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Leopards

by Judith Lile and Jim Sneed

The Schoenhut Leopard
The leopard was introduced to the Humpty Dumpty circus in 1906. It had a long production run. There are seven designs for leopards known - two glass eyed, three painted eyes, and two reduced.  No decal eyes leopard is known.

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Photo by Jim Sneed from the collection of Judith Lile

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Photo by Jim Sneed from the collection of Andy Yaffee

Glass eyes

The first leopard, introduced in 1906, featured glass eyes, a ball neck, a cord tail, leather ears, and an open mouth. The body and legs were decorated with dark brown spots. The back spots were made with brown spots with yellow spots over them.
Keller Style I - Very Scarce

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Photo by Jim Sneed from the collection of Andy Yaffee

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Glass eyes, chamfered lip

This glass eyes leopard's lower jaw is chamfered in the front. This is probably just a variation in the hand finishing.
Keller Style I - Very Scarce

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Photo by Judith Lile

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Photo by Jim Sneed from the collection of Susan Turner

Painted eyes, leather ears

This is a transitional leopard style with a one-piece neck and head, leather ears, and painted eyes. The head shape more closely matched that of the GE leopards. A similar transitional tiger exists. We have seen only two examples of this extremely rare style. This variety is not seen in any Humpty Dumpty circus style books. Very Rare

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Photo by Jim Sneed from the collection of Jim Sneed

This specimen is the second found. Other examples may exit but, to date, only the the two shown here have been documented.

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Photo by Jim Sneed from the collection of Susan Turner

Painted eyes, open mouth

Note that in this style, the ears were also integrated into this molded head. The painted eyes are closer together and the chin area is heaver than the previous styles. Keller Style II - Scarce. 

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Photo by Jim Sneed from the collection of Susan Turner

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Photo by Jim Sneed from the collection of Andy Yaffee

Painted eyes, filled open mouth

The second painted-eyes style is distinguished by his filled open mouth. This must have been yet another effort at reducing costs by eliminating the step of cutting out the mount area from the molded head. Or, perhaps,  the designers felt that the painted teeth looked more intimidating. This is may be the rarest leopard version. Several examples have been seen so its production must have run for some time. Very Scarce

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Photo by Jim Sneed from the collection of Andy Yaffee

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Photo by Jim Sneed from the collection of Jim Sneed

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Photo by Jim Sneed from the collection of Susan Turner

Reduced size, open mouth

The reduced size leopards feature molded heads and cord tails. The eyes were painted. 

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Reduced size, closed mouth

The head design and the body color are different  in these two reduced size designs.

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Photo by Judith Lile
The regular glass eyes leopard with a reduced leopard.

 
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Photo by Jim Sneed from the collection of Jim Sneed

The Three Styles of Regular Size PE Leopards

The left-most leopard is the transitional PE style whose head is the same as the GE style except for having painted eyes. Schoenhut must not have made them for very long as this example is only one of two I've seen. In the center is the most commonly found PE style. On the right is the rarer style with a filled mouth with painted fangs.