Clock Two: The Breyer Boxer Clock

Finding my Breyer Boxer clock was absolutely the most jaw dropping collecting experience I have ever had. An extremely rare piece, I wasn't even sure he was real when I discovered him in 2014 sitting on a table in a local antique shop.

Boxer clock on the highest shelf; individual boxers on the lowest.

Here's the story about how he made his way into my collection, taken from a 2018 blog post titled, The Boxer Clock - My Biggest Find.

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My dearest hope over the years has been to score a decorator. Decorators were produced in the early 1960s and did not sell well. Who wanted a blue or gold horse? (I didn't - back then.) Now they're very valuable and sought after.

My beautiful decorator Running Mares.

I've kept my eyes peeled for a decorator for decades and just this spring and summer added two Running Mares and their Foals in wedgewood and gold charm to my congas of those molds. 

I had always thought a decorator would be the most exciting thing I could find and add to my collection. But in 2014 I made the biggest collecting find of my life.

Taking a break from a stressful school day, I popped into an antique shop where I have found some nice pieces at good prices in the past. As I poked around, I spied a Breyer Boxer - a dog that the company had produced in its early days and is fairly easy to find. (I have four.)

It had the original studded vinyl collar, marking it as from the earliest days of production. I walked over to take a look. But there was more to this dog than first appeared.

 

It was attached to a wooden plinth and had a clock.

I paused. Breyer had made clocks in conjunction with Mastercrafters. They, too, are highly collectible. This looked a lot like the clocks I had seen in pictures.

A Breyer Davy Crocket clock. (Picture by Sande Schneider, pulled from Google Images.)

But never, ever had I heard of a Boxer clock. I'd not seen any at shows where Breyer clocks were featured or in any of the reference books I have. And the asking price was high enough that I hesitated to take a chance on it.

So, I left it behind at the shop. 

I went home and emailed my friend, Sande Schneider, about it. Sande is also a long time collector, and she has file cabinet upon file cabinet chock full of Breyer history documentation. If anyone could tell me if Breyer had made a Boxer clock, it was Sande. (Breyer has even come to her to get documentation as they did not keep good records in the early days of the company.)

Sande responded that she did not know of any Breyer Boxer clocks, but would do some research. In her archives is the material Nancy Atkinson Young collected when she wrote the definitive collectors books on the company. Sande bought all of Nancy's research materials, photos, and notes when she decided to no longer update her books.

And while going through Nancy's archives, Sande found this:

(Photo owned by Sande Schneider and used with permission.)

A picture of a Breyer Boxer clock. Same studded vinyl collar, same wooden plinth, same clock housing, but a different clock face.

My clock for comparison.

The only other Breyer Boxer clock known. I had just come across quite a valuable piece, and I'd left it behind! 

The next day I was SOOOO distracted in the classroom - all I could think of was that Boxer clock sitting on display and for sale to anyone, collector or not, who wanted it. I left school as soon as the dismissal bell rang and raced into town, hoping against hope that the clock would still be there.

Luck was with me and it was! I grabbed it off the table it was sitting on and bought it without haggling over the price. (As it turned out, it was on sale for 10% off!)

Sande put me in touch with the owner of the clock pictured in Nancy's files. That collector and I have chatted about our clocks, and she says she bought hers at an early BreyerFest. It is in storage at the moment so I have not seen it, but she was excited to hear about mine and to see just how similar they are. I hope that the next time she pulls it out, she takes some photos or that she contacts me and we can get together with our clocks, examine and compare them, and chat.

So, what is the story behind these two Boxer clocks? The other collector and I both live a reasonable radius from the Chicago Breyer facility. There are reports from collectors who also live within this distance of interesting finds, of meeting former jobbers at flea markets selling one of a kind pieces, etc. My guess is that the two Boxer clocks may have been marketing experiments or tests that made it out of the factory and ended up being sold somewhere on the secondhand market.

. 

Which leads me to suspect there may be more of them out there, too. You can bet that, any time I see a Breyer Boxer at an antique shop or flea market, I now take a closer look!

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Since I wrote that blog post in 2018, one more Boxer clock has appeared. It was found within the same radius from Chicago that the other two clocks were found and is the one that is posted on Identify Your Breyer.

I learned a lesson with the Victor clock - don't forget to look UP when you are searching for models in shops and thrift stores! But it was a very different lesson that I learned from finding my Breyer Boxer clock - don't be afraid to take a chance, especially if your gut feeling is telling you that you have found something special.

Give Away Error! 

I checked the photo of the license the man had shown me at the Feast (and given me permission to use here on the blog) and I have made an error. It is NOT a license to drive, it's a license to RIDE.

So, the question becomes, What is he licensed to ride? 

To be fair, I'm going to extend the deadline to answer  until Monday night (tomorrow at 11:59 PM Eastern.) Want to change an answer already in the comments? Delete the comment and make a new one. If that doesn't work, make another comment and indicate that it is a corrected comment. I'll use that one when I spin to win.

Good luck!

