My First Metal Miniature

Anne of the Anne's Attic Blog posted some pics of her very first painted miniature last month. She was pretty hard on herself about how the mini turned out (Honest Anne it's really quite good for a first effort!)  but it got me a thinking of the time when I got my first metal miniature.

I've mentioned this chap before - "Jimmy" - in my very first blog post last year and the observant amongst you will also have noted that he also appears as my profile pic.

                                         

It was the September 1979 edition of the Military Modelling Magazine that really started me on the slippery slope that I have been sliding down for the last 33 years.

The much thumbed and read Military Modelling Magazine

And on page 759 appeared the following advert

No there wasn't 759 pages in this magazine, the numbering ran consecutively with each issue starting with the January issue!







In the days before the internet, you sent off a Stamped Addressed envelope to the advertiser, sometimes with a Postal Order, sometime with stamps (Citadel asked for 25p worth of stamps) and in return you would get the latest lists/ catalogue and sometimes a free sample figure and that's how Jimmy arrived. To be honest, if I'd had my choice of sample, I wouldn't have picked FA6 Bard figure from the Fantasy Adventurers range (which is Jimmy) but would have picked a more exotic sounding model such as FA9 - the "Barbarian with Two Handed Sword" or FA14 "Elven Hero with Sword" but Jimmy is what I got and I've kept him ever since.

Compared with today's figures the detail, as you would expect, is pretty limited and my pretty basic paint job doesn't help but I'm too scared to try stripping the paint and re-painting him just in case I end up ruining the model given the age of the metal.

And given the trend for 25mm models to become 28mm and now heroic 32mm in size, Jimmy, unfortunately is just to small to be used with any of the models in production nowadays.

Even with the help of a plastic base, Jimmy is a Dwarf compared to Hector McHoosie

So although Jimmy won't be coming out to play with my other models he will stay on my display shelf as a nostalgic reminder of how it all began.

So Dear Reader, what was your first model? How did you come by it and do you still have it?