Archives

Atomic Joe Love

This page is from the 1975 Eaton’s catalog and I’m pretty sure I burned it into my brain that year. Joe’s world (and packaging artwork) has always captivated me and 1975 was a super special time for me…mainly because I was five. Atomic Man was a childhood favourite of mine (though the appearance of Steve […]

Mattel Spin Welder Commercial

This is another commercial I recently had converted (and now giving away with my DVD sets). I don’t have much to say about Spin Welder other than it’s a cool concept and my parents would never have let me have it. The font in it’s logo was used more famously by Mego for the Micronauts […]

Costume Spotlight: The Shadow

   I gotta say, I’ve got nice friends. This month is always a bit of a stretch to come up with a whole month of Halloween updates. Enter my pal Matt, Shadow collector extraordinaire (check out some of his cool collection here) . While I knew Collegeville made a Shadow costume, I had no idea […]

The Mego Wiz

Wizard of Oz merchandise seems commonplace today but in 1975, when Mego nabbed the toy license it was a huge, hairy deal. The company actually put one of the film’s producers on their board of directors and for Toy fair reunited the living cast members, the orders flowed like melted butter. The remaining cast of […]

Diener Industries 1975 Catalog

  Seeing as it’s back to school time, no catalog makes more sense than Diener, who specialized in rubber figurines, erasers and pencil toppers. Essentially the inexpensive toys disguised as School supplies you could sneak into school. Looking at this thing brought a flood of memories to me, as it’s an inventory of stuff I […]

Cirque du Weeble

As I’ve mentioned multiple times, my parents denied me the Weeble experience, as we were a devout Fisher Price Little People family. Life was good, so I’m not complaining but the grass always looked pretty green in Weeble-ville.

Fun with Mr Action

LJN’s Mr Action went by many names around the world (seriously, this line sold everywhere there were kids it seems) but it’s largely forgotten it seems. Most commonly mistake many of the parts for GI Joe these days, which is ironic because lines like this actually were seriously hurting Hasbro’s bottom line in the early […]

1975 Hasbro GI Joe Catalog

1975 was a very good year for G.I. Joe, well at least from where I stood, seeing as I was five at the time. The whole Joe line got a make over including the man himself  a new more muscular body, gone were the solid boxes in lieu of blister cards. The Ad campaign this year was […]

1975 Pied Pier Toy Catalog

I’ve never heard of Pied Piper Stores, not surprising, as I didn’t grow up in California in the 1970s. No doubt they were one of the many “Mom and Pop” toy store chains that at one magical time dotted our landscape. One thing i do know is that Pied Piper stores had a pretty grasp […]

Dare Devil Rider?

   I think this figure from Durham wonderfully illustrates the true joy and cheap chicanery often involved with Rack Toys. The packaging is enticing and vibrant, not to mention well done. It promises action with a slightly “Evel Knievely” setting.  The figure however,  is a chubby guy with a flag, who looks like he might […]