Blue Cavern

Hi again,

I am working on my Dupuispage again and wanted to consult you again.

The reason I am starting with these smurfs are that I will try to start from the beginning and go slowly towards today. As you probably know it takes a lot of time.

First the information Fram has given on the Kittys cavern:

"Dupuis, the editor of the Smurf comics and of the Spirou magazine, where the stories of Johan and Peewit and of the Smurfs first appeared in, started making vinyl and latex puppets of its most popular heroes in 1957. That first one was the Marsupilami.
In November 1958, a few more Marsupilamis were added, and a Peewit. At this time, the Smurfs had already appeared for some two months in the comics of Johan and Peewit, but they weren't yet very popular, and Peewit was a favourite of the young readers. In the following decade, a whole bunch of figures were made in different sizes, from 5 cm to a whopping 80 cm.
With the Peyo figurines, one year later, in December 1959, the first three small (5 cm) Latex Smurfs were made: Papa, Normal and Angry. At the time, they weren't available as keychains yet. These were the first Smurfs in the format and approximately the material as they have later become world renowned from Schleich and Bully.
By 1963, they were joined by a Johan and a Benoit Brisefer (another hero of Peyo, but he doesn't figure in the Smurf comics)."

These 3 smurfs from 1959 I had never seen before. But Benny sent me pictures of this catalogue from summer 1963. The pictures shows puppets made of latex. Three smurfs are shown and goes well with the information from Fram. As seen also the Marsupilami Fram tells us about are in the catalogue. Also followed by new sizes of Marsupilami as Fram also mentions was released after the first was made. Pewitt is also there. Johan is not there, but according to Fram he was made first in 1963 so he probably was added in the autumn this year.

What do you think?

These 3 must be the first Dupuissmurfs made in 1959.

Do anyone have any information about them or ever seen them "live"??

If I understand it correctly they are reinforced latex bendable figurines?? Is that correct?

I think you're right André, "reinforced", "bendable", "decorated/adorned" latex figurines!

Wow...first time I've heard of those...would love to see a picture of them if anybody is lucky enough to have those in their collection

As Fram wrote they started making puppets of latex and this goes very well with the figurines shown. Also the fact that it seems to be characters from comics edited by Dupuis in the catalogue also tells us this probably are the first smurfs from 1959.

I don´t know where Fram got his information from but it goes very well with this catalogue. I have tried to look through his old posts regarding the Dupuis but it seems not all pictures are there anymore. Therefore also it is good that I try to gather as much information as possible before it gets lost in the cyberspace?? After the Dupuis I will try to go to the next step which are the first Schleichsmurfs given away at BP stations in 1965/66.

Maybe if I follow history it is easier to fulfill the puzzle??

Here is a closeup on the Pewitt puppet in latex from 1958.

Another thing. I noticed the marking on the dupuis garden smurfs reminds of the markings on Goebel toys. Do any of you have any information regarding these garden smurfs. To me it seems when looking at them they must have been made around 1973-75 also?? So among the later Dupuis smurfs??

Here are closeups on the smurfs from 1959.

Just like with the Dupuis keychainsnad the early Schleichsmurfs they used the same mold for many smurfs. In this case it seems they only had one mold and just painted it different.

It would be great to see if anyone have any of these.

But just like with other collectibles, probably not that many were made in the beginning. And at that time since they were new there were no collectors saving them for us. So among the smurfs made before 1970 many were probably lost, especially the very early ones.

But it would really be great to see if anyone still have one. Off course maybe the quality was not that good??? Like today with my kids we throw many toys away because they are broken. So if the quality was bad maybe none are still out there???

Fascinating information André

Someone somewhere in the big wide world must still have some of those in their attic / cellar / garage & it would be brilliant if we could find better & clearer photos of them. Let's keep our fingers crossed

It looks like Papa's beard was just painted on

Yes Tojo,

it looks funny. And it is most likely just painted.

But when thinking, that only one year before this was made, nobody had ever seen a papasmurf before???

These were made so early they probably had no idea if the smurfs were going to be populair or not. Just like many of the other figurines shown in the catalogue they are just "side-characters" to the maincharacters in the comics. Because Pewitt was the funny guy in these comics I assume he was most populair. I remember reading many of these comics when I was a child and especially Starke Staffan ( original name: Benoit Brisefer). Peyo made the first 4 of these stories. Actually it says that because the smurfs became so famous Peyo concentrated making smurfcomics instead!!

But I loved them both when I was a child.

double

a very helpfull big collector just send me these pictures
I have no further info, just the pics!

enjoy!

Lia

ak

Thanks Lia!!

That is awesome!!

more

more

last picture

Those are so nice Lia!!

You must thank the collector from me!!

The red smurf? What is that for a figurine? latex also?

The other ones seems to go nice with the pictures.

Is it possible to see the numbers beside the figurines Lia?

I suppose, the red one is latex too and I will thank the sender of the pics!

I had to make the picture smaller because pics over 120 kb are not allowed on the forum, but I will send the original (bigger) picture to you!
perhaps you can read the numbers

Lia

Wow I'm very impressed! big thank you to you Lia and the happy smurf collector

Fantastic, Lia

These photos are of enormous historical importance concerning the first ever smurfs figures. It is fantastic to be able to see them