Secretariat, the Return of the Decorators, and a Missing Link Test Run?

This year marks the 50th anniversary---the golden anniversary no less---of Secretariat's Triple Crown victory in 1973. To celebrate, Breyer has produced a new gold charm Secretariat model on the Smarty Jones mold reminiscent of the one they released almost 25 years ago on the original Secretariat mold. And they have also recently debuted a classic scale gold charm Secretariat for the Vintage Club on the Man O' War mold. So it seems particularly fitting therefore that a gold charm test run model possibly related to that first gold charm Secretariat model came to light just a few months ago.

Unfinished test run gold charm Classic Black Stallion

But first, a little backstory. As everyone knows, Secretariat swept the Triple Crown in 1973 in dramatic fashion, winning the Kentucky Derby and Preakness in stakes record times before smashing the Belmont by 31 lengths in a new world record that still stands to this day.

As I've mentioned here and on my studio blog, I have been a horse racing fan my whole life. I learned to read with C. W. Anderson's horse stories, and I was always enthralled by his memories of great horses like Native Dancer, Stymie, Exterminator, and especially Man O' War. Despite all the talented horses he saw in his lifetime, Anderson never wavered from his opinion that the original Big Red was the greatest of them all. He died in 1971 however, two years before the mighty Secretariat swept the Triple Crown, and I have always wondered what he would have written about the second Big Red.

While I'm too young to have seen Secretariat, I do nonetheless have a very clear memory of the evening news reporting Secretariat's death on October 4, 1989. I was only eleven at the time, but I had seen his Triple Crown races on a VHS tape my parents had bought for me of the (then) eleven Triple Crown winners. I knew he'd been a phenomenal racehorse, and Lady's Secret and Risen Star had proved that he was a good sire as well only a few years earlier.

Breyer did not release a Secretariat model until 1987, almost 15 years after the great horse's Triple Crown triumph. Breyer historian Nancy Young wrote that Breyer had approached Penny Chenery, Secretariat's owner, shortly after his great victory to make a model, but Penny had declined, feeling that a toy was inappropriate. Peter Stone finally won her over years later with an appeal of "what about the children?" Secretariat debuted as part of the Artist Series, a line of small traditional scale models by well-known equine artists like Chris Hess, Rich Rudish, and Jeanne Mellin Herrick. It was the last model Hess sculpted for Breyer before he passed away.

I honestly don't recall a thing about buying my regular chestnut Secretariat model, but I do very well remember acquiring one of the next colors released on the mold, the gold charm.

This model was in storage for 30 years, hence his bright,
untarnished gold color

In the late 1980s, after Reeves International bought Breyer, Peter Stone continued to work for the company and travel the country promoting Breyer models. For several years, Breyer hosted a series of signing parties at various toy stores where Peter would visit for an afternoon and sign any models customers purchased or brought in from their own collections. In 1990, a special run gold charm Secretariat model was offered to signing party attendees. My dad very sweetly drove me and my little sister Sarah to a toy store in downtown Atlanta where we stood in line to buy a gold Secretariat and have it signed by Peter.

 

 

At that time, it had been more than 25 years since Breyer had produced the original decorator models, and needless to say, the gold charm Secretariat caused a bit of a stir. While we stood in line, my dad and I chatted with other collectors about it, and part of the excitement was the reintroduction of a decorator color after so long, and part of it was due the fact that it was not quite a traditional gold charm model. Instead of having a white mane and tail, bald face, and four white feet like the '60s gold charm models, the new Secretariat was gold all over with a blaze and 3 socks like those of the real horse. And as a run of only 3500 pieces, he was considered somewhat limited in those pre-internet days.

 

 

A 1960s gold charm Mustang for comparison

Later that summer in July 1990 at the inaugural BreyerFest, yet another new decorator was released, a florentine Misty raffle model limited to 21 pieces. The color and style of this model were a close match to the florentine models of the 1960s.

1990 BreyerFest raffle model florentine Misty

A 1960s florentine Mustang for comparison 

The following year, Breyer held BreyerFest events at four locations---in Lexington at the Kentucky Horse Park as they done the year before, as well as in Redmond/Bend, OR; York, PA; and Pomona, CA. Each location had a different decorator raffle model, and unlike the florentine Misty from the previous year, none of the 1991 decorator raffle models were a match for their 1960s counterpoints.

The 4 original 1960s decorator colors

The florentine Legionario does not have a white mane and tail, has only two socks and no bald face, and has grey hooves instead of pink. The copenhagen San Domingo does not have a white mane, tail,  socks, or bald face, and he also has grey hooves. The gold charm Man O' War is gold all over except for his star to match the real horse. And the wedgewood Sham has a white mane and tail and four socks but no bald face, and grey hooves instead of pink.

The 1991 BreyerFest raffle decorators (Man O' War photo
from Identify Your Breyer, Sham photo by Mel Grant,
Legionario photo by Sarah Wellman, San Domingo photo
by Molly Bates)

Subsequent decorator models such as the 1996 BreyerFest raffle model Malibu, a wedgewood Hackney, returned to the style of the 1960s models with white manes, tails, bald faces, socks, and pink hooves.

So when this gold charm Classic Black Stallion turned up in an online auction a few months ago, it immediately caught my attention because it reminded me strongly of the gold charm Secretariat and the 1991 raffle models. I was certain he was original finish because everything about the way he was painted, from the way the gold on his legs fades into white socks to the distinctive way the underside of his tail is not painted, suggested he was absolutely factory original. After 40 years of collecting, you just know that OF look.

Interestingly, he escaped the factory unfinished (his hooves and eyes are not painted). His gold paint has oxidized ever so slightly in the 30 or so years since I believe he was created. The Classic Black Stallion mold was introduced in 1983, and until about 2002, it had some rough pimply spots on the barrel. The mold was smoothed out in 2003. This gold charm model does have the pimpled barrel, so he had to have been made sometime between 1983-2002. But I think the window for his creation date can be narrowed down to just a few years, probably sometime between 1989-1991.

Because he was painted with a gold mane and tail and a solid gold face and because he is a small standing model, I can't help but wonder if he was painted when Breyer was testing options for the gold charm Secretariat release. The models are of a similar size in a similar pose, and the non-traditional gold charm paint job is very alike in terms of style. He also bears a strong resemblance style-wise to the unconventional 1991 raffle models.

While I can't prove that this model is the missing link that brought decorator colors forward into modern production after a long hiatus, I think it's highly likely that he dates from the right time period. Furthermore, we do know of a few other oddball decorator colors on classic scale molds from this period, such as the wedgewood Classic Man O' War and the wedgewood Classic Kelso that were sold at the 1997 and 1999 BreyerFest auctions respectively. At the time, the models sold in the BreyerFest auctions were true factory tests plucked from the archive shelves, not one of a kind models made deliberately for the auction as they are now. Both of those models were likely painted several years earlier around the same time as the 1991 raffle models. Could this gold charm Classic Black Stallion be a part of that series of test models, too? I'm not sure we'll ever know for certain. And that is part of the thrill of collecting and hunting for rare Breyers. You just never know what unexpected things will turn up!