Category: Toys

I hereby surmise that 1959 was the perfect year in which to be born. In addition to missing out on Vietnam, being too young, and having the computer age and the internet appearing at the right time for me to gain good employment in the fascinating fields, I was also very fortunate to have been eight years old when Hot Wheels were introduced. And an eight-year-old kid is the perfect demographic for Hot Wheels cars.

Kids have always loved miniatures. Our great-grandparents played with miniature horses and the like. When automobiles appeared, toymakers quickly followed suit with smaller versions for the kids.

By the 1960’s, Matchbox was the undisputed king of little cars. They had pushed past competitors like Corgi, Cigarbox (a little obvious there, brand name developers), and Tootsietoy to be the major supplier of toy autos to eager kids.

That all changed in 1968.

Mattel developed a new concept in small cars. Their prototype had an axle that was a flexible wire anchored towards its middle, allowing it to flex up and down, much like a real car’s suspension. Additionally, the wheels were very low-friction. That’s because Mattel used a special plastic called Delrin as a bushing between the axle and wheel. The wheels had a small ridge that was the actual point of contact on the track, reducing friction even further. The cars could travel a scale speed of 200 MPH.

And the cars didn’t just sit on the shelf, either. No, they were designed to run on flexible orange tracks with highly banked curves that could make figure eights. The cars could be propelled with a device called a Rod Runner (pictured) or a Supercharger.

Are you beginning to appreciate the brilliant marketing accomplishment that was Hot Wheels cars? This is stuff that every prepubescent boy in America immediately began relentlessly hammering on their parents to buy them. It was a new concept in miniature cars. Don’t just admire them, race them!

The original models released in 1968, according to Wikipedia, were Beatnik Bandit, Custom Barracuda, Custom Camaro, Custom Corvette, Custom Cougar, Custom Eldorado, Custom Firebird, Custom Fleetside, Custom Mustang, Custom T-Bird, Custom Volkswagen, Deora, Ford J-Car, Hot Heap, Python, and Silhouette. I had several of those. The Hot Heap looked like a dune buggy. The Fleetside was a pickup. The stockier models (e.g. Hot Heap and the Volkswagen) were dogs on the race track. The fastest were the lower, sleeker models like the Barracuda.

Each car came with a little metal clamp-on badge, too, making Hot Wheels even more irresistible.

The original cars cost around a dollar, as I recall. Surprisingly, that is still what they cost, although their quality is not what it once was.

They were covered with Spectraflame paint, a clear paint that shined like a new penny when applied to polished metal.

A kid would soon accumulate quite a few of these beauties, and that necessitated a carrying case. Mattel was more than happy to sell you one. They made a wheel-shaped model where your cars sat in a circle around the center in individual compartments. I had a rectangular case filled with long slots. You placed dividers in them to create individual compartments.

The cars were brilliant, but not perfect. For one, it was possible to bend those axles by over zealously pushing down on the top of the car. One you did that, it was over. I was never able to restore splayed axles.

That paint was easily chipped, too. A car went from gorgeous to ugly with a single noticeable chip. I even stripped all the paint off of some badly damaged ones, hoping they would look good with just the shiny metal. Alas, it quickly tarnished. You could also spray paint the cars, but the spray paint was even softer than the original Spectraflame.

Hot Wheels nearly put Matchbox out of business. They quickly realized that they needed to shift from making staid miniatures to outrageously tricked out hot rods. They survived, but were later absorbed by Mattel in 1996.

The brilliance of the concept can be seen by the fact that Hot Wheels continue to be a hot seller nearly forty years later.

And that creates another strange concept. If my grandfather was to buy me toys he played with as a kid, they would have been cast iron wheeled horses. But when my grandkids arrive, I’ll be able to buy them Hot Wheels cars (at the same price my parents paid!) very similar to the ones I had when I was eight years old.

Our parents loved it when we asked for inexpensive toys. I guess that’s because we so seldom did so. While TV commercials hawked expensive games and toys, the subject of today’s piece was, and continues to be, a huge seller with no advertising whatsoever.

Plastic green army men were in residence by the dozens in practically every toybox in America in the 1960’s. After all, they were available at the dime store, individually for a nickel, or in a bag of 50 or so for 99 cents. And while it took some serious cajoling to get mom to spring for a toy like the James Bond attache case, she could sometimes be convinced to throw a bag of army men into the basket, or at the very least allow me a dime to get a couple more of the guys shooting the rifle while laying prone on the ground (I loved those!).

What would happen next would generally involve going to a friend’s house, or having one come over to yours. Both parties would have their own armies. There was no need to mark which ones belonged to each opposing sides, because hand-to-hand fighting generally didn’t take place.

The battle would begin with strategic planning. The battleground, generally an area of the home team’s bedroom, would be scanned out by both generals. Then, the platoons would be emplaced so as to inflict the most damage on the enemy. After the soldiers were in position, the battle would begin.

