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King Kong Statue

C

colinwilliams1

Guest
We had a bloomin great King Kong gorilla in the centre in the 1960,s , then it went out to camp hill as an advert for Guess what KING KONG motors..

Then what happened to it ??
 
Well done you.

I could understand him having a pink bum . but all over ??

I wonder if they decorate him at all .

In Milton Keynes where I live it is great sport for people to keep repainting the concrete cows.

Some one put them in pyjamas once , then pianted red noses on them.

Then some one nicked the baby one.

Must say i has been quiet for while .. But then I've been busy
 
King Kong?

It was really a female...I married her daughter.........
 
Your' wicked I hope your wife doesn't see these posts ...


My wife refers to me as a "Silver back" for obvious reasons and its not just that I do great gorilla impressions .


I dressed up once as a gorilla as part fo the father christmas arrival that I had organised for local dept store . some other staff dressed up in varoius fancy dress and we had a great time.

Its amazing what you can get away with when you are dressed up as a gorilla ,, but it dont half hurt the thighs stooping all the the time .
 
King Kong Statue

Hi,
Dug this photo out the other day you may want to look at.
interested if anyone remembers the SADLER FAMILY from the Birmingham area.They worked for British Waterways canal also at some of cinemas in the Small Heath area Grange etc. and they also worked as school caretakers at little GREEN LANE and STEWARD st Ladywood late 50s:meuh: Great site........:lock:
 
King Kong

Up until Oct 2005 King Kong was alive and well living at Ingliston Market Edinburgh. He had been painted pink at was used as a meeting point and landmark for lost children. The market closed in 2005 and the market owners said he was being taken away to have some repairs done and he would be re-sited elsewhere.

I am unable to find any further reference, but I have heard rumours that he has been disposed of and he is no longer of this world. Perhaps some one else can find a happier ending for this poor ape.

pmc1947
 
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The Ballad of King Kong.

In the early 1972 The Peter Stuyvesant Foundation commissioned Nicholas Munroe to design a statue of King Kong the giant ape of movie fame from 1933. This being a commission for The City of Birmingham Sculpture Project.

On completion it was displayed to the public in Manzoni Gardens at the back of the Bull Ring for some six months, but after the original sponsorship ran out the City with its usual courage of conviction couldn't’t get rid of it quick enough and sold it on. The buyer was a Mr Carl Racey owner of the Camp Car Company at Camp Hill, his business was car sales.

Mr Racey changed the name of his pitch to the King Kong Kar Ko and displayed King Kong sometimes dressed in different apparel as an advertising gimmick. After some time at this car sales pitch and another in Lady pool Rd, Sparkbrook. He was again sold on.

This time he was purchased by Spook Erections a company that ran markets in Scotland and was to spend the next 30 years standing in a market at Ingleston Edinburgh where he was used as a meeting point for people who got seperated, and sometime during his sojourn in Scotland he acquired a pink coat. When the market finally closed down in 2005 he was last seen being taken away on the back of a low loader lorry. Though lots of people enquired and there were even rumours of enquiries being made by Birmingham City Council. Nobody was able to find any trace of him. There were even rumours that because he had been damaged beyond repair he had been melted down (is that possible).

So although I do not know how true this is, but I am glad to report that there have been rumours this year of him reappearing at a market in Penrith, Cumberland sporting a new white coat. He’s getting closer, perhaps he is returning to Birmingham.

Phil

KingKongManzoniGardens.jpg
KingKongCarSales.jpg



KingKongEdinburgh.jpg
KingKongPenrith.jpg
 
jennyann

I had seen that story by BRMB, I think that campaign has been going for a while now. I think there is even a possibility that is where I got one of my pic's from, although I have had it a while, so I'm not sure. I think its showing the car sales site when it was in Ladypool Rd and not the one at Camp Hill. If you look behind the people you can see the M & B sign, and I think that is the gable wall of the Brighton Hotel on the corner of Brighton Rd, Ladypool Rd.

Phil
 
last time i saw him a couple of years ago he was at wookey hole underground caves... i will try and sort out the pics...

astoness
 
Hya all

I have just phoned my son in scotland and as far as he knows KING KONG WAS STILL IN Edinborough.
At the mo he is at work in kendal but said when he gets back to his home in Wishaw he will take a picture and mail it to me
 
I like Phil's King Kong Kar Ko. photo for the Kellogs Corn Flakes K's on the sign and King Kong saying "I have for sale below me the biggest Trabant ever built"
icon11.png


PS as you can see, there is a way to get a small smiley when the usuals are not available.
 
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Beware of Imitations!

[I've gathered together all the facts discovered in earlier posts, and will keep this post up to date as a summary of what is known about our kid. Corrections and additions are very welcome.]

Just so we know who we're looking for, here are our kid's vital statistics (corrections and additions welcome):
Height: variously reported as 18 - 25 ft (we need a surveyor who's willing to travel to Cumbria!).
Weight: 1,960 lb (140 stone!).
Commission: Peter Stuyvesant Foundation for City of Birmingham Sculpture Project.
Artist: Nicholas Monro (born 1936).
Genre: pop art sculpture.
Medium: painted reinforced fibreglass.
Colour history: white with pink feet (2007); pink (2001); grey (1973); brown? (1972); charcoal grey (1971).
Eyes: originally red.
Location history: Penrith's Saturday Market, Skirgill, Cumbria (Oct 2007); under repair and in storage (Oct 2005); Ingliston Market, Edinburgh (1973); Sparkbrook (c 1973); Camp Hill (Sep 1972); Bull Ring Manzoni Gardens (May 1972); pedestrian walkway under Colmore Circus (Dec 1971).
Ownership history: Nigel and Lesley Maby trading as Spook Erection Ltd (1973 to date); Carl Racey trading as King Kong Motors of Ladypool Road, Sparkbrook (c 1973); Mike Shanley trading as King Kong Kar Ko (formerly Camp Car Co) of Camp Hill (15 Sep 1972); Birmingham City Council (Dec 1971).​
So beware of imitations (see here, here, here, here, here, here and here).

If we really want our kid back, we might have to form a company and buy his freedom! (I'd be a shareholder.) Then there's the question of where to "erect" him. Hmm ...
 
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Location suggestion: On a special plinth above the flyover between Aston Expressway & Queensway - give people a proper Brummie welcome

Nice one Aidan a big "Drive Carefully "flashing sign in one of his hands put the fear of King Kong up the boy racers who all think they are Jason Button. Dek
 
Am i correct in believing that the very first appearance of Brimingham's own King Kong was in December 1971 on his own curtained stage in one of the pedestrian walkways underneath Colmore Circus? I don't mean the Old Square location-it was the one directly outside the (then) Gaumont Cinema. I've checked out the newspapers of the day but all the printings are washed out by now.

Here's Mr. Kong in his (second?) home of the Bull Ring gardens, accompanied by children from various Birmingham schools who have made their own replica of our furry friend as a riposte to the City Council who had by then sold him off to the Camp Hill car sales business.

Photo (reproduced for educational and non-commercial purposes) dated July 1972 if anyone wishes to follow up the contemporary news story somehow.View attachment 54150
 
Here is an amusing anecdote about the early days of our kid (from this website):

To mark his proud new purchase, Mr Racey even decided to change the name of his used car dealership, previously known as The Camp (Regent) Garage because it stood near the Camp Hill flyover, to King Kong Motors. However ... the day after Mr Racey opened his business under the new name, he received a letter from the Business Names Section of the Department of Trade and Industry, telling him that he was not allowed to use the name King Kong as it gave the impression that he was patronised by the Royal Family and that the Queen and her relations were his customers ... Mr Racey, being very upset, told the DTI that he, in turn, would complain to the Queen. He explained: "There wasn't the slightest chance of confusion. I had the gorilla on the roof of the garage and he was dressed up as Santa Claus. There wasn't any way he could be mistaken for a member of the Royal Family."

