New Runway Display Board - First Shots: Tarheel Industries Project SWORD Probe Force 2

I'm gonna have to go through all my airplane, spaceship, and airport toys and start dragging things out to photograph. The collection doesn't have a lot of airfield accessories, things like AGE (Aerospace Ground Equipment), portable ladders or staircases, or other ephemera one would see on a flightline , but I still have enough to do something!

Today's series of photos highlights Tarheel Industries Project SWORD Probe Force 2 (P2). In the Project SWORD storyline, there were three SWORD bases: Moon Base; London, UK; and Woomera, Australia. Wellll I have nothing that resembles any of those locals so let's pretend the photos reflect an as yet unnamed auxiliary base! In the first couple of photos we see SWORD P2 getting prepped for take off (I'm thinking 1/72 / OO scale airfield accessories might be appropriate here). The last photo shows P2 rolling down the runway. Be Blessed and Relish Life! Ed

Project S.W.O.R.D. - A Quick Rundown of My Toys

The line of toys in this post represents my on-again, off-again efforts at collecting the spaceships and vehicles associated with the comic strips printed in the Project S.W.O.R.D. Annual starting in 1968. Essentially these were toys being made by Century 21 and the idea was to promote them using a comic strip format with an end-of-world story line. There's more to the history but the below extract is enough to allow you to get the gist of the matter. 

An excellent source for Project S.W.O.R.D. (or SWORD - both are correct) is the Moonbase Central blog where Woodsy, Scoop, Wotan and a coterie of contributors, have tried to tell the history of the strip and the toys, track down the toys themselves (common and rare alike), and feature knock-offs and variations. Be Blessed and Relish Life! Ed 

(The following is an excerpt from a now-defunct website: www.technodelic.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk:)

"The City... New York. The Time... near World's End.

The opening caption of the first strip in the Project SWORD annual sets the scene for this ambitious format to promote a new range of Century 21 Toys. The irony is, the format is not set in the 21st Century at all. But then, to be in the pages of TV21 when it did, it would have to be somewhat removed from the other series. So 'near World's End' was a thousand years in the future, in AD 3031.

The feature In The Beginning starts six years previously, with an equally ambitious plan to explore deep space to find resources for a depleted Earth. S.W.O.R.D. - acronym for the Space World Organisation of Research and Development - is set up for this quest, beyond the known worlds. The second main feature 3031 explains how chaos and destruction had now come to Earth in the form of a meteorite plunging into the Pacific Ocean. In a broader reworking of the opening instalment of Project SWORD in the weekly comic, and illustrated by three of Ron Embleton's artworks from TV21 (below), we are reintroduced to the desperate plight of Earth and its survivors. Project SWORD is again reiterated as the last hope for humanity, with a three part mission - Evacuation, Rehabilitation and Investigation.

So what of the annual itself? Production lead times indicate it was being written just as the first instalments of the weekly Project SWORD stories got underway. Howard Elson, who was working as an editor in the Century 21 Publishing book department,  'The idea was they had a range of merchandising that they wanted to sell, and they decided to sell it on the back of strips. The strips basically revolve around the vehicles, which was a unique idea at the time"

My Project SWORD Toys

The two companies most closely associated with the Project SWORD line of toys is Tarheel Industries, and Century 21. The line actually got its start with Century 21, but I'm not sure how Tarheel became involved. In addition, companies like Tri-ang produced smaller versions of some of these toys but weren't branded as Project SWORD.

