Box

Narrative: Score: 77/140. The fact that this item has a christmas theme relates it to the act of giving confections at Christmas. It is the association between this time of year and Britain that gives it real gravitas as the happiest time of the year is 'British'.

Notes: Harry Vincent set up as a confectioner near Birmingham in the West Midlands of England in the 1898. He had the ambition to build a factory which would not only be very beautiful but also a pleasant place to work - a common experience shared for example by the Cadbury family who built on green fields not far away at Bourneville, and the Fry's who built their chocolate factory near Bristol. Harry Vincent realised his ambition in 1927 when his factory was built. Until this time his toffee was called Harvino, but when Harry came across Maeterlink's play 'The Blue Bird of Happiness' he renamed it the product Blue Bird.' If the address on the tin includes 'West Midlands' it is 1974 or later. If instead it ends 'Halesowen B62 0EN' it is early 1970s (as postcodes were introduced around then). If the address ends 'Hunnington, Worcestershire' then it is 1950s or 60s. If the address ends 'Hunnington near Birmingham' it is 1930s - 1950s. Some of the older tins are rectangular-shaped, but with the corners cut off - leaving an eight sided tin with relatively sharp corners. By the 1960s the tins were simpler - four-sided with rounded corners - and had slip lids. The older tins sometimes had hinges. http://www.bluebird-electric.net/blue_bird_toffees.htm RT: Christms - Pencilled-in number change: "973.12"