The first shot would be fired. This, in my case, would consist of one of my prone riflemen opening fire on an opposing infantryman. The reports of his machine gun fire would be provided courtesy of my sound effects, perfected by many hours of watching Rat Patrol and learning to imitate their jeep-mounted 50 cal. The hapless first victim would be proclaimed to be dispatched by me, as I turned him over on his back to symbolize his departure. I might throw in an “aaargh!” for further effect.

Then, it was the rival general’s turn. One of my own would bite the dust.

We liked close battles, so even if one of us had a smaller army, the odds were evened by allowing things like bombers to take out several of the enemy at once. Of course, the bomber would immediately be shot down afterwards. After all, this battle belonged to the army men, not technology.

The skirmish would continue until it was down to two individuals. They would then blow each other away. In play, as in real life, war has no winners, only losers.

The army men were frozen in different battlefield poses, including the bazooka guy on one knee, the hand grenade thrower at full backswing, the guy talking on the radio, and several soldiers caught in the act of shooting rifles.

Like real soldiers, we generals considered the inexpensive army men to be expendable. I can remember blowing them up with firecrackers, launching them into space tied to a three bottle rockets at once, and melting them with a magnifying glass. The local ants preferred that I target the army men, as well.

I also remember turning them into paratroopers by tying a handkerchief to them with sewing thread, carefully rolling it into a parachute, then tossing it as high into the sky as I could. The chute usually opened, although it was still fun when it didn’t, as I could accompany the unfortunate jumper with a death scream all the way to the ground.

Marx began manufacturing green army men in the early 50’s. While the Vietnam War was going on as we played in the 60’s, we never imitated its battles. World War II was fun. It was over. We won. But mention of the Vietnam War incited images of wailing neighborhood parents having been informed of the death of their son.

That wasn’t fun at all.

As I’ve mentioned frequently, my father was tight with a buck. I found that irritating, until I grew up and realized the value of doing so for myself. Heck, the man was a financial genius.

However, as a child, it meant that I had to do without many of the toys my friends enjoyed. It wasn’t that I was deprived in any manner, it was just that while many of my friends had brand-spanking new Tonkas, I had mostly hand-me-downs.

But thanks to a fortuitous bout of the mumps, and my dad in an unusually generous mood, I was able to procure the FIRST GI Joe in my neighborhood, way back in 1965!

GI Joe was a memory shared by nearly every Boomer born from about 1955 on. Released by Hasbro at a fortuitous time for war toys, before Vietnam had become an ugly word, it was an instant huge hit.

You could pick your choice of service for your GI Joe to serve in. Depicted is a sailor (with that cool hat ready to doff), but my choice was an army soldier. As I mentioned before, I was sick with the mumps and miserable. Dad said “can I get you anything to make you feel better?” Willing to take a chance, and having seen the commercial with its unforgettable jingle about a hundred times, I rolled the dice and said (a little extra pathetic added for good measure) “C . . . c . . . could I get a GI Joe?”

To my utter astonishment and delight, he said “Sure!” Before i went to bed that night, I had in my possession the first GI Joe in my Miami, Oklahoma neighborhood. He truly was, as the ad stated, a foot tall. He also had that macho scar on his face. And he came with a few accessories, as I recall. But the best part was the extras you could get, if you could cajole your parents into spending the bucks.

GI Joe was a hypnotically irresistible toy for boys. Sure, he was technically a doll, but even though girls liked to poke fun at us Joe fanatics, we all knew in our hearts that he was no doll, he was an ACTION FIGURE! No wimp like Ken, this guy could kick butt.

Unfortunately, many Joes ended up missing limbs due to the extreme adventures they were put through by their youthful owners. I remember the sad day mine lost his leg. He had been in my possession for four years of nonstop play with nary a battle scar picked up when I took him up on the roof of a building on the SW Missouri farm we lived on in 1969. He was being pursued by the enemy, and his only recourse was to dive into the stock tank below. Sadly, he hit the edge of the steel tank, and his right leg was severed at the knee.

I was sad, but Hot Wheels cars had caught my attention by then anyway. I don’t recall what ever happened to my amputee GI Joe.

As Vietnam got more and more unpopular, GI Joe turned into a non-military Adventure Team guy. I was long past my obsession by then.

But I have lots of fond memories of building Lincoln Log forts, digging foxholes and excavating shelters in the back yard, and trading accessories with friends during the 1960’s.

Speaking of accessories, look for a future piece on those. There were enough to rate their own mention.

Check out Island of Lost Toys for lots more old toys.

A cootie, according to the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, is defined as a louse, especially one affecting humans, as the body louse or head louse. So if you were a soldier in either world war, cooties were extremely undesirable.

However, if you were a kid born after the conclusion of the second conflict, the term had a much more pleasant definition. It referred to a game involving big plastic bugs and lucky rolls of the dice.

Cootie originated with Herb Schaper, a letter carrier for the U.S. Post Office. He envisioned a game that would be fun, educational, and profitable.

