I was born in Sluis in the Netherlands
Because of the profession of my father we have had to move regularly, with Heerlen as the last place.
My wife and I still live in beautiful South Limburg, the children have also settled in this beautiful part of the Netherlands.
In my younger years I was fascinated by toy motorcycles, but because of relocations they were always lost, probably thrown away.
But after my marriage the collection started again, I started with two remaining Dinky Toy motorcycles.
The collection slowly expanded and at one point I was already sitting against 200 miniature motorcycles.
One day someone came to me, he had bought me a Chinese tin motorbike on his trip to Australia, I thought it was beautiful and gradually. I started to like and buy tin toys, in the beginning of course only motorbikes But at a toy market in the early 80s the Netherlands, my wife found a figure, too ugly to look at but with charm, so bought and go find where it came from.
It turned out to be Martin’s drunkard, so it was at the start of our Martin collection.
Occasionally we also bought tin toys from Günthermann, Lehmann, Staud, Schuco, etc. but in the end we returned to Martin every time.
We started to find this increasingly interesting toys and during my search we came in contact with Lourens Bas and Arthur Verdoorn.
Both of whom became very good friends of ours, but both are no longer among us.
I also had the privilege of being able to help with the book about Fernand Martin published by Lourens Bas and Arthur Verdoorn.
Then I started browsing the internet for toys, articles, magazines, catalogs, postcards, etc. about Martin and his toys and I found many beautiful pieces and some of these articles are included in the book.
And now I want to share all beautiful and interesting pieces with all Fernand Martin enthusiasts, collectors, museums, auctioneers etc.
And finally; my English is not perfect but i hope this won’t disturb anyone
With the best regards Cor van Schaijk E-mail: cor@vanschaijk.com