DTCA

Hello,Is there anybody who can tell me if the DTCA exists in 1988? I was reading some old Model Collecgtor magazines and found a short article about the DTCA. In this article is asked for members to show their rare Dinky Toys. Maybe there are members wo are now member, but also member in teh eighties.

Hi, in the first volumes of Model Collector there was a regular series 'Dinky Toys Review', always or mostly written by Mike Richardson. This series did not last long in my opinion. Indeed the header included 'The Dinky Toys Collectors Association'. Whatever the success or lack of success and the exact ambition, it had nothing to do with the present DTCA. My earliest Model Collector is Vol, 1 No. 3, Winter 1987, and there is such a review and I see them all through 1989. They were long detailed articles with loads of information and many interesting and nice quality factory drawing details. There was also another DTCA, the Dinky Toys Club of America, with similar lack of success. This is what I can comment quickly, others may correct and/or add to this. Kind regards, Jan

Hi again, Jos Heraud kindly asked me to post the following answer/explanation regarding several DTCA's: 'The first DTCA was created by several UK collectors in the early 1987, with Les Duplock from Model Road and Rail as president and backed by Mike and Sue Richardson and others, and advertised in Model Collector. There was an application which I filled and sent, but had no reply. It was supposed to be free but unfortunately, never got really up and running.In 1995, the DTCA/USA was established by five American collectors and whose president was Jerry Fralick, in Baltimore, Maryland. It was very successful and it lasted until the year 2000, when abruptly he decided to call it quits after he created a website for it. I was a member until its demise, and at its peak, it had 500+ members, not only from the USA but from the UK, Canada, Australia, South Africa, France, etc. Mike and Sue Richardson were made honorary members, but never attended a meeting. At the AGM, there was always a big swapmeet, where members from the US and abroad came to trade and sell their extras at good prices. All this before the internet and eBay were available'. [signed: Jos Heraud] Kind regards, Jan

Jan You are quite correct in regard to the USA Dinky Toy Club of America, the DTCA. I joined this club in 1995 and it had been in operation since 1994. I was Member #127, and by the time the Club wound up in 2000, there had been a total of 532 members, although possibly not all remained with the club continuously. In 1995, I was the only member from Australia and 10 from England, which also included Mike and Sue Richardson who were member number 131 having been offered Honorary Membership. By 2000, there were four members from Australia including a well-known member #417 from Strathmore, Victoria. Those living in the UK had dropped to only five with the Richardsons having opted out from their honorary membership by then. As of December 1999, there were 350 active members, including Jose with whom you and I have been in close contact for many years, his membership number being 198. The newsletters were often filled with tips on restoring, discoveries of something new, as well as many pages of Dinky Toys being offered for sale. I bought from quite a few collectors over the years. When Jerry started to create a website in 1999 dedicated to Dinky Toys manufactured by Meccano, he encountered all sorts of legal problems from the attorneys representing Mattel. By the middle of 2000 this conflict even reached the stage whereby anyone using the name 'dinky', 'Dinky' etc as his nickname, such as Mr Dinky (that was Jerry) Dr Dinky (cannot quickly locate his name) were also being 'urged' to cease as this contravened the ownership of the trademark 'Dinky Toys'. My own Newsletter DINKY NEWS never reached this difficulty, as from the start, I had a small box at the bottom of the title page acknowledging the ownership of the various trademarks. It is also the reason I have used the Pidgin English translation of Dinky News which is Dinkinius for my identity. I think it was the threat of legal action that made Jerry decide to terminate the club and with apparently nobody else interested, the club just unfortunately disappeared. The following is a sample of the first issue I received. I still have most of the newsletters that Jerry issued. Kind regards Bruce (150) 25 January 2016 #756

Bruce--Thanks for sharing that copy of the newsletter from the old Dinky Toy Club of America......it was fun reading it, but also sad to realize over the years how many aborted efforts there have been to keep an organization or newsletter alive and ongoing in our hobby.Best regards, Terry