michaelc
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Post by michaelc on Nov 27, 2017 20:23:27 GMT -5
It was around 1992....I was in elementary school. I was very much into wrestling. I Hasbros and Galoobs had now taken over. I had a few LJNs I bought in stores when I was young. Hulk Hogan, Mene Gene, Big John Stud, the referee, Macho Man, and a few others. I was more concerned with Heman, Thundercats, and GI JOE when LJN was in its prime. After Wrestle Mania 7, I was hooked. I started picked up random LJNs at yard sales, and flea markets. So it was early 1992 in a Shopping Mall outlet in Orlando Florida, we went to a Toy Store called. TOY LIQUIDATORS. Too my surprise they had rows, rows, and rows of Black card LJN figures. I was pumped....I started flipping through them trying to find my favorite wrestler, the Ultimate Warrior. They had Rick Rude, Haku, and A TON of black strap Andre the Giants. I also remember them having Brutus Beefcake on a black card. I was so mad that they didn't have the Ultimate Warrior, that I passed on picking up Rude, Andre and Haku. I was basically pouting like the usual 10 year old does. I'll never forget that. I was young, but I remember the store easily had 40 plus Andre Black Straps....and the rest were 50/50 Haku/Rick Rude. My dad tried to convince me to buy them...but I didn't listen. I instead picked up a 2 pack Starting Lineup Set of Johnny Bench/Pete Rose and a Yankee 2 pack ( I think it was Ruth/Gehrig). They also had some random figures from prior series. I distinctly remember Outback Jack and Jimmy V. I've seen numerous black card MOC figures on ebay over the years with the orange TOY LIQUIDATORS price tag $3.99 still attached....Man if I had a time machine. Thanks, another great story...and interesting to see that the discounted Black cards made it down to Florida rather than just up North as often thought. and yes the old time machine! Gonna' have to check images now to see that TOY LIQUIDATORS price tag.
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michaelc
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Post by michaelc on Nov 24, 2017 0:12:18 GMT -5
Such a great thread! I was very young when ljns were main stream,the only memories of seeing them in stores was seeing a bunch of mean genes,refs,Vinny macs,and Jesse the bodies at a Sears outlet store.however I have many memories of the figures themselves.i think it was the Christmas of 86 I got hulk,piper,the ring that my uncle tied the ropes super tight, macho man, Captain Lou,bundy and Kirchner.but my all time favorite memory was of my Grandma,yes my Grandma! She had boughten me Tito and steamboat for a gift after I had a surgery on my hand when I was four.i remember her playing with steamboat,and placing grapes in his upper claw hand and flinging them across the kitchen! I remember laughing uncontrollably because it pissed off my mom..RIP GRAMS AND MOM...LOVE YOU FOREVER! ...and it continues. So the Grandparents rule Mene Gene!!!
Love the bit about your gradma and the grapes!
What I have also noticed about the responses to this thread is the happiness that is coming through in your recollections. Not nostalgia - which can be a bit dangerous and skewed through an adult mind - but true happiness and connectedness with your families! I never expected that.
Please keep these stories coming guys it seems we are all enjoying them!
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michaelc
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Post by michaelc on Nov 23, 2017 19:53:18 GMT -5
Many of you have probably seen this if you're on Facebook... But this is my collection. I only collect LJN items and a few other 80s pieces here and there. I'll be adding Ax MOC to it next week and I have gotten a figure or two since this picture was taken, but I think you get the drift. I've also gotten my LJN ring signed by about 10 other LJN era superstars at The Big Event NY, so that's looking much more cluttered with autographs now. Ah yes. I have visited your page many-a-time!
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michaelc
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Post by michaelc on Nov 23, 2017 19:45:07 GMT -5
Keep the stories coming, they're great and really show what it was like to be a kid collecting the toys you wanted back then. One thing that is interesting is the role of grandparents in helping get the extra figure or two. The grands are certainly popping up in a few of your stories - and normally coming through with the good figures as well!
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michaelc
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Post by michaelc on Nov 23, 2017 4:56:25 GMT -5
I was lucky enough to actually shop at The Wrestling Ring store before they went exclusively to mail orders only. They had a very small shop in Ocean City, Maryland. I was very young but my dad told me the first time we went the guy didn’t even have a store he just had the MOC LJNs seating on the staircase of one of the boardwalk hotels. Once he actually had the store I can remember looking through all of the figures for the ones I didn’t have yet. I got both of the Hart Foundation there on single cards. Also got Elizabeth and Terry Funk on the same trip. Funk’s branding iron never even made it home. I lost it at the hotel. (I finally got a replacement one just a year or two ago at a flea market in a random box of toys) Over the next few years I would get the rest of my LJNs through mail order. I got most of the ‘89 series for Christmas in 1989. The last ones I got were Haku and Rick Rude in April of 1990 for my birthday. The only LJN I never had as a kid was a black strap Andre. Apparently when my dad went to order me several as a gift my mom told him I didn’t need another Andre since I already had the other two. That Andre is still the only one missing from my collection. Fantastic story! Thanks for sharing!
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michaelc
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Post by michaelc on Nov 21, 2017 19:55:40 GMT -5
"Interesting you mention that. I've long suspected that was the case at times, specifically with the green card Hasbros. Back in the late '90s into the '00s, I was trading volumes of wrestling tapes to someone in GER for green card Hasbros. It was like he had an endless supply! I figured he was reselling copies of the tapes, and using the proceeds to buy them at fair market value, but still...you'd think they would still be scarce. I had dozens upon dozens of green card figures go through my hands in those days like they were as common as Hulk #1. So considering the short run here in the US, I felt it possible they shipped whatever was manufactured to another country that would still certainly buy them up. Your story sounds like the exact same theory, just a different location.
Yep we got them here which I mentioned in my 2016 thread. The Green cards landed in Australia (not sure of the year 1996 maybe?) first at $5 each (Hasbros were normally $10) and then many more at $3 each. I would've bought about 120 of them - I would drive around and clean out the stores. I was trading them with a guy in upstate New York for the LJNS I couldn't get here. First trade was 3 123 kids for SD, Muraco and Elizabeth; and for people used to the immediacy of today's world - they took 5 months to arrive.
I traded many, many more with Big Jim for all the LJNS he could get (about 30 to add to my collection) and then for the first few series of Jakks. It was an absolute win/win and people, especially internationally - did a lot of trading back then including for tapes. All my Hasbros are in storage but there was a different international sticker on the back. I'd have to dig them out to have a look. We also got the Galoobs at $5 as well, a bit earlier than the Green Cards.
You can still find losse Green cards for sale at markets here and online, not common now, but in much greater numbers than you'd expect. Many kids had a full set for only $35 or $21 Aud at the time. Also I remember having Bombs and Borgas coming out of "..." (don't think you can swear on here?) with that stupid picture of Borga on the card!
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michaelc
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Post by michaelc on Nov 20, 2017 20:23:01 GMT -5
Hi again people. If you have a look on ebay right now there is a Black Card Ultimate Warrior available. Don't worry about the price!!! This item is for sale from NZ . Have a look at the sticker on the pack and you will see Funmaker Products Limited text under the clown head device.
Funmaker is a defunct New Zealand toy and games distributor from the 1980s and 1990s. (In Australia LJNs were distributed through Kidