THE WILLIAM T. CIOFANI BREYER COLLECTION STORY On Sunday, November 5 (2000?) I received a call from a friend in Michigan who had just been contacted about a Breyer collection in Illinois. Contact was made via the internet by the daughter-in-law of a man who was a painter for Breyer for 40 years. She advised my friend that her mother-in-law was moving out of state and wanted to sell her husbands collection before she moved on the following Thursday. She mentioned that there was a pink elephant and a couple of blue horses. My friend did not have the time to go look at the collection as the lady wanted to sell them immediately and didn't want to have to move them. She said that a couple of people had looked at the collection and made offers but she thought that their offers were a bit on the low side. I contacted the daughter-in-law and made arrangements to go to her mother-in-laws house in Illinois on Tuesday the 7th. When my friend and I walked into the house the living room was full of models. The first to catch my eye was a small poodle mold in beige and pink. I found a similiar model in 1996 in a blue/grey variation. On the shelf in front of a bay window were several woodgrain models. There was a poodle cut woodgrain black Angus, two variations of the race horse, a couple of Clydesdales and three, yes three of the woodgrain in-between Family Arabian Mares. There were also many test color pieces such as a pearlized fighting stallion,a smoke grey Grazing Mare, and a grey Shire with black points. Other vintage models included a white Boxer, a test color Davy Crockett, a molded in pink elephant, a pinto Arab foal made for the Ford Motor Co. in 1970, an in-between three eyed Misty, and three test color pigs. In the garage was another 300 models or so, mostly more common models.After looking them over for a while I made an offer for the entire collection. She immediately accepted the offer and said that it was considerably more than the previous two offers combined. The best models were carefully packed in boxes while the more common models were boxed and bagged. My station wagon was loaded to the limit for the trip home.It was either buy this collection or a new car. I'm still driving my 1987 Chevy with 195,000 miles. The next day I contacted Nancy Young about the in-between mares. She wanted to know the mans name and when I sent it to her she replied that Mr. Ciofani is mentioned in her book, 2d edition, page 333, paragraph 4.It turns out that Mr. Ciofani and his brother were the ones who painted all of the original Breyers in the early 50's. In later years he did test and prototype painting for Breyer on a contract basis and was the man who made the masks used in the painting of Breyers. He was associated with Breyer for 40 years. Even after Breyer moved out of Chicago he still made masks for them. When I bought the collection I knew that her late husband had been a painter for Breyer (he died a couple of years ago). I didn't know or realize at the time exactly his association was with Breyer. I just thought that he was a painter. I didn't realize his importance in the history of the company. I did realize that his painting was superior to any that I had ever seen. A few weeks later I contacted Peter Stone who graciously confirmed Mr Ciofanis' association with Breyer. I kept for my collection the models that I thought were the neatest and appealed to me the most. The rest were offered on Ebay in an attempt to recoup some of the $$$ it took to buy the collection.I'm still in debt, but enjoying every minute of it. Thanks to a good friend and some blind luck I was able to acquire some super rare, vintage Breyers for my collection. If anyone wants to see photos of some of the models just e-mail and I'll send them to you. Almost all of the models in this collection were in mint or near mint condition. I never thought I would ever see an in-between woograin Family Arab Mare, let alone three of them. I'll remember the sight of that living room forever. The hunt never ends. For 5 years I've known about another painter for Breyer who still lives in Chicago. I finally talked to her personally last month and am presently trying to make arrangements to go to her house and she what she has to sell. Only time will tell. Enjoy the day. Bob Peterson