This is one of the last style figures Craig Lovik produced and was called Lovik World. These figures were made using Vacuform and he really kept his little boy style.
This figure stands 36″ tall and is 100% original except I did replace the hair. He has slot jaw and all around moving eyes, side to side eyes and blinking eyes all on one control and they do self center. The hands are original as well as the shoes.
I have talked about the length of head sticks on ventriloquist figures before but I had a couple inquiries about the long head sticks recently so I thought I would touch on it again for those new to the Ventriloquist Central fold.
Back in the early days of the Knee figures they were made with head sticks that went all the way through the body and attached to the bottom board of the body. This meant that the bottom of the neck was flat and the hole in the shoulder board was large enough for the head stick to fit through but not the neck itself.
It would rest on the shoulder board, sort of. In reality there would be a space of maybe 3/8th of an inch between the bottom of the neck and the shoulder board. This would allow for the head to rotate in a 360 degree or circle.
Here’s a video of Terri Rogers’ “Shorty Harris” Insull ventriloquist figure. This happens to be Terri’s back up head of Shorty Harris.
Terri used his mouth and raising eyebrows and did not use much else as movements although the figure had more functions. In fact except for not having the wiggling ears Shorty is a loaded figure with lower lip, upper lip, side moving self centering eyes, winkers, blinkers and raising eyebrows.
With the popularity of the Insull Figures back in the 1950’s it seems rather strange that this style figure was not used very much here in the United States. W.S. Berger was importing Insull figures and was selling them too. Most of the Insull pocket figures that are in this country today are here because of Mr Berger.
Frank Marshall was very friendly with Mr Berger and because of this the one leather mouth Marshall figure that I know of may have been made because of Berger.
I was sitting in the midst of the Ventriloquist Central Collection and it came to me that I was without question a collector of Ventriloquist Figures and not a dealer. You must remember that I was a true dealer of antiques for almost 30 years prior to becoming involved with the ventriloquist figures. I had no problem adding a profit on to what ever item I would purchase and then put it up for sale.
I did in fact sell a lot of ventriloquist figures when I first started because I was new to the item and to get more of them I had to sell. I quickly realized that I was buying and selling other antique items but I was not selling the figures. As matter of fact when I did sell a ventriloquist figure it really bothered me. I never had that happen with any other item I had ever bought.
