G'day Bruce!

G'day Bruce!

SKJ HQ is pleased to announce another childhood original has been coaxed out of retirement and returned to active service. He recently led the 'revisiting the pics of  '76' Mission.



Cliff's reactivation in february 2014 was supposed to be 'the 1st of the rest of the come backs' and launch a series of returns to active duty by my childhood guys but everyone knows how slow the wheels at SKJ HQ turn. My old guys are still languishing in my old VAM box.





Bruce was originally a 3rd issue soldier and reported for duty christmas 1973. One of those new fangled 'gripping hands' chaps. Being a bit of a latecomer to my crew means he survived in pretty good nick!



It's a closely guarded secret at SKJ HQ and something we'd never admit to outsiders but there's a plausible theory that most of my guys have my aunt's dubious taste in music to thank/blame for their names. So a few days after xmas my cousin and I were sitting in front of the Hi-Fi brainstorming a name for my new VAM. 'Cliff' LP in hand we began to read....'Cliff (Richard)...used it already'....'Hank (Marvin)...used it'...'Bruce (Welch)..'
'Bruce??..your name not Bruce?' We both launched into a rendition of the Monty Python 'Bruce' sketch and my new VAM's name was pretty much decided!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_f_p0CgPeyA

He didn't have a surname for awhile but it nominally became 'Ross' after James Cagney's character in 'Each Dawn I Die' which had been on TV recently. I finally settled on 'Rosser', named after a local politician after seeing 'Vote Rosser' signs all over the place. I've since found out it was the surname of a famous US civil war general too.

Bruce was nominally an Australian and so a bush hat would have been nice..



..But I didn't have one as a kid so he went on his 1st few missions wearing an old Mountie hat I had!



I had this 'great' idea to add some corks on string to it to give it an Ozzie feel but luckily never got around to it!

Bruce and Joe have had their ups and downs...



..But get along most of the time!

Fantastic to see another of the old guard restored and reporting back for duty! he look the business mate! another down and not long till they are all back in service Top work Steve


Pity the hat never happened

Fantastic thread Steve ,love those old pictures , some prang on the car though , what happened there? great that you are fixing up the old guard !

Excellent "1st of the rest" figure, Steve!!!

Really enjoyed the 'bruce' skit too!

but over here we call all our figures 'Joe' to avoid confusion...

Really great story Steve, just spoilt a bit by some weird kid 'photobombing' a perfectly good Action Man photo... bloody cheek of it!



Can't wait to see Bruce restored!

BTW that car looks like it was in a bit of a prang!

I love all your old original photos , and putting things back together is a very interesting and great thing to be doing .

Great vintage figures, vintage photos and vintage love for quality toys.

Love the old photos of your guys Steve, also like the current one with them lying in the shoe box.
I must get round to sorting my originals out, only ever managed one so far.
Is Bruce getting a reflock ?

more missing pics