Mercedes Benz - original vintage late 1950s keyring - collector's item

An original Mercedes Benz  keyring which will have been produced in the late 1950s .

We have just this one example to offer – when this keyring has been sold this listing will be cancelled .

Some time back we did have a couple of similar keyrings which were listed and sold at the time and then more recently another one did appear which has since sold .

Now we have received another example which could be new old stock – this keyring is in really excellent condition and does not appear to have had much use if any use at all .

The vitreous enamel badge is mounted onto a keyfob in genuine black leather .

The leather on the back of the keyfob has a few ‘wrinkles’ in it – quite usual for the high grade of ‘corrected grain’ leather which has been used here .

Corrected grain leather was sometimes used at the time – this was leather which had had the surface grain removed to reveal a more consistent finish – nowadays we tend to prefer to see the natural grain of the leather .

Beneath the badge is a circular cut-out in the leather – the idea of this was that the registration no. of the car could be written there ………………….

Nowadays we would regard this as an invitation to theft of the car if the keys were lost – it was a very different world in the 1950s .

‘MP’ is cast into the back of the badge – so small that it can hardly be seen but can just be see in the enlarged high resolution listing photos .

We would think that this stands for ‘Manhattan Products’ in which case this will be one of the very first keyrings which Manhattan ever made – they became the biggest manufacturers of automotive keyrings in the world from the late 1970s right through to the early 2000s trading as Manhattan Windsor of Birmingham.

Right from the earliest car keyrings which appeared in the mid 1950s until the late 1980s almost all keyrings for the world’s cars were made in England – it was quite an industry.

This keyring is original & correct for use with any 1950s or early 1960s Mercedes Benz motor car.

The keyring in the photos is the actual one which you will receive .