Gumcards! Gumcards! Gumcards!
Vintage Valentines
What's left of childhood friends.
I also found several old Eaton's catalogs, I can't believe I moved out of there without this stuff. My wife was thrilled to see me pull up with a "basementy smelling" box.....
I don't own any of the Gabriel Lone Ranger series nor did I as a kid but I do have a lot of respect for it. It's one of the best made toy lines of the 70's and holds it own. Case in point this Carson City playset, what a quality product this is. I'm a playset junky mind you....
Boys have baseball bats, girls have catcher's mitts
AMT was a pretty big deal in the mid seventies, they had some terrific car model kits but for those whose tastes ran geekier they had an amzing line of kits based on Star Trek. I can't tell you how many of these great kits I ruined with my crummy gluemanship and sloppy testors paint jobs. Check out what was new for AMT in 1975 here.
Thanks to Mike Rogers, I can see what the kits were supposed to turn out like.....
Even ladies aren't safe from the fashion massacre that is the Put Together. More on this all July, it doesn't get better, I assure you.
Seeing as Gabe Kaplan is making news as an author these days it seems cool to revisit the Mattel Welcome Back Kotter dolls. The classroom playset had a record so you could reenact your favourite moments, the Sweathogs motorcycle was a clever recycling of Big Jim's motor cross bike. Mattel never throws anything out!
Seriously, I like this bathing suit, it's kind of "star trekish" in a sort of sexy way.
That red number in the corner is the piece I have been looking for, it's what I plan on wearing to weddings of people I don't really like.
Does anyone else hate the word "slacks"?
Today, we go back 30 years (!) to the 1977 True Value Toy Catalog to look at some of the hot items of the day, it was a banner year for toys with memorable items such as Telestar, Stretch Monster, Fuzzy Pumper Barber shop, The Sunshine Family, Pulsar, Charlies Angels and so much more.......
Previous True Value Toy Catlogs on Plaidstallions:
Remote Control seemed to come on real strong in the late 70's, wireless toys became more cost effective I guess. I had the remote controlled R2-D2 (which broke quickly!) and remember desiring Tobor greatly. That Batmobile by Remco would have been killer too.
Not content to let JC Penney's Man Mates collection roam the earth unchallenged as the world's only "Permanent Bachelor Wear" so Monkey Wards came up with "Put Togethers" a series of outfits that should have made God angry. All this month we'll be featuring new put togethers, leaving you to judge which line is worse. For now, enjoy Captain Lime and the Pastel Force.
Two killer updates to the rack toys section at plaidstallions.com, the first being this very rare Filmation Space Sentinels Magnetic Figure. This is one of the only pieces of merchandise I have ever seen for this series.
I remember reading about this Ghost Rider set in a heroes world comic back in the day, I was disappointed when I finally saw it. I always assumed it was a mego figure as a kid..
I've always been intrigued by the Ready Ranger pack, in comic ads and catalogues it seems to make a lot of promises. I mean, Power Pack, signal light, compass, weather forecaster, PA and a compass? If that all worked it would be so bad ass. I've heard from friends that this was not the case however. Anybody have it?
I found this odd toyline in a spiegel's 1974 Christmas catalogue recently. I was first caught by his resemblance to Dr. Quest but then I started to recognize the pieces. Big Red is actually better known as "Mr. Action," a G.I. Joe wannabe produced by LJN that we all probably have pieces of in our toyboxes and didn't even know it. I still have that flightsuit.
Pieces from this line appeared in several G.I. Joe catalogue pages and the dolls themselves were sold worldwide, just under many different names and aliases. You can't fool me Big Red if indeed that is your real name......
Fun addition to the site today, it's a Marvel comics brochure from 1982 that details their service of providing Superheroes to your next event. Want Spider-man, Destro and ROM: Space Knight to visit your mall? This is the sales kit you'd recieve and it's pages of fun shots of actors dressed as Marvel Superheroes and some iconic toy characters from the past.
If anyone has childhood pics of a mall visit such as this, I want them! Send them to me and I'll send you a prize pack.
I wanted to play Destro but I'm too smooth chested....
This may be a Mall costume but I like it better than the recent movie doom.
Not many movies can still keep selling toys two years after their debut but I guess that's why Star Wars was such a phenom. The kenner toys were kind of in a state arrested development by this point, next year would see Jedi and tons of new toys but at 13, I found much of it too "muppety"*. Star Wars figures piqued at Zuckuss, Bossk and IG88 for me. It's all about the bounty hunters baby...
* Muppety is a registered trademark of the plaidstallions corporation
Masters of the Universe was another toy line that caught my eye during this time. It's bright colors and simple themes reminded me of a simplier time (pretty amazing considering I was 12 at the time). Castle Greyskull is also one of the best done playsets I have ever seen. Although I closet watched the series on Saturdays, it was after all filmation, even I knew I was too old to buy the figures.
I think that made me mad, that is until I discovered girls and teen drama.
