Toy Show Finds

Just got home from one of my favorite vintage toy shows. It's an annual event that happens each January, which really seems like a lousy month for a toy show, coming as it does right after Christmas. This year I planned strategically: when my family asked me what I wanted for Christmas, I said "money for the toy show please!" Here's what I spent it on:

There were all kinds of toy treasures, including a tin litho grocery store playset made in the 1950s by Wolverine; a scarce (and creepy) Hugo, Man of 1,000 Faces from the 1970s; a two-headed Doublenik troll from 1965 along with a tiny vending machine troll; a Weinermobile whistle; a bunch of 1950s space guys; Buck Rogers and Flash Gordon newspaper comics from the 1930s-1940s; a 1960s Batman puzzle; Barbie's original convertible; and a 1950s tin wind-up robot. I'll post properly about them later, but here are some quick pics and sneak peeks.

The robot has some rust, but he also has lots of character.

1950s space guys.

A Doublenik two-headed troll from 1965,
with its gumball prize friend.

Hugo, Man of 1,000 Faces, was a bizarre toy made in the 1970s. It's essentially a creepy looking guy's torso and head, along with a package of "disguise" accessories, including false chins, fake scars and warts, various noses, glasses, an eye patch, and hair pieces. I'm guessing it was inspired by spy films, but who knows. It's weird and now rather rare.

Hugo, Man of 1,000 Faces with some of his original accessory pieces.

Barbie's convertible, made by Irwin in the 1960s, was her first car.

The two shelf units on either side of this tin litho grocery store fold inward to close up the playset. Originally it would also have had a separate counter with accessories like a scale, but these are usually missing. The center span features great imagery of a 1950s supermarket.

The iconic weenie whistle.

The 1930s Buck Rogers newspaper comic above is complete, while the Flash Gordon strips below are only portions (but they feature a fantastic alien giant squiddy monster) :

These two mechanical bears were made in Japan in the 1950s. When wound, the bear on the left turns the pages of his book, while the one on the right wipes his glasses before holding them up to his eyes.

Homemade Robots

Whimsical robots made from old cans, tins, and leftover bits and bobs have become somewhat of a cottage industry lately, and can be found everywhere from Etsy to your local craft show. Here are a few I found recently at a small town art gallery.

The largest robot is 12 1/2 inches tall.

 

 

 

 Mr. Half and Half has a themostat head and arms made from socket wrenches.

 

 

 

The Clock Bot has a vintage alarm clock head and arms made from can openers.

 

 

 

 The tiny T&T robot has a spice box body, a film canister head,

and a clever hat made from a sink strainer.

 

 

They are adorable, and ready to take over the world.

 



Clanky the Chocolate Syrup Spaceman

The space race of the 1950s and '60s resulted in all sorts of fabulous interstellar themed products for children ranging from toys to snack foods, including some like Clanky that were a little bit of both.  

Clanky Chocolate Flavor Syrup debuted in 1963, with a bizarre but catchy commercial (see it by clicking here.)

From the commercial, Clanky's theme song:

"We love Clanky, Clanky the Spaceman.
 He can do a lot of things nobody else can!
 We just squeeze him,
 (bloop, bloop, bloop)
 And he makes our milk all chocolatey.
 Chocolatey!"

Clanky's ingredients: a little bit of stardust and a whole lot of sugar.

The 9 1/2 inch plastic Clanky the spaceman came filled
with chocolate syrup that could be stirred into milk,
poured onto ice cream, or simply squirted directly into your
mouth if your mom wasn't watching. Once all the chocolate was gone (and, presumably, mom had thoroughly rinsed him out)
Clanky could be used as a toy, a sort of large scale action figure
(minus the action features).

Today Clanky serves as a great example of vintage space race product tie-ins, and he looks fab smiling from a shelf full of related toys.

Antique Show Find: Mentor Game

Found this far out game at a summer antique show: Mentor, the Electronic Wizard, made by Hasbro in 1960. The giant bronze plastic head is Mentor. He looks like something out of Metropolis, an Art Deco robot with a mind of his own. To play, you select one of the cardboard game tracks, and insert it into the board. You and Mentor then take turns moving the pawn (a giant finger) along the track. Mentor tells you how many spaces he wants to move by flashing the lightbulbs on the base. First one to the finish wins, and it's usually Mentor.

Mentor, in a characteristically thoughtful mood.

Mentor game boards.

 The moving finger, wired up to Mentor.

itty bitty robots

When I was a kid back in the 1970s, one of my favorite toys was actually one of my smallest and cheapest: a set of tiny, 1 inch tall plastic robots that came from a gumball machine, or possibly from the "cheap toy aisle" at the grocery store, I can't really remember. They were just the right size to carry around, and they went everywhere with me. My two little brothers loved the robots too, and even though we all played with them and toted them about, we still have them today.

Shown twice as large as actual size!

I've always been on the lookout for more of these wonderful little robot guys, but had never seen any until we discovered some at a recent toy show. Oddly, these are red, although they're clearly from the same molds, and they have exactly the same stamping on the bottom ("H.K." for Hong Kong.) The dealer and I were both really excited to find each other, as we'd both been looking for more information on these guys for the last 20 years, but were both disappointed to discover neither of us knew anything about them. 

Does anyone out there recognize these robots???

Vintage Ideal Games: Mr. Mad and Ker-Plunk

Found some great vintage games at a toy show last weekend, including two classics made by Ideal in the late 1960s. Featuring fantastic design and graphics, they are also two of the noisiest games ever made, as each one ends in a cascade of clattering marbles.

