Green BAYKO Bricks

I do feel a little guilty that I haven't fully covered this topic earlier, not least because I promised to do so, on-going health issues being my only excuse. Undoubtedly the appearance of the "Green BAYKO Bricks", on eBay, in the relatively early time of Covid, Christmas, 2020, raised a significant murmur in the BAYKO community - understandably! How could such a curious anomaly appear, in quantity, totally unforeseen and unheralded, out of left field, as it were, after a pause of well over 80 years?

Firstly, let me declare a vested interest. I bought the first lot of the "Green BAYKO Bricks" that appeared on eBay, a 'job lot' of four pieces. Not surprisingly, I studied them for quite a while when they arrived : -

To the left [front view] and right [rear view] you can see images of the "Green BAYKO Bricks" to which this page refers. The 'pock marking' seen on the right hand side of the rear of the Brick is not uncommon for the period.

It does to me, and I know of no one who is questioning it.

Well, on my suggestion, and with my recommendation, the BAYKO Collectors Club bought a single example to be added to the club's display board on which almost all possible combinations of moulding, material and colour are displayed at every meeting, as a service and/or inspiration to members. It remains there to this day, occasionally contributing to the aforementioned murmur, but generally accepted as kosher, as far as I'm aware, certainly on the balance of probabilities.

The original eBay script suggested that these "Green BAYKO Bricks" were created as a bespoke order back in history, circa 1939, and then lost or simply forgotten. I suppose there was quite a lot going on at the time - thanks Adolph!!!

I'm not aware of any further examples of bespoke or personalised BAYKO production runs, however : -

I personally own several examples of 'one-off' colour variants of otherwise standard parts, mainly sourced through Plimpton friendships. What I mean by that is that many of them came via a late friend of mine, Paula Brown, who lived near to, and was friendly with, the Plimpton family.

Plimpton Engineering, BAYKO's manufacturer, were also in the business of manufacturing bespoke plastic pieces to supply a variety of other markets. For instance I believe the knobs on MECCANO cabinets were a Plimpton Engineering product. This profit stream was actually why the manufacturing company was called Plimpton Engineering rather than BAYKO.

As an aside, It's often been suggested that experience of bespoke plastic manufacture was one of the factors which MECCANO found enticing. Manufacture of modest quantities of bespoke pieces is very different to mass manufacture of standard pieces. Plimpton, of course, had experience of both.

I should add, for completeness, that I did recently try to contact the eBay vendor in the search for more information on the "Green BAYKO Bricks" provenance, in order to provide readers with the maximum amount of information, however, to date, I have not yet received a reply.