He carved the first COOTIE out of wood in 1948. In the first years, Schaper built, by hand, 40,000 wooden COOTIE games. Within three years, more than 1,200,000 were produced with the aid of machinery.

By the time I came along, the parts were made of plastic. I never had a Cootie game myself, but I had friends who did. When I would visit their homes, it was a blast playing with the bugs. Sometimes we would play the game, which required rolling a one to get started. Other times we would just build the critters and play with them.

Of course, like any game involving small plastic parts, legs, antennae, and other appendages would soon disappear down heating ducts, under furniture, and sometimes in the digestive systems of puppies. So the games would often only allow competition with less than the intended four players.

Schaper’s company remained independent until 1987, when it was acquired by Milton Bradley. They continue to crank out the game, creating memories for a new generation, and stirring them in the minds of the parents and grandparents who recall how much fun it was to create big bugs with fortunate rolls of the dice.

True, we Boomer kids did spend most of our lives outdoors. However, there were many sweet rainy afternoons when we passed the time by playing board games inside.

Of course, every Boomer household had Monopoly. But many other familiar board games could be found on the shelves in our bedrooms.

One game that sadly was NOT in my own bedroom was Mouse Trap. Introduced in 1963 by Ideal Toys, I remember drooling over the TV commercials that showed the bizarre mechanism that you would build which would then be powered by a steel ball, enabling you to capture an opponent’s mouse.

I never got the game, despite much begging on my part. Oh well, it’s good to have some tantalizing things just out of reach. It prepares you to face real life.

The game of Clue was introduced way back in 1948. The exercise in deductive reasoning taught many of us how to examine evidence and reach accurate conclusions. It also introduced us to such familiar characters as Professor Plum, Colonel Mustard, and Miss Scarlet.

Many a game of Clue was played during the 60’s. Its simple elegance provided untold hours of entertainment. In this way, it contrasted greatly from the mechanized Mouse Trap. But each game had its own charms.

In 1965, Marx released a game called Green Ghost. The game was depicted on TV as being brightly lit up in the dark, but kids were disappointed to find that that was not the case. It was ultraviolet lighting that gave the ghost its bright green glow, sadly unavailable for most of us in the 60’s.

But the game was a lot of fun anyway, even if played in broad daylight. The object was to make your way around the board while obtaining keys to the various vaults, containing creepy items. If you were lucky, you obtained the elusive green ghost himself (named, as any Green Ghost aficionado knows, Kelly).

Lastly, I recall one of my favorite board games for a rainy afternoon: The game of Life. I was surprised to learn that this venerable game goes all the way back to 1860! That was the year Milton Bradley introduced us to a pastime that simulated life itself. The game received a rework a hundred years later, to the familiar look I remember so well. In the game of Life, you could experience marriage, college, a career, kids, and retirement at Millionaire Acres if you were lucky.

As we grew up, those wonderful board games may have gotten stored in the upper shelves of closets and went forgotten. But not always. My grandmother and I enjoyed Scrabble in the early 70’s. Nowadays, my wife and myself play at least a game a week, and we’re pretty stinkin’ good! We average a seven-letter word apiece per game, and have combined to make as many as four in a single match!

So if it’s a rainy afternoon,why not shut the idiot box off and get an old board game out? Enjoy the same simple pleasure that you remember as a child. It’s guilt-free!

Television of the 50’s tried to shield us from many ugly facts. For example, the very idea that married couples would sleep in the same bed! The horror! And we never, ever saw the Beave or Wally heading for the can.

But thanks to a man named Abraham Katz, the female members of the Boomer generation were a bit more informed. The reason was that way back in 1934, he released to the world the Betsy-Wetsy doll.

Betsy-Wetsy, named after Mr. Katz’s daughter, would take water into her mouth from the included baby bottle. And physics being what it is, as well as biology, the water would eventually be expelled from the southern end of said doll.

Thus were our female brethren more educated about the facts of life than we males who watched hour after hour of 50’s era sitcoms which carefully hid the fact that people have to occasionally relieve themselves.

Betsy-Wetsy was available in a number of sizes, depending on how much our parents and grandparents wanted to spend. But they all had in common the need to drink and urinate. And thus, they effectively taught our feminine members that if you’re gonna have kids, there’s work involved.

Betsy-Wetsy was also one of the first dolls that was made available as a doll of color, aka black. Here’s a raised Guinness to that!

And Betsy-Wetsy introduced another feature that would later be ubiquitous: eyes that shut when she was laid down.

None of these features were patented, either. A prior company sued Ideal because they had produced a doll that did the same thing. The judge ruled that drinking and urinating weren’t concepts that could be patented. May I add “duh!”

Ideal isn’t around any more, and neither is the original Betsy-Wetsy. But how many of you female Boomers have fond memories of “raising” a baby that required real hands-on action? Enquiring minds want to know!