In this Time Capsule, I’m treating all of you Star Wars fans to something really special. It’s the Kenner Star Wars Return of the Jedi Collections catalog from 1982. Flip through it all you want and salivate over all of the cool toys they were offering at the time!
The flip book below is super easy to use. The controls are in the control panel below the book, and you can use them to go forward or backward. I suggest using the expand button to blow it up to full screen for maximum enjoyment.
As part of the Show & Tell blogging event featuring video games, Jason over at Rediscover the 80s wrote about the Activision video game patches he wished he’d earned back in the 80s. I read that post and got jealous myself, because not only did I never win a patch, but I never even knew of their existence until his post.
But it triggered a memory for me of an old Atari “magazine” I have. As it turned out, it wasn’t actually a magazine, but rather a newsletter. Back in 1981, Activision founder Jim Levy wrote a “welcome” letter introducing the original Activisions newsletter to Activision’s loyal fans. The Activisions newsletter was created to inform gamers of new titles in development and give the reader a small peek into Activision, its designers, their games, and the people who played them. The first Activisions newsletter arrived in the fall of 1981 and the last issue was sent out in the fall of 1983. Seven issues of the Activisions newsletters were created in all. In this Time Capsule, I’m presenting that seventh and final edition. It features some of those patches that Jason yearns for. Enjoy.
The flip book below is super easy to use. The controls are in the control panel below the book, and you can use them to go forward or backward. I suggest using the expand button to blow it up to full screen for maximum enjoyment.
In this Time Capsule, go back to the early days of Dungeons & Dragons with this TRS Catalog from 1981. There was a surprising amount of products available from TSR even back then, and this catalog showcases them all. It’s a great look back at the pioneering days of role-playing games and a real trip down memory lane.
The flip book below is super easy to use. The controls are in the control panel below the book, and you can use them to go forward or backward. I suggest using the expand button to blow it up to full screen for maximum enjoyment.
As I’ve said before, nothing reminds me of Christmases gone by more than browsing through old catalogs. As a kid, I could sit for hours looking through the many pages of possible gifts, circling the things I wanted in hopes Santa Claus would make my dreams come true. As we’ve already done with the 1988 Sears Catalog, and the 1991 Sears Catalog, we’re going to uncover some highlights from an old catalog, and this time we’re looking at the 1984 Montgomery Ward catalog!
I had one of these bed tents, but I didn’t have it by 1984, so I would have been asking for one I’m sure. I’m not really sure what the intent was with these bed tents, but I can tell you that I used mine in a multitude of ways. First off, it made for a great fort in my bedroom. And when I wasn’t using it for defensive measures, I was using it to imagine I was camping out under the stars. And sometimes, I liked to imagine I was sleeping in some fancy bed. You know, the old four-posters that you could draw the sides on.
I probably had at least a dozen different power cycles through the years. My cousin Tim and I would just wear them out going up and down the hill at my house. We’d do down the hill at top speeds, and then lock up the front wheel for a sliding stop. All of those sliding stops would wear flat spots on the front wheel, and before long, they would be un-rideable. But I never had this GoBots cycle. That kind of surprises me as I was a big GoBots fan, and this looks like a cycle I would have been asking for.
I was also big into books on tape, and books on records, especially when they featured properties like these G.I. Joe and Masters of the Universe ones. I don’t remember having any of the ones shown here, so I’m adding them to my list.
Oh man, I always thought that Rock ’em Sock ’em Robots were pretty damn cool when it was Red Rocker vs. Blue Bomber, but this set featuring Rocky Balboa vs. Clubber Lang is so much cooler! You could replay the fight of the century over and over again, and if you were really feeling your oats, you can dare your friend’s sister to come over and find out what a real man was like, just like CLubber Lang!
The designer kit on the left is the one that my brother had, and I was always so jealous. Mainly because he loved the damn thing so much that he would never let me touch it. He designed so many cool cars on that drafting table, that he developed a lifelong love for stuff like that and ended up pursuing a career in blueprinting. But since he never once let me have a turn at trying my hand, I’m adding it to my list now.
