I stumbled onto a couple of really cool vintage kids books over the past month or two, both for a few dollars, one at a thrift and one at an antique mall in Memphis over Thanksgiving. It's called "A Rocket Trip to the Moon" by Geraldine Russell with pictures by Shiba Productions. I had never seen anything like this book! The puppets are pretty amazing. After doing some googling, I realized the photo illustrations were created by the same people that made these amazing books (one of which I found at the thrift store! The Little Mermaid.. that's coming).
Although these puppets look different than a lot of the Shiba Production puppets, that is why I didn't make the connection. These look a bit less kitschy (well, less kitschy is relative.. ha!). I'm not sure how these puppets were contructed, but the faces look like they were possibly made of wood or clay, where as the Fairytale books look like they might be cloth pose dolls, not sure. But the faces are definitely different! These reminded me of Disney for some reason.. or maybe Epcot. ; ) I LOVE the space theme.
Also after googling, I found this post over at Modern Kiddo about the same book with more details if you'd like to read!
I wonder where these dolls are now? They would be amazing to see in person.