The Boxer Clock - My Biggest Find

My dearest hope over the years has been to score a decorator. Decorators were produced in the early 1960s and did not sell well. Who wanted a blue or gold horse? (I didn't - back then.) Now they're very valuable and sought after.

My decorator Running Mares.

I've kept my eyes peeled for a decorator for decades and just this spring and summer added two Running Mares and their Foals in wedgewood and gold charm to my congas of those molds. 

I had always thought a decorator would be the most exciting thing I could find and add to my collection. But in 2014 I made the biggest collecting find of my life.

Taking a break from a stressful school day, I popped into an antique shop where I have found some nice pieces at good prices in the past. As I poked around, I spied a Breyer Boxer - a dog that the company had produced in its early days and is fairly easy to find. (I have four.)

It had the original studded vinyl collar, marking it as from the earliest days of production. I walked over to take a look. But there was more to this dog than first appeared.

 It was attached to a wooden plinth and had a clock.

I paused. Breyer had made clocks in conjunction with Mastercrafters. They, too, are highly collectible. This looked a lot like the clocks I had seen in pictures.

A Breyer Davy Crocket clock. (Picture by Sande Schneider, pulled from Google Images.)

But never, ever had I heard of a Boxer clock. I'd not seen any at shows where Breyer clocks were featured or in any of the reference books I have. And the asking price was high enough that I hesitated to take a chance on it.

So, I left it behind at the shop. 

I went home and emailed my friend, Sande Schneider, about it. Sande is also a long time collector, and she has file cabinet upon file cabinet chock full of Breyer history documentation. If anyone could tell me if Breyer had made a Boxer clock, it was Sande. (Breyer has even come to her to get documentation as they did not keep good records in the early days of the company.)

Sande responded that she did not know of any Breyer Boxer clocks, but would do some research. In her archives is the material Nancy Atkinson Young collected when she wrote the definitive collectors books on the company. Sande bought all of Nancy's research materials, photos, and notes when she decided to no longer update her books.

And while going through Nancy's archives, Sande found this:

(Photo owned by Sande Schneider and used with permission.)

A picture of a Breyer Boxer clock. Same studded vinyl collar, same wooden plinth, same clock housing, but a different clock face.

My clock for comparison.

The only other Breyer Boxer clock known. I had just come across quite a valuable piece, and I'd left it behind! 

The next day I was SOOOO distracted in the classroom - all I could think of was that Boxer clock sitting on display and for sale to anyone, collector or not, who wanted it. I left school as soon as the dismissal bell rang and raced into town, hoping against hope that the clock would still be at there.

Luck was with me and it was! I grabbed it off the chair it was sitting on and bought it without haggling over the price. (As it turned out, it was on sale for 10% off!)

Sande put me in touch with the owner of the clock pictured in Nancy's files. That collector and I have chatted about our clocks, and she says she bought hers at an early BreyerFest. It is in storage at the moment so I have not seen it, but she was excited to hear about mine and to see just how similar they are. I hope that the next time she pulls it out, she takes some photos or that she contacts me and we can get together with our clocks, examine and compare them, and chat.

So, what is the story behind these two Boxer clocks? The other collector and I both live a reasonable radius from the Chicago Breyer facility. There are reports from collectors who also live within this distance of interesting finds, of meeting former jobbers at flea markets selling one of a kind pieces, etc. My guess is that the two Boxer clocks may have been marketing experiments or tests that made it out of the factory and ended up being sold somewhere on the secondhand market.

. 

Which leads me to suspect there may be more of them out there, too. You can bet that, any time I see a Breyer Boxer at an antique shop or flea market, I now take a closer look!

Collections within My Collection: Clocks & Such

 Second Post of the Day

Often when writing about the collections within my collection, I have pieces that could fit into several different sub collections. Such is the case with my clocks. It's a smaller sub collection, but it contains one of the most valuable pieces in my entire collection.

My Breyer Boxer Clock. Go here to read the full story of how I found it, left it behind, and then raced back to grab it the next day when I realized what I'd found.

My Boxer clock was only the second one known in the hobby at the time. A third has since surfaced and is shown on Identify Your Breyer.

The first clock that came into my collection is this old Hartland Victor horse-over-clock piece.

I happened to glance up as I was leaving an antique shop and spied it on a high shelf next to the door. I did an immediate about face and bought it.

A very recent clock is from the Vintage Club.

Pioneer, the Western Pony Clock from 2025. His color and sooty dapples are lovely.

I have one music box and it is also from the Vintage Club. Rustler, 2023.

I haven't been able to upload YouTube videos since yesterday's problems, but here is a link to a video of it playing its song. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SqUd6hNnPvE&t=1s

Sadly, my Rustler music box quit working a year or so after I received it.

The Vintage Club provided my only night light, too.

Kirk, 2024 Vintage Club night light. 

I like the Geronimo mold a lot and the vintage spatter dapple grey is very well done on Kirk. He's beautiful!

I have no Breyer lamps in my collection, mostly by choice. They take up a lot of space and can be very expensive to purchase. 

That wraps up the last of the dog collection as well as the clocks and such. More collections within my collection to come soon.