Tarheel 

Nova I No.5918 (posted just yesterday)

For some strange reason, Tarheel used the same item number for all three ships

Nova II No. 5918

(Shown with Tri-ang 1/72 scale spaceman for size comparison)

Nova III No. 5918 

Probe Force 2 

Task Force No. 1 

Task Force No. 3 No. 5917

Century 21

Project SWORD Moon Prospector

(To be blogged)

Tri-ang / MPC Golden Astronaut

SpaceX Rocket Ship 'Hawk'

(Shown with Tri-ang 1/72 scale spaceman for size comparison)

SpaceX Prospector

Tarheel Indutries, Inc. Project S.W.O.R.D. Nova I No. 5918

Here's a Project S.W.O.R.D. spaceship I bought last year and totally forgot to post. Unfortunately, like so many of my purchases, due to budget constraints, this one was bought on the cheap because it had condition issues like a missing canopy and missing right front wing. Oh well, If I ever get around to building a landing strip diorama for my space fleet, I can still pose it in a hangar or something. It measures 10.25" (26.03cm) L x 2.375" (6.03cm) W. Be Blessed and Relish Life! Ed 

Arto's Tarheel Industries No. 5918 Moon Rocket Nova III (Complete and with Original Card)

Before I forget to post this (again - been wanting to do this for the past two years), a quick diversion from our look at Lido Captain Video spaceships.

A couple of years back I had the opportunity of photographing fellow collector Arto H.'s Tarheel Industries No. 5918 Nova III spaceship.  I posted my own sample back in 2020, but mine is missing the canopy and had no packaging. Arto's sample had already been removed from the blister pack by a previous owner and fortunately all of the packaging was saved. This allowed me to photograph the whole shebang! Enjoy! Opa Fritz

My sample missing the canopy. A Golden Astronaut figure is shown for size comparison.

Here's a Tri-ang Nuclear Freighter alongside one of their astronauts. It's interesting how we associate these miniscule spaceships with the 1/72 scale figures, when in fact the large ships from companies like Tarheel are more on-point!

Arto's Moon Rocket Nova III

Tarheel Task Force No. 3 No. 5917 - Thanx Arto!

Tarheel Industries made a whole bunch of toys in their Century 21/Project SWORD series, and some are a real bear trying to find - so I don't try! Occasionally I'll find one in a random search and other times I acquire them quite by chance - like this Task Force No. 3 piece. I owe a big thank you and a big apology to fellow collector Arto H. from Finland for this wonderful Tarheel Industries Task Force No. 3 spaceship. We were working out trades' way back in 2022 and I got this terrific, carded spaceship as a result. But, in my pondering, procrastinating way, it never got posted or fully credited to him! Good grief, the story of my life!  The toy measures 8.25" (20.95cm) L x 2.625" (6.66cm) wingspan x 1.75" (4.44cm) H. Enjoy! Opa Fritz

Tarheel Indutries, Inc. Project SWORD Probe Force 2 (1967)

Okay, I am treading thin ice here with this post in that I don't have a complete understanding of the Tarheel Industries series of Project S.W.O.R.D. (or SWORD) toys. Here's what I think I've figured out so far. 

If you're familiar with Gerry Anderson and his wonderful Supermarionation creations like Thunderbirds, Supercar, Fireball XL-5, Captain Scarlet, etc., from the 1960's then that's a beginning. He also had an offshoot or auxiliary business in the form of TV Century 21 comic books featuring stories from those shows along with other futuristic story arcs. Those other story arcs were then translated into toys made by Tarheel Industries., Inc. but were never made into television series. Here's an interesting site explaining the series that never was: Project S.W.O.R.D

Tarheel's Nova II, Nova III, and Task Force No. 1 have already been featured on the blog so now let's look at Probe Force No. 2. Measuring 12.25" (31.11cm) L x 4.5" (ii.43cm) wingspan  x 2.25" (5.71cm) H - my sample came without a box and was missing the tires for the friction drive motor. I found 'good-enough' replacements on fleaBay (they're a tad loose but that doesn't show so much in the photos) and photographed the toy as-is. The nice thing about these toys is that they are scaled to allow for 1/72 or 1/87 (HO scale) figures to fit in the cockpits (although the cockpits are closed, IF they were accessible, those are the size figures that would fit in them). This is more along the lines of a realistic spaceship than the far smaller Tri-Ang SpaceX, Golden Astronaut, LP range of spaceships covered here on the blog. Enjoy! Opa Fritz

Photo culled from the Moonbase Central blog (thanx Woodsy)