So at this time, my two main toys were G.I. Joe and Masters of the Universe. When it came to G.I. Joe, I had several figures pictured in the above scene, but none of the playsets featured. My brother had the Sky Striker, but like a lot of his things, I wasn’t allowed to even touch it, let alone put it through its paces. But it’s the Hovercraft that really catches my eye. Of all the toys to be produced for the line, it’s the one I always wanted the most, with the notable exception of the USS Flagg Aircraft Carrier. So I’m definitely putting the hovercraft on my list from this catalog.
As mentioned above, MOTU was one of my two favorite toy lines. I don’t know what year I got my Castle Grayskull for Christmas, but Snake Mountain came the year after that. I want to say I got Grayskull in ’84, and would have gotten this Snake Mountain in ’85. But memories are funny, so I can’t say that with any certainty. Regardless, it was an awesome addition to the MOTU line and a toy that I would go on to play with for hours and hours after getting it. We had a fireplace in our den where I played, and I would set this thing up in front of it, and the fire behind it became kind of like a Mount Doom before I knew what that was.
I also had the Fisto figure pictured here, and he was one of my favorites. I want to say that I had the dragon walker as well, but my memory is a little fuzzy on that, so don’t quote me. But for shits and grins, let’s add everything seen here to my list.
Construx was another big toy for me. I had several of the sets through the years. Whenever I got a set, I would build it the way it was supposed to be, but then quickly take it apart and incorporate the pieces into my larger collection and make my own creations. I had the big set pictured on the left, as well as the truck and helicopter at the top. I know I had several space sets, but can’t remember exactly which ones. Let’s assume I had one or both of the ones pictured here. Again, let’s just everything seen here to my list.
The Fall Guy was a kick-ass show, and I never had a remote control car as cool as Colt Seaver’s truck. I would have taken this thing everywhere and run it up and down my long driveway. It probably wouldn’t have lasted long as I can see myself wearing it out quickly, but that’s not going to stop me from adding it to my list!
I don’t want to be too greedy, so we’re going to stop this list right here. Getting even some of these things would have made for an awesome Christmas back in ’84. Hell, it would make an awesome CHristmas this year. C’mon Santa, work your magic and bring me some of this stuff this year!
Now that we’re past Thanksgiving, I’m all in on Christmas, and that means features like this. We’re going to look at a few things that really caught my eye while browsing through the 1991 Sears Christmas Wishbook.
I’m going to kick things off with the main event…the SNES! As I’ll be describing in an upcoming feature, the SNES was all I wanted for Christmas in 1991. Being a Nintendo kid, seeing that an upgraded system with better graphics was coming out just kept me on the edge of excitement all through the fall. The 1991 Sears catalog didn’t have a very big spread for the SNES but I guess that was because it was so close to press time when it came out. At the bottom of the listing, it listed just a few games with a note that said more games would be available on Nov. 1st, but you had to call and inquire about those.
TMNT was the hot property in 1991. The catalog had a couple of pages of just the toys, but the book was filled from front to back with licensed Turtle merchandise. Pajamas, clocks, roller skates, skateboards, and just about anything else you could think of were available with the Turtles emblazoned on them. But I like these action figures. I had a couple of the main Turtles roster, but I was at that age where I was transitioning from playing with action figures to more “grown-up” toys, so I didn’t go all in on the line. Looking back now, I wish I had. The figures were just so vibrant, and the well was deep when it came to unique characters.
As I said above, in 1991 I was in a transition period when it came to the things I was buying. These game watches are a great example of the kinds of things I was spending my money on at the time. A watch is a “grown up” thing, but being a game watch, they were also fun enough to still be a toy in a way. I don’t know how fun the Super Mario 3 watch could have been with the limited graphics and gameplay ability, but Tetris is a game that is perfectly suited to this kind of offering. Being the big fan of Tetris that I’ve always been, I’m surprised I never had the watch.
