The AD&D lead figurines were probably were probably my favorite elements of Dungeons & Dragons along with the handbooks. I loved the cover art of these boxes, particularly the two pictured above: “Denizens of the Swamp” and “Dwellers Below.” I’ve always been taken by Lizardmen, Dopplegangers, Basilisks, and Beholders, and these boxes had all the coolest monsters. I got these sets at a local comic/hobby shop called The Incredible Pulp, and it was one of my favorite stores as a kid. Not only did they have Joust and Galaxian in the way back, but the store itself was stock full of comics, figurines, and Dungeons & Dragons paraphernalia.
In fact, I discovered my first maker culture at this shop. There were all kinds of dioramas of dungeon scenes featuring painted AD&D figurines, and once I saw that I was hooked. People had spent time making these settings, and films like Clash of the Titans seemed to come alive in The Incredible Pulp, it was truly a mecca for a young imagination. Once I had my figurines, I had to figure out how to paint them, and luckily I had an older neighbor, Billy White, who was a master figurine painter so I apid him $1 per figure to paint a few of them so I could get a sense of how he did it. It was worth every penney, because I could see how he used color on the lizardmen, and the way he worked in the brown around their outfits and the like. He was extremely gifted, and I while I painted a bunch of my own, they were no where near his masterpieces (lucky I had him paint my favorites like the lizardmen, beholder, and the doppleganger).
I loved these figurines, and while I lost all the originals, I actually spent a small fortune a number of years ago buying up a number of the original Grenadier sets, including the Halflings, Theives, Specialists, Dwarves, and Fighting Men. As might be expected, the monsters were much harder to get on Ebay, and I am still searching for the Dwellers Below (which I have to beleive is the most difficult to fins) and Denizens of the Swamp. I will get them eventually, and my plan is to bust out all my AD&D stuff for Tessy and Miles in a 4 or 5 years, and introduce them to the literature as well as spend some serious time painting these figures that truly inspired a sense of wonder at the human imagination for me when I was 10 years old.
For more about AD&D figurines, check out this post from on Yoyorobbo’s “Back in ’81” blog, which is where I got the above images—thank you Yoyorobbo for putting this stuff out there, hope you don;t mind the filch.
Ohh, yes, what a trip! I remember these. I had a bunch! I remember my favorite: an Amazon warrior with a huge bow. I’ve always liked archers, maybe that’s why. Thanks for the memory.
Hey Rachel,
I’ve seen some of the magic you and your son create at Faculty Academy, so perhaps you may want to surprise him with some half-orcs with bows this holiday 🙂
http://www.jakestabletop.com/forsale/grenfw1437small.jpg
I could never afford full sets, but collected a handful of single figures to represent my main characters.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/dnorman/3593065843/
Now, Evan’s found the box of old D&D stuff and has been busily drawing his own maps so he can lead people through “aventures” some day. Sigh.
I have an enormous collection of rare and hard to find miniatures from Grenadier, Ral Partha etc. I am selling them to recover my costs on a job I did that they ended up not paying me and leaving town and was given boxes of miniatures as compensation. Having played for years when I was young I realized that these had solid value. I happen to have a complete, unused, still in the box with the original paperwork and all figures present and undamaged, Dwellers below in front of me right now. I was actually looking up the value of it when I came across this page. If you are interested in buying it we can work something out. Let me know. I can send you pictures of set and figures. You can contact me at leonardratliff@gmail.com . Thanks.
i have about 115 of these figures…i dont really know anything about them but let me know if your intrested in taking a look
I would love to see what you have, and let me ask you this, do you have any of the boxes?
Send me some pictures at jimgroom@gmail.com
I have a few sets of figurines in boxes, one is a little beat up (the box) but the figures are not touched, so no paint. Also have some extra stuff along with that from back in the 80’s.
So nice to see these images. I had both of these sets, and a lead dragon.
Really was a special time. 🙂