Vintage toys are a time capsule to the past

 

Joe Southern with Mego Robin and Superman figures.

Hey, I used to have one of those!

Every once and a while I’ll come across an object, usually a toy, at an antique shop or thrift store that takes me charging down memory lane.

Much to my father’s chagrin, I loved playing with action figures as a kid. I think he would have preferred his boys be more interested in he-man, manly pursuits like sports, hunting, fishing, and cars. Although I did enjoy sports, hunting and fishing, I was never a car guy. I liked playing with action figures. I had a lot of them and even now in my late 50s I’d still rather dote over the plastic figures than turn a wrench under the hood of my car any day.

Vintage toy collecting has become a huge industry over the years, especially as baby boomers and Gen Xers move into their retirement years. And it’s not just toys but all kinds of contraptions, albums, appliances and other things we had back in the day.

For me, “back in the day” meant the late 1960s to the early 1980s. That’s really when the golden age of action figures took place. The first action figure was G.I. Joe, who came out in 1946, just after World War II. With the arrival of G.I. Joe came the ongoing debate about whether or not action figures are dolls. Technically they are, but not if you want to market them to boys. Girls were not going to play with toy soldiers and boys certainly were not going to play with dolls, thus the creation of the term “action figures.”

The first action figures I remember owning (and still own) are my Lone Ranger figures. I loved the television show and watched reruns every weekday morning with my figures by my side. Among the many figures I had were Stretch Armstrong, Johnny West, the Bionic Man, and Evel Knievel and his stunt bike.

I really loved comic books and the original “Star Trek” TV show (and yes, I am a first-run viewer and lifelong fan). When Mego came out with their 8-inch action figures of various superheroes, villains, and “Star Trek” characters, I gobbled them up. I was obsessed with them.

I don’t know how many of those figures my brothers and I went through. Whenever they got wet, the elastic band inside would break. We got to be pretty good at rewiring them with rubber bands.

Mark, my friend who used to live in the house behind us, also liked playing with the action figures and we hauled our collections back and forth. We had many grand and wildly creative adventures with them. Unfortunately, my collection was left behind at his house when his family up and moved to Oklahoma. I never saw them again. I was crushed.

Fortunately, this new movie came out called “Star Wars” and my focus shifted to that. I initially resisted getting the cheesy 3 ¾-inch figures because I was waiting for Mego to make them.

Mego missed out on the “Star Wars” deal, and I relented and started collecting the mini figures. I had all of the original figures, including the mail order Boba Fett, but I later let them go at a garage sale for 50 cents each. Ugh! In good condition today they can be worth upwards of $200.

Mego went out of business in the early 1980s but was reborn in 2018 and began making the beloved figures again. The original figures sold for about $2 each and these new ones are over $20. I don’t have a budget for that, but I usually put them on my Christmas wish list each year. My daughter, Heather, came through and I now have Batman, Robin and Superman again. It was Christmas deja vu!

Now I have a dilemma. Do I open the boxes and take out the action figures or do I leave them mint in the box where they will hold a higher value? Actually, it’s not much of a dilemma at all. I got them for the sentimental value, not as an investment. So open them I will.

Looking back, it has become clear to me that I am a very nostalgic person. I have an affinity for things from my childhood – actually, from throughout my life – as I have plastic tubs in storage full of things from action figures to stuffed animals, old press credentials, and sports memorabilia. They’re kind of like time capsules of my life.

Whenever my wife Sandy and I go into antique stores, I am usually drawn to things that I used to have (or still have). It seems weird seeing things that I grew up with being old enough to be antique. My kids will gladly tell you that I am an antique. Apparently, I’m supposed to remember what it was like when the dinosaurs were around. To answer that question, I’ll have to ask my dad.

Still, as we go antiquing, it’s not unusual for me to say to Sandy, “hey, I used to have one of those!” She is younger than I am, so inevitably the mention of dinosaurs comes up again and we move on.

Birding: It happens to the best of us eventually

 

A male Attwater Prairie Chicken in full boom.

It happens to the best of us eventually. One minute you don’t give a flying flip about birds and then one day you look up and realize the bird feeder is empty and you miss seeing the colorful winged creatures in your yard.

For the record, I’m not a birder, although I’m probably in denial about that. The birds I’m most concerned about are the 26 chickens, eight ducklings and the gosling we are raising on our little farm. That doesn’t mean that the flash of red when a cardinal flies by won’t turn my head. It doesn't stop me from looking around when I hear an owl hoot. I even keep a bird feeder full of seed in a tree outside our back door. Sometimes the squirrels will leave some for the birds!

Whenever I think of birders, I think of people in safari outfits with binoculars and notebooks who hang out in wilderness areas getting wet-your-pants excited about seeing a certain breed of bird or hearing their melodious songs.

“Come here, Norman. Hurry up. The loons! The loons!” – Katherine Hepburn to Peter Finda in “On Golden Pond.”

Growing up in Colorado, we didn’t have a wide variety of birds to swoon over. Robins, barn swallows, magpies and crows were pretty much the norm. Ducks and geese were seasonal each spring and fall. It wasn’t unusual to see pheasants, doves or pigeons. On a rare occasion you might see a hawk. Sure, there were plenty of others, but they had fancy names, and we didn’t see them very often.

In Boy Scouts, we used to send the young boys on snipe hunts, just as our older peers did to us. As a teenager I like to hunt ducks and geese. The only duck I ever got managed to fall into the sewer pond at the local sewer plant. On one hunt, a duck and a bittern took off at the same time. I fired, but it wasn’t the duck that fell. At least that’s what the nice game warden told me.

Down here in Texas, there are more bird varieties than I could possibly imagine. When I joined the Brazos Bend State Park Volunteeer Organization in 2012, I was taught about the various birds that inhabit the park. I was overwhelmed. I still have a hard time remembering what most of them are called and how to tell the difference if something is crowned or crested, scissortailed or breasted, but I do remember that the little, tiny ones are hummingbirds.

I enjoy hanging up a hummingbird feeder and having the little buggers flit around my front porch. I like the challenge of trying to photograph them. They move fast and they’re hard to get.

One birding experience I will never forget came a few years ago when I was working for The Sealy News. Sealy is located near the Attwater Prairie Chicken National Wildlife Refuge. Twice I was given a private tour early in the morning to see and photograph these critically endangered birds as they did their mating ritual. There are fewer than 200 Attwater Prairie Chickens known to exist, and most of those are at the refuge.

The males will inflate the orangish-yellow sack on their necks and rapidly stomp their feet on the ground, which is called booming. They do this in the spring whenever a female is nearby.

This weekend the refuge is holding its annual Boomin’ and Bloomin’ Festival. It means having to get there by 7 a.m., but it is worth the trip! The protected prairie there has many species of birds and other animals, along with many natural wildflowers that are blooming this time of year.

Last fall I covered the grand opening of REI Co-op in College Station. They were using the event to help raise funds for the Rio Brazos Audubon Society. I got to interview the organization’s president, Mark McDermott.

“We’re a conservation organization, or more specifically a bird conservation organization,” he said. “We run activities and conservation programs that are designed with conserving bird life and the habitat that they need to thrive.”

I might have to check them out someday.

It’s become obvious to me that birding is something that sneaks up on you as you grow older. Even though I don’t identify as a birder, I think it’s happening to me. I probably won’t wind up an old man on park bench feeding pigeons, but my family enjoys feeding he seagulls off the back of the Galveston ferry boats. I guess that’s kind of the same thing.