1991 would have been right near the beginning of my obsession with trading cards. My friends and I spent every afternoon trading cards, and whole summer days were taken up with the hobby amongst us. A set like this would have been something I probably actually circled in the catalog back in the day. I mean, it comes with random cards, sleeves, 9-card pages, an album, and a price guide. What more could a budding collector ask for?
I was bin into slot car tracks from an early age. My older brother had them, and he and my dad used to race them as a way of spending time together. I had several tracks of my own through the years, but nothing quite like this Canyon of Doom track. It’s pretty much just a basic track with a corkscrew in it, but it’s the theme elements that make this one stand out. Racing across the rickety bridge and through the volcano is pretty badass. Not to mention racing behind the waterfall. My cousin Tim and I could have killed many an afternoon with this track.
I was all in on the Robin Hood movie back in 1991. Hell, I’ve always loved the stories of Robin Hood in all their forms. So when these toys came out, I was almost compelled to revert back to the childhood ways that I was desperately trying to shake at this point in life just to play with these things. And it’s not really the action figures themselves that I salivate over today, it’s the playsets. The re-purposed Ewok village that is the “base” for the Merry Men, and the net launcher and boulder slinger really grab my attention. Especially since the net launcher and boulder thrower were re-purposed from the Bone Age toy line that I never had but always wanted.
Oh man, this set of mini golf toys may look cheesy, but let me set the stage for you. Back in the late ’80s and early ’90s, I was doing all kinds of stuff to mimic things I was seeing on TV. Like, I would see bowling on Wide World of Sports, and I would then go and make a “ball” out of Construx, set up empty soda bottles as pins in the hallways, and I would spend the rest of the afternoon bowling. Stuff like that. So to get a set like this that I could set up a 9-hole course through the house and play some mini golf would have been right up my alley.
As I mentioned earlier, I was overly into Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves at this time in life, and as I just mentioned above, I was usually into re-creating stuff I was watching. So here comes this bow and arrow from Nerf that would just have made my playtime a whole lot easier. This Bow could easily make one of my lists of toys I always wanted but never had because I never did get my hands on one.
Besides the Super Nintendo, this Days of Thunder Go Kart is the best thing I found browsing through the catalog. Days of Thunder was another movie that I was overly into back in the day, and I had a lot of merchandise surrounding the movie but I never had something as cool as this. While I would rather have a replica of the green and yellow City Chevrolet, I would still take this pink and white Superflo car. Do you realize how cool it would have been to cruise this thing up and down the road to trade cards with my friends instead of riding my bike? I would have been able to dazzle them so much I could have talked them into any trade I wanted.
Those are just a small snippet of highlights from the 1991 Sears Wish Book. Considering there are over 700 pages in that book, I could easily do a list of a hundred things I want from it, but we’re stopping at these nine. You can check out the full catalog, and many more, over at WishBookWeb.com. And if this kind of post is your thing, check out these other highlights posts here on Retro Ramblings:
You probably remember from past posts that I’ve always loved LEGO. In fact, I’d put LEGO at a solid number three right behind G.I. Joe and Masters of the Universe as far as favorite toys of all-time goes. I was pretty fortunate back in the day that my mom was supportive of my love of LEGO, and would buy me small sets on a fairly regular basis. Every once in a while, I would get a big set, but those times were mostly like birthdays and Christmas.
A while back, I got my hands on some of the old LEGO Shop at Home catalogs. As a matter of fact, one of the first Time Capsule posts I did here on Retro Ramblings featured the 1987 LEGO catalog. Being how it was a Time Capsule, I refrained from adding any context or memories to those pages. But today, I want to highlight some of the offerings in the 1989 catalog. Let’s check out some of my favorite things from the line in ’89!
I’ve covered this one before in the Highlights From the 1988 Sears Wishbook post, but I’ve salivated over it for so many years, that it’s worth covering again here. I grew up fascinated by big rigs since my dad had to drive them on occasion for his business. Beyond that, they were always around because there was a trucking company across the road. So I had a lot of exposure to them.
And being as how I was a big fan of LEGO and had numerous other vehicles, wanting these rigs and the truck stop just came naturally. It looks like the set comes with one tractor and trailer, one tractor without a trailer, and a big rig wrecker. Not to mention the truck stop itself, and several minifigures.
I could have certainly put this set to good use with my other LEGO city sets.
Here’s another one from the city section of the catalog…the Victory Lap Raceway. I had the smaller version of this once upon a time. My dad had come home from a trip, and we took mom out on that Friday night for her weekly shopping trip. While killing time just walking through the store while mom shopped, we found ourselves in the toy section. It didn’t take much of an ask, and my old man said I could get it. But that set only had two cars and not much else with it.
This set features four racecars, two pit stalls, numerous figures, a press box, a walkway above the track, a car hauler, and two base plates! That’s an incredible amount of play time built into this set. And what cityscape would be complete without a raceway on the outskirts? Not a city I would want to live in.
The Castle System for LEGO always fascinated me, but I never had enough of it to do much with. On an episode of the old TRN Podcast, I told the tale of my cousin, Stevie the Tyrant, having the King’s Castle set at my grandmother’s house. I told how he would never let me help put it together. Instead, he would give me a knight on a horse and have me go into another room and pretend to hunt while he built the castle. A-hole.
This castle wasn’t the largest one offered in the line, but it is the largest one in this catalog so it’s going on my list of highlights. I count twelve figures, and four horses. That’s an impressive lot to go along with the castle. Especiall if you had other sets from the castle system to enjoy with this one. Just imagine the many scenarios that could be played out with this set. I know I would using it to create some of my own scenes from Willow or stuff like that with it.
From the golden age of castles to the futuristic age of space travel. Now while I never really fancied the space sets from LEGO, this monorail always interested me. Back then, I had these dreams of building a whole LEGO city, and wanted this monorail to run through the city.
I don’t know any of my friends who had it, so I have no point of reference as to how big it was, but if it had any size to it at all, it would probably have been pretty cool to surround other space sets with it.
This was the introduction year for the Pirates sets in the world of LEGO. THey first came to my attention in and ad in the back of an issue of Brick Kicks magazine before their release, and when I saw that ad, I was instantly hooked without ever laying hands on them. I dreamed about them so much, I featured one of the ships as a gift under my virtual Christmas tree in an old post.
After the castle system sets, it should have been a no-brainer to go with a pirate theme. That or a western theme (which would come later) would have been logical choices. They went with Pirates, and the sets they produced to back up the idea were great. I mean, just look at these two sets. Let’s start with the Caribbean Clipper on the right. A pirate ship makes a great playset as theres plenty of adventures to be had just with it. From “sailing” it around to waging battles on it’s deck, I can think of numerous things to do with it.
And then the Eldorado Fortress on the left looks like a perfect island based playset. Just think about how much fun could be had by combining the two sets. With the Clipper trying ti raid the fortress, and the fortess having to fight off the pirates…damn, I can still think of numerous adventures to be had with these things. And what you’re not seeing here is another ship that was available, and several, smaller, playsets.
I never did end up with a single piece from the Pirates system, but that never stopped my imagination from running wild everytime I saw them featured in ads or in box art.
While this entry may seem a little mundane, remember that I said I had dreams of building a LEGO city. To have done that would have required accessories just like the ones featured here. The roadway plates, the trees, and the minifigure sets all would have been necessary to pull it off. And I can’t forget to mention the train accessories at the top. I know I wanted to incorporate the monorail system, but a train system would have been awesome as well.
There were plenty of more sets I could have highlighted in this post, but those were the big ones for me. At some point in the near future, I’ll get the entire catalog loaded to the site as a Time Capsule, so keep your eyes open for that.
Playmobil toys were some of my absolute favorites when I was a kid and I could sit and look at advertisements like this for hours on end. I hope you enjoy seeing this as much as I enjoy being able to present it to you.
Here is another Time Capsule for you to peruse, and it’s another trip back in time courtesy of the 1986 Mattel Toy Dealer’s Catalog. Enjoy this look at all of the Wheeled Warriors toys that were available at fine retailers everywhere in 1986.
Matchbox cars have been around since 1953, and every year have offered new varieties of their cars. In this time capsule, you can see all of their new offerings for 1983.
Back in 1990, handheld gaming systems were the new hotness, and Gamepro provided a handy guide to all of the games that were currently available for both Gameboy and Lynx for the holidays. This way, kids knew exactly what games to bug their parents for, and now you can go back in time and enjoy this awesome look back at the state of handheld gaming in December 1990. Enjoy!
You know I love old catalogs…especially ones from the late ’80s because that’s just my wheelhouse. And you know I also love Christmas. And lastly, you know that I love archiving scans of various catalogs, magazines, and the like. So this is a big one and hit all those notes. I’m proud to present to you the 1986 Toys ‘R’ Us Out of This World Toy Book! I hope you enjoy salivating over it as much as I do.
For today’s installment of Retro Ramblings, I’m you with a few of my favorite Saturday morning cartoons from the ’80s. I put a couple of stipulations on myself for this one. First, only Saturday morning cartoons. No before or after-school syndicated cartoons, so that knocked stuff out like He-Man and G.I. Joe. Second, all the cartoons on this list had to debut in the ’80s, so no Scooby-Doo either. I’ll tackle all of those missing cartoons at some point in the future, but for now, let’s get into these Saturday morning cartoons of the ’80s!
To me, The Smurfs were not only one of my favorite cartoons, but I think the case could be made that it was one of the best cartoons to come out of the decade. I loved the medieval setting along with all of the forest stuff in it as well. For some reason, I was always a fan of seeing stuff get built, and The Smurfs had a lot of that. I remember when Handy had to get everyone together to build a dam. I’m sure I pulled out some LEGOs and tried to recreate that at some point during that Saturday afternoon.
A lot about why I loved the Smurfs also applies to why I loved The Gummi Bears. Medieval theme? Check. Lots of forest action? Check. Getting to see them build stuff? Check off that one as well. Beyond the Smurfs though, the Gummi Bears had such rich colors in its animation, and the lore behind it I found more engaging than that of The Smurfs. It hit on all cylinders for me and was a cartoon that I dared not miss on Saturday mornings.
Being into pro wrestling like I was, there was no way I wasn’t going to watch this one. I can remember knowing about it well in advance of its debut, probably from constant hyping on WWF Superstars if I had to guess. But even though most of the plots had little to nothing to do with actual wrestling, it was still a really fun cartoon. As much as I enjoyed the animated part, I believe I enjoyed the live-action comedy scenes just as much.
I didn’t know any boy at school around my age who didn’t watch The A-Team. And I also didn’t know any boy around my age at school whose favorite character on that show wasn’t B.A. Barracus played by Mr. T. We were all totally enamored with the guy. Hell, I still am. I even wrote a feature for The Retro Network about 12 Things You May Not Know About Mr. T. So the cartoon was just a natural extension for me. I don’t know how or why they landed on the concept of having Mr. T coaching a teen gymnastics team, but whatever, it worked. The stories were simple, but the action was fun. And much like Hulk Hogan’s Rock ‘n’ Wrestling, I loved the live-action segments with Mr. T himself.
My older brother had been into comic books since the late ’70s, and I would see his books and want to read them, but I was just at an age where they couldn’t hold my attention long enough for me to actually read them. So having this cartoon to watch at that time filled my need for comic book characters in a much easier-to-digest format. I loved it then for what it was, but now as an adult, I appreciate it even more when I go back and watch it because the show featured so many cool characters over its run. If you haven’t watched it in a while, I suggest you give it another look on Disney+.
That’s it for this edition of Retro Ramblings. But don’t worry, there’s plenty of more posts here for you to go explore.