rod Roberts had some nice items from his collection for sale.
Joe Saine had a bunch of new & old painted metal soldiers. Plus, some Barzso Playsets.
Here are some pictures of a few tables from some unknown venders to me. I think some are from Rick Keller.
Here are a couple of pictures of Gary Wendeln’s table.
We end the review here with our tables. We have been switching most of our sets into boxes instead of the bags with the header cards. Besides the Warhorse products we had some Barzso resin soldiers, other brands of plastic figures and some things from my collection for sale. I had some of the new Saxon Huscarls with me too. I am working on a few new Saxon sets that I should have at the Gettysburg show. Just like the room trading the show attendance was down again. We still did good and had a great time. Hopefully next year things are better. We will take a look at some of the items that I picked up at the show.
I picked up this lot of Native American toy soldiers from John Anderson for $10. There were a group of Airfix recast horses, 7 recast Marx Teepees and 4 bagged groups of Timpo solid Native American Indians. They are all 1/32 scaled.
I picked this group of Conte WWII GIs from Rich Egan for $30. Conte made some of the best World War II toy soldiers. The sculpting and details are really nice.
I also got these Plastic Platoon German Paratroops from Rich Egan for $50. I already had this set in a different color. They are also really nice, but I dislike the rubbery resin they use. The weapons are hard to straighten out once they get bent.
I picked up this lot of Barzso toy soldiers from Mike Knutick for $40. I always can use more Redcoats. There were some character figures. The Scottish flag bearer was a weird color and seem to be a little bigger. They also felt a little like vinyl.
Here are some of the Warhorse British compared to the Barzso British. I should have a better color as soon as I have the chance to start testing again.
I picked up this boxed set of 7th Cavalry from Mike Knutick for $20. It is not complete, but I was mainly interested in the box. I have more 7th Cavalry to complete it. Most of the models were in really good shape. I have most of the Airfix boxed sets in my collection.
Also from Mike Knutick was this boxed set of Native Americans. It was also missing some models, but again I was interested mainly in the box. It was a little damaged in the back. But for $15, you can’t go wrong.
I got this boxed set of Normans from Joe Saine for $5.
I picked up this Atlantic Buffalo Bill set from a collector named Mike for $40. It was missing a few pieces. I have a rider somewhere and some more Buffalo that I had picked up years ago.
I found this group of toy soldiers at a thrift store of $5. The miniatures are about 54mm, a little smaller. I have not seen anything decent like this for a while. It is like a mini playset. I do not know who makes this. There is a sticker on the truck that says, “SDE Dongguan“
We usually will stop at some thrift stores after the show as we are traveling home. I found this drum for $4 at a Salvation Army.
I found these items for a $1. The tree was a gift. The Saxon miniatures are made by Replicants. Everything is 1/32 in scale.
I picked up these CTS Sioux Indians from Cal Luckett for $5. I like this orange/brown color that they had used. They look a little bigger than the dark brown ones that I have.
And lastly, I traded some of my native sets with John Atherton for these two Barzso Longhouses. They look good with my Warhorse miniatures. John had just started making these again. The longer longhouse is from the Rogers’ Rangers Attack on Saint Francis playset. The other one is from the Last of the Mohicans playset. They are nicely painted.
If you are in the Evansville, Indiana area check out Evansville Military Collectors club show. It is over 3 days starting on April 24th, 25th & 26th. Around 160 tables of Military relics & collectibles.
Speaking of shows, we will be setup for the Gettysburg Toy Soldier show on May 4th. It is the best show on the East Coast. You can find anything at this show, vintage & new plastic or painted metal toy soldiers, vintage models & toys, custom painted sculptures, military books and other hobby related items. There is a nice mixture of dealers like Hobby Bunker and collector/vendors selling off parts of their collectors. We hope to see you there.
As usual I am busy designing and testing out new products. I will have a few new sets at the Gettysburg show. Thank you for reading, that is it for now.