If you are a reader of this Blog then you know our fascination with the Original Hartland  statues of the late 50's/early 60's. We were always disappointed that there were not more than 18 player statues produced. Our imagination wandered to think of other players from that time frame that could have been immortalized by Hartland. Of the 18 original statues- the players represented only 11 of the then 20 Major League teams of the early 60's. Wouldn't it have been great if players from the Phillies, Reds, Indians, Orioles, Athletics, Mets, Colt 45's, Angels and Senators had been represented with statues?  Players such as Frank Robinson, Vada Pinson, Brooks Robinson, Frank Howard,Richie Ashburn would certainly have been welcomed additions to the Hartland family. We do know that Hartland had planned statues of the New York Mets skipper Casey Stengel and the Baltimore Orioles slugger Jim Gentile before Hartland's closing in the early 60's.

To our great pleasure, we received a call from the new owner of "Hartland of Ohio" - Fay Halliwell. She is now the single owner of the company and has been for the last 3 years. She is passionate about keeping the integrity of the original Hartland statues and has been releasing new issues that are absolutely outstanding. One of her projects was to produce the Stengel & Gentile statues that would have been issued close to 50 years ago. The re-creation of the Stengel was an instant success and the statue which was limited & numbered to 200 was completely sold out in a "flash". It was produced in the U.S. A. by Randy Guthrie of Lil Monsters (as was a reproduction of the Bob Feller statue which was limited to 100).A mold was made from the picture from this Blog of the Stengel prototype insuring that the statue would be almost identical to the original plans of Hartland. Halliwell also created a box and tag that looks like it could have been issued a half century ago.

Her latest endeavor is to make the Jim Gentile statue (see our Blog entry concerning this statue) that Hartland had proposed back in 1962.With the Gentile statue, the mold was created from the picture of the original prototype shown on this site. It promises to be a beauty and we are happy to have helped in our small way. Hartland of Ohio has also produced a number of fine statues of other players from the past and even has issued a series of Negro League  stars(all are hand signed). They are made in very limited amounts and are very reasonably priced.

The Hartland of Ohio creations can be viewed at their web site: www.hartlandllc.com. If you have questions, Ms. Halliwell can be reached at 440-796-9673 or by email at sgapromo@aol.com . It's worth the visit to the site.