Mark Rich, in his wonderful book, 101 Greatest Baby Boomer Toys, writes of these games: "The trend that started in 1961-62 reached its crest a few years later. Games once designed for family enjoyment, fairly quiet...and often dependent on mental agility and knowledge, gave way to bright, brilliantly designed, fast-paced, noisy games of impulse and chaos. Many games gained their feeling of mounting tension by creating an imminent disaster, which one player would set off. No one could tell at the beginning who that player would be..."

Mr. Mad, released by Ideal in 1970, was the epitome of such games. Players took turns dropping marbles into the mouth of a fearsome looking, 10 inch tall robot, Mr. Mad. If the marbles hit a button inside the robot, he would begin spinning and tilting, shooting marbles left and right out of holes in his arms. One unlucky player had to try and hit his "off" switch using a plastic "stopping" stick. By that time, dozens of marbles had usually scattered across the room (I've still got some stuck under my refrigerator from our test run...)

Isn't this just a fantastic looking robot?

The next game I found was Ker-Plunk, made by Ideal in 1967. This huge game box, 21 inches tall, features great graphics in day-glo '60s colors. The object of the game was to remove plastic straws one at a time from beneath a heap of marbles, held suspended in the top half of a clear plastic tube by said straws. When the wrong straw was pulled, the marbles came clattering down. This was not a good game for those susceptible to migraines.

Vintage Space Man Robot

One of my favorite vintage robots is this, the "Space Man" made in Japan by Horikawa in the 1960s.

The 11 1/2 inch metal robot is unusual for its lithographed face, apparently representing an astronaut inside a mechanized robot suit.

I think he looks kind of like Robert Mitchum....

The Amazing Magic Robot Game

One of the coolest robot-related items in my toy collection is this, "The Amazing Magic Robot" game, made in England by Merit in 1953.

Look how excited those kids are! That's because it's AMAZING!

The game contains several sheets colorfully printed with trivia questions and their answers. The Amazing Magic Robot, 2 1/2 inches tall, is placed in a circle on the question side of the board, and turned to the position of the query you would like to have answered. When picked up and placed on the answer side, he Amazingly! and Magically! spins and points to the correct answer. (It's done with magnets, somehow.)

The Magic Robot himself appears to be made from a smaller version of the Archer Space Men's robot mold. He's a cutie.

The Amazing Magic Robot is not only amazing, he's also 

Ingenious, Mystical, and Infallible!

And judging from this illustration, he's intent on world domination...

Vintage Russian Key-Wind Robot

Mechanical robot toys have been made for a long time, and the best examples are the fantastically lithographed tin varieties from Japan, circa the 1950s and '60s.
This much simpler robot, made of red plastic with a key-wind mechanism, hails from 1970s-'80s Russia. Standing about 7 1/2 inches tall, he sports a metal chest plate with cut-out circles. As he walks, a multi hued panel behind the chest plate spins, causing the colors within the circles to change.
I guess that's his super robot power: color-changing circles. His designers must have been all out of laser beam eyes and ray guns.

"Beware my color-changing circles! Flee before me, puny human!"

Vintage Barbies

I never liked Barbie as a child, but I decided to take another look at her this year, during her 50th birthday hoopla marketing blitz. After all, I reasoned, what toy collection can hope to call itself reasonably comprehensive without a Barbie or two?

First I came across a big pile of vintage 1959-1963 Barbie clothes at a local antique mall, being sold for only a few dollars each, and I was surprised to see how beautifully they were made. The coats have full linings, there are tiny little zippers and toggle buttons, and every piece features more careful and precise stitching than is seen in most grown-up clothes today.

After I got the clothes, it didn't take long to find a few dolls to go with them. I started as close to the beginning as I could, with a blonde Barbie #3 from 1960 (pictured above and below). She has a solid body, vinyl that has faded to an ivory tone, and a very brightly made-up 1950s couture face.

I also got a blonde ponytail Barbie #5 from 1961, to see how Mattel continued to change the design (this is actually a rather interesting thing to observe) and a red-headed version of the first Bubblecut Barbie, from the same year. The Bubblecut came with a trunk and some more clothes and shoes, which she is graciously sharing with her sisters.

Another happy surprise was finding that Barbie is in perfect scale with my 1950s Marx and Ideal robots, who are enjoying having someone to menace...

Cool Robot Lunchbag

Check out this cool new lunchbag I just found at Border's: all kinds of robot-y, 1950s kitchen-y, kitschy goodness!

Marx Electric Robot and Son

The Marx Company made this fantastic robot in the 1950s. Called the Electric Robot and Son, he stands over a foot tall, and has some really cool features, like a pull-out tool box in his tummy (the red rectangle just above his "belt"), a metal radar antenna on his head, and light-up eyes. If you're wondering what the "Son" in his name refers to, well, originally he came with an adorable little robot who dangled from his pincer hand. Sadly, my robot's son has gone missing. We all hope he'll turn up someday...

Ideal Robert the Robot

This is one of my favorite robots: Ideal's Robert the Robot from the 1950s. He's big: over a foot tall, and comes attached to a cabled, ray gun styled control box that makes him move backwards and forwards. (For some reason, mine will only go backwards now. I just consider it an interesting personality quirk.) He also has a tiny record inside which is played by turning a crank on his back. When he feels like working properly, the message he plays is: "I am Robert the Robot, the Mechanical Man. Drive me, steer me wherever you can." (As long as it's in a backwards direction, that is...)