1936 Marx Popeye Honeymoon Express In Original Box
Magnificent mechanical tin litho (Honeymoon Express) circular toy with all original parts, no restoration, and spectacular complete original box plus original instruction sheet. Incredible near mint condition with excellent+ to near mint box. Both the toy and box are the best examples I've seen. It's the first complete sheet of original instructions I've seen for this toy. Of the 40+ "honeymoon express" variations produced by Marx, the Popeye Express is by far the most scarce and the most distinct. It features a full color illustrated, two sided, lithographed cardboard circular insert in the center. Typically this is missing or has been replaced. Popeye's flies a three dimensional monoplane with working aluminum propeller, while an M-10000 style train (four cars) with comic character portraits on the roof of each car circles below. Of course this is the Popey version of the classic Marx Honeymoon Express circular train toy. Beautifully lithoed with images of all the original Thimble Theater characters, of which Popeye was the most famous. Olive Oyl's streamlined train passes through two Wimpy and Sappo hamburger tunnels and across camouflaged girder bridge, as Popeye circles overhead. The planes propeller spins continuously as it rotates. The train speeds through a camouflaged bridge and two tunnels marked "Hamburgers" with Wimpy and cook Sappo on the sides. A switch on one of the tunnels starts and stops the train. The outer edge of the toy is lithoed red and shows several head portraits of Popeye. Concentric blue and white rings of "track" lead to the green pasture and forest in the center where Olive and several children look skyward. In the center is the airport hanger which houses the spring wound motor and attached key. Marx produced two versions of this toy by changing the lithography on the airport hanger roof. This example is version 1. In version 2 the roof of the airplane hanger is lithographed in orange, black, and green camouflaged pattern similar to the bridge. The box cover and all four aprons are covered with comic drawings. The front panel shows Popeye waving from his plane "Spinachovia" as he whizzes over the rooftops and above the speeding train. Below him a fuming motorcycle cop races alongside the train, while hanging out of the locomotive an angry Olive shakes her fist. The side panels have the name of the toy flanked by repeating illustrations of Olive, Wimpy and Sappo on one end, and Popeye slamming another guy with a right to the jaw on the other. The reverse side of the box is blank. Size: 9¼" diameter Date Sold: Mar. 2011
Price Sold: $ 3510