Like a lot of kids, I was arcade obsessed in 1982, I even recall buying magazines about Donkey Kong. The kid who got Colecovision could guarentee popularity for much of 1983 (this expired by '84)
Those table top arcade games by Coleco that inspired hours of drooling for me. I remember really liking the commercials featuring "Video Man", who would use his powers to shrink the arcade games to table top size.
The years have not been kind to Video Man, with his supercuts hairstyle and silver members only jacket he looks kind of like a dorky uncle you avoid at family reunions. Again, the memory cheats...
I wanted to write a big long preface to this week but it was nice outside yesterday and I forgot about it. To be brief, 1982 represented the time when I stopped playing with toys, I drifted aimlessly until I started collecting them three years later.
One of the last toylines I picked up was the first wave of G.I. Joe: A Real American Hero. The adventure team was such a big influence on me, I didn't care if I ran into a school pal while buying these at Woolco (OK I looked over my shoulder). When I got them home, I basically just posed them and they sat on a shelf. I'm not sure if it was the last gasp of childhood or the early beginnings of a collector.
Seeing what the first issue RAH figures go for, the collector in me wishes I'd kept these.
I've been meaning to do more 70's DVD reviews for the site but never find the time, so today I did a quick review of the classic kids series Jason of Star Command. If you want it in a nutshell, I loved it, otherwise click here.
Today we journey back to 1973 to witness the birth of one of the hottest toys of the 1970's the Ideal Evel Knievel line! If you you were a child in the mid seventies there was no way you weren't aware of this toy.
Coming Next Week: Plaidstallions jumps forward to 1982
I'm a self professed Martial Arts nut but isn't wearing a simulated Gi with Bruce Lee's picture on it pretty much like an adult verson of underoos? Not that I'm judging, if they made adult underoos, I'd be a one man Justice League.
It seems even the dress alike twins can't contain their dislike for the "Aztec" sweater, talk about people in glass houses!
Is it just me or does the Aztec sweater remind anyone else of Ozymandias from the Watchmen?
I admit it, I had a Donny Osmond doll. Even worse was that I chose him during the annual family March break shopping trip to the Scarborough Town Center, passing over the Mego Human Torch doll i had coveted for so long.
All of this was done to impress my older sister who remarked how cool the Osmond toys were. The reality kicked in during the ride home when I realised I was now the proud owner of a Donny Osmond doll. I'd like to go back in time and stop myself.
It got worse when one of my friends found it in my room....
Is your couch a boring, almost tasteful affair? Not anymore with these fabulous slip covers. That's better!
Today's site update is the 1979 Empire Toys Catalog. Empire didn't make many trendsetting toys, mostly items to fit in with other companies existing lines and using a lot of licenses. Superman, Spider-man and the Incredible Hulk get a lot of face time here.
Chip and Lance are devil-may-care go getters with a real thirst for action. They live for kicks baby! Murray is the sensitive one......
My grandmother had one of these back in the day, thank you Miss Mary of Sweden!
I don't think Hasbro ever stopped making this set, it's always in parts lots. It was so popular that Power Records made a book and record set about it. I had the record as a kid, it was pretty darn terrific!
How far we've come in my lifetime, here we have the Barbie's "Friend Ship" play set. What's Barbie's role on her plane? Stewardess. Something tells me that Ken would be serving the coffee if this play set were released now.
Mattel recycled this into a Killer play set for Big Jim, I believe Big Josh was the flight attendant on that one.
This one's kind of personal to me, seeing as my mom seemed to do most of her Christmas shopping with her Eaton's Card. Three years after they stopped making Wishbooks, Eaton's department stores made this cool newspaper circular that featured the hot toys of the time. From Muppets to Micronauts, Star Wars to Green Machines, the 1979 Eaton's Toy Flier is one fun time warp.
I'll try and struggle through the Catalog copy here, "Never before have females had a more flattering, graceful and leggier look". Flattering is questionable, leggier is sort of a given but graceful? That's like using "Pixie like" to describe Shirley Hemphill. You could hide children in those things.
"Well I couldn't find a sitter so my daughter is sleeping in my Palazzo's"
Belly Shirt for her, good idea. Matching belly shirt for you? Awful and emasculating, you might as well have an oversized lolly pop in your hand.
Nothing like waterproof outfits with great "hip huggin' flares for the beach" but wait there's more!
The His and Her Zip-aways allow you to change in a flash revealing:
That's so you can reveal "Bold Bikinis for both of you" Be a show off with sleek and comfortable Antron Nylon.
And that means it's time for the first ever Summer outfit week on Plaidstallions, spotlighting the only the greatest beach wear ever. This was made possible by my awesome find of Spring and Summer Catalogs at a flea market on the way home from Megomeet.
The pic above is an interesting twist on dress-alikes, because of the matching suits I feel like the guy is cheating on his wife!
A new and hopefully growing featuring to Plaidstallions will be the world of rack toys, which features the memorable lower priced toys from companies such as AHI, Fleetwood and Empire. If you've got something I don't have please drop me a line, I'd love to add it. Click the pics to visit.
uh, why does Superman need a parachute?