View attachment 54203
 
Here is an interesting page on artist Nick Monro. And here is a flickr set by aakulman63, which shows that our kid was originally dark charcoal grey but seems to have gone brown later (a trick of the light perhaps). Also seen are two interesting (if poor quality) pictures of our kid being delivered and installed at the Bull Ring site. I've "borrowed" one of his pictures (below left) because it's so cute (Ron Steadman postcard 1972).

Finally, pictured below right is Monro's life-size (6 ft 5 in) painted fibreglass "Dude", sold by Christies on 24 November 2005 for £5,760 (though its pre-sale estimate was £400-600). Obviously Monro's reputation is growing by leaps and bounds, and if word reaches the art market that our kid is still alive and well, we're going to have to pay a lot more for him than we might have hoped. So perhaps we'd better keep quiet! (Incidentally Spook Erections is alleged to have paid about £3,000 for him in 1973).

[Notice the arms and hands in all the Monro works we've seen so far?]
 
The Irish Post (21 December 2005) reported:
"The 25-foot fibreglass gorilla was sculptured by Nicholas Monro and stood in the centre of the Birmingham for almost all of 1972. Despite a massive campaign to make it a permanent feature it was finally sold by the city council to Irish-born car dealer Mike Shanley — who sited it at the entrance to his showroom and renamed his firm King Kong Kar Company. Mike later sold King Kong to a firm in Scotland for an estimated £13,000 — and now the giant beast is a tourist attraction in Edinburgh."​
[Which gives a new maximum estimate for the height of our kid, and introduces Irish-born Mike Shanley for the first time as the purchaser of Kid Kong from the Brum City Council (instead of the previously accepted Carl Racey).]
 
"King Kong" the Movie!

Thanks to the "Mike Shanley" reference, I was able to find this remarkable colour video clip featuring our kid soon after he was sold on by the City Council. The following text is taken verbatim from the Media Archive for Central England webpage:
Title: ATV Today: 18.09.1972: Birmingham garage owner buys King Kong statue.
Summary: Tony Maycock interview with Mike Shanley, Birmingham garage owner, who has bought the statue of King Kong to stand it in his car sales forecourt.
Notes: The statue was first erected in Manzoni Gardens in Birmingham in May 1972. Many Birmingham local history websites give Carl Racey as the Birmingham garage owner who bought the King Kong statue. It is likely that Racey was the second owner after Mr Shanley.​
 
Re: Beware of Imitations!

Aidan said:
... I don't think I originally saw his backside (so to speak) but he may well have been species Troglodytes Giganticus Gorilla ...
Click to expand...

He bears a passing resemblance to the Western Lowland Gorilla, which would make his scientific classification "Gorilla gorilla gorilla"! But I suspect that our kid's "not of this world".

[Pictured is "Guy the Gorilla" (30 May 1946 - 1978), denizen of London Zoo for many years.]
 
Another movie featuring our kid ("Oi loik 'is red oyes!"):

[video=youtube;kCGSdxGcvFg]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kCGSdxGcvFg[/video]
 
Here is a media article from 17 October 2007 which provides a few more facts about our kid. Pictured below is Kid Kong with Spook Erection (not "Erections") proprietor Lesley Maby. Spook Erection Ltd has its own website. Our kid is pictured on the home page (still coloured grey so probably at Ingliston in the early days), but is otherwise not mentioned.
 
Re: Beware of Imitations!

Thylacine said:
He bears a passing resemblance to the Western Lowland Gorilla, which would make his scientific classification "Gorilla gorilla gorilla"! But I suspect that our kid's "not of this world"...
Click to expand...

Is that not one of his calling cues along with:
* "Kong, Kong, Kong" (chanted by scantily clad locals - enough of those down Broad St of a Saturday night, surely)
* The patented "Fay Wray" scream to swoon as per post-#29

Your doing great exploration work - perhaps your moniker should be Livingstone Thylacine....
 
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