Stay 'tooned!

Last call on entering for the January Give Away! Guess Mila's favorite dish in the comments before 11:59 PM Eastern tonight.

The Rearranged Shelves

I spent the early part of this month rearranging my models (and doing the obligatory dusting that happens when you begin shuffling large amounts of pieces around.) I said I would post pictures of the end result, but I began a sewing project that day and hauled out all my sewing things, the ironing board and generally made a mess. I am still working on that sewing project, but I decided I would go ahead and post pictures of the rearranged shelves anyway. Just ignore the sewing stuff, okay?

Here is a link to a previous blog post with photos as to how the shelves looked before I rearranged: before view. I guess did have my sewing machine out - I've been working on this sewing project longer than I remembered.

 I wanted to get rid of my smaller shelves that were really for DVD and CD storage so I took out the one beside my desk. (Of course, that blank wall makes me want to buy a set of traditional-sized shelves and pop it into that space now...)

 The Running Mares are all together on the top of the shelves along with their foals. The Stud Spider pieces are in a new place as are the Phar Laps. All the Hartlands, with the exception of the woodcuts, are now in tubs and in storage.

The Jumping Horses and Pacers are in a new spot, and if you look closely behind the Quarter Horse Yearlings, you can just see my Breyer Boxer Clock. (I'll post about it tomorrow.)

I didn't do it deliberately as I was just looking for chunks of space to put congas as I rearranged, but there is a contiguous "circle of mares" across the tops of the shelves - Running Mares/Foals, PAMs, the Thoroughbred Mare and Nursing Foal, and the Indian Pony!

I tried to keep the old molds together as much as possible, but again, space concerns did not make that always possible.

I also put the Family Arab Foals away from their mothers and put them two deep on the shelf as a way of saving space.

The Thelwells (except for my in-box Breyer Kipper) were moved to where the Hartland Tiny Mites were. (The Tiny Mites are in tubs with the rest of my Hartlands.)

And most of my drafters were put together in one spot. Sadly, I still have two of the DVD/CD shelves in use - I hope to make some more changes after Christmas. Almost all of my clearware are on this shelf, too, and down low. I don't want their color fading in the sunlight, and with them placed here, the direct sun never hits them, and when it is shining through the window, they still are in shade.

 Western Horses and Ponies, Western Prancers, my Hartland clock, and Fury Prancers are all on this shelf along with the cattle and some other single pieces or mini (beginning? Hah!) congas.

 I am happy with how things turned out. (View from my office door.)

Now that I am retired, I spend a lot of time in this room - in fact, it is my favorite room in the whole house. I feel better now that all pieces are back on their shelves or packed safely into tubs for storage.

I am toying with moving all the individual shelving units into one of the spare bedrooms for book shelves and then putting up different, matching shelving.

Or, I may begin with this one bare wall and move the painting and add shelves there, then if I like the look, do the same to the rest of my office. It would be quite an undertaking, but it may also be worth the investment of time and energy.

Of course, I would have to fill those new shelves up with models...

Not Seen Enough?

In case you haven't seen enough palominos already, here are some pics of other early ones in my collection. Look at how varied the color is!

Yep, that's the Quarter Horse Yearling in palomino! She is one of the darker, almost sorrel ones. I got her in 1970.

Not palominos per se, but that same luscious carmel color, light and very dark!

These are early boxers with their original chain and leather collars.

My boxer clock. There are only two others known in the hobby. When I found this clock, I left it behind and then sent a flurry of emails and pics back and forth to Sande Schneider. She found a photo of the first one in Nancy Young's files, so I zoomed back to the store the next day, fingers crossed, that it was still there. It was! (And, it was on sale!)

Now that's orange! This is the Lassie that was produced 1995 - 1996.

I picked this fawn up recently at an antique shop and was struck by its beautiful color. 

Not Sunkist orange, but orange nonetheless!

A light carmel one - some of the old FAMs sure are lovely.

And the "burnished gold" trio that got me started wondering and researching on The Palomino Project!

Okay, now we are well and truly done with palominos! 

Left Behinds

There are a lot of HSOs (horse shaped objects) to be found in Indiana. Antique, thrift, and resale shops are full of them but most of the things that I find don't come home with me. Here are some of the more interesting "left behinds" from some recent antique shop visits.

A painted cast iron Breyer Quarter HorseYearling?

Nope!

Another metal Quarter Horse Yearling, this time as a clock? Nope!

A cheap plastic knock-off of the iconic Alabaster Family Arabian Stallion? Nope!

The bare plastic Hartland Morgan with a broken ear was left behind.

As were all these Breyers and Hartland due to price and damage. (Or, that I already had them.)

I was tempted by the Marx Pancho who was tucked in with some glamour ponies but still left him behind.

This Hartland pair got a second look but price, damage, and missing tack made them nopes, too.

In fact, I leave behind most of the things that I find when I go out to look for HSOs. 

But it is all worth it when you have a big find and all those "nopes" become a great big "YEEESSS!!"

(This boxer clock is one of only three known to exist. And when I found it a few years ago, it was on sale, too!)