"Those of us of an age will remember the fielding of the M16 rifle, and the accompanying comments on it's plastic furniture... "If it's Mattel, it's swell!" From the truth is stranger than fiction file... Wired's Danger Room reports the Army is asking a toy company to develop a rifle."
That's the link. The Army is asking a toy company to develop a rifle. That's why I have those two artifacts - they represent a toy company making weapons. As many of you correctly noted, one of the objects in question is a spigot mortar, in this case a German Granatenwerfer 16, made for use in WWI. The "pineapple shaped" item to the right of it is one of the bombs it fired. The cartridge was set in the tail of the bomb, which slid over the post, which is hollow and contains a firing pin. The tail is robustly built, because it is in fact the barrel of the mortar. It operates, less the recoil spring aspect, just like a PIAT, the Brit anti-tank/anti-bunker weapon of WWII.
It was made by the Bing Brothers, a very famous maker of toys, especially steam trains and steam engines made in Germany from the 1860's to the 1930's.
The toy cannon is also a Bing product. Based on what I know of the history of Bing (my interest stems from the fact I was stationed in Nürnberg in the early 80's - as an aside, that's where "fdcol" and I met, serving in the same battalion at Pinder Barracks.) looking at the trademark, the cannon dates from the 1924-32 era. The gun could date to at least as far back as 1927, as I've seen a catalog of that date with the cannon in it. It's a well-made tin-type toy, in very good shape for it's age - meaning it must not have seen too much play time, sadly. It spends its days now sitting amiably next to its older, war-veteran brother (who came to the Castle from the estate of a WWI vet in Jetmore, Kansas), both silent witnesses to turbulent times.
Especially when you consider that the Bing family, who were Jews, ended up fleeing Germany shortly after the Nazis came to power. They fled to Britain, where Stephan Bing helped start the British toy train company Trix. In one of those ironies that make the world interesting... Trix is now owned by the German model train company Märklin.]]>