As time marches onward, some people might be tempted to think that military history lives increasingly in the world of books and old photographs. Yet the ingenuity of W.Britain Model Figures allows people to literally grasp history in three-dimensional form.
“For us at the creative end, it’s the research for evidence, accuracy, and when it’s about historical items, use,” said Ken Osen, company president. “What technology brought it about? How was it made? How often was it used? What color was it? How heavy was it?”
Together with his wife Ericka, company co-owner and manager of sales and marketing, Ken gave MHQ an inside look at the magic that has been transporting military history into people’s homes for 130 years.
“Ericka and I both have had a long history since our teenage years with historic sites and a lot of our friends are museum professionals,” said Ken. “Seeing real things, handling real items, working with museums and private collectors, even doing a little collecting ourselves, making reconstructions for living history or museum exhibits—we’ve had a lot of hands-on experience.”
“Some people like to look at what we do as being almost anachronistic, but it’s amazing—we have incredibly young collectors. Some of them start with their grandparents giving or buying something for them,” he said. “Our collectors range from age 8 to 80 plus.”
The company was known for over a century for its classic glossy soldiers in red boxes.
A household name in the military figure industry and arguably the most well-known toy company in the history of the United Kingdom, the company became famous after William Britain Sr., a former brass clock maker, began producing hollow cast soldier figures in London, England in 1893. Using
