1950s Space Race Card Game

I found this fantastic 1952 space themed card game, "Space Race," at a toy show last weekend, and was blown away by its graphics. The deck features classic mid-century space exploration illustrations, including sleek rocket ships, clean-cut space men, and outrageous space monsters.

Here are closeups of some of the coolest cards:

Vintage Dexterity Puzzles

I saw literally hundreds and hundreds of vintage dexterity puzzles at a toy show last weekend. Several dealers had entire display cases full of them, and I spent what seemed like hours (oh: my long-suffering toy shopping companion just told me it was hours...) picking through them. In the end, I selected these three.

A fortune teller "Jiggle" puzzle from 1957:

A tiny Cracker Jack prize puzzle just 1 3/4 inches tall, from the late 1960s-early 1970s, made of paper and fragile plastic, with a fantastic character design:

And a wonderful space-themed, dome-shaped puzzle, from the 1950s, with great mid-century space race graphics:

Antique German Dollhouse Dishes and Tables

At a toy show last weekend, I found a wonderful, very tiny set of antique porcelain German dollhouse dishes tucked away in an old candy box, buried in a pile of junque under a dealer's table. Price: just $10.00!

(I cannot even count the number of times I've found fantastic things hidden in delapidated, unrelated boxes...it's always worth taking a look!)

The set, circa the early 1900s, includes a tureen, vegetable dish, gravy boat, cream pitcher, plates, and a serving tray. For a sense of scale, the itty bitty tureen is just 1 1/2 inches long.

At a different dealer's table a few minutes later, I found these German dollhouse tables, circa the 1920s, just 5 inches long and priced at only $5.00 each. They turned out to be the perfect size for the dishes, and my favorite small doll:

Tiny Troll

One of the dealers at a toy show I went to last weekend had tables full of "grab bags" she had made, each priced at just $5.00. Each bag, a large ziploc type, was filled with an assortment of small toys of varying age and quality. Mostly junk, yes, as is often the case with grab bags, but occasionally harboring a treasure, as is sometimes the case with grab bags, making them always worth a good look. In one, amongst the single doll shoes, broken barrettes, and unknown action figures missing an arm, was this tiny, 1 1/2 inch pencil top troll, made by Scandia House in the mid-1960s. She still has her original outfit (possibly a clown costume) unusual purple eyes, and her blue mohair. A hard-to-find and pricey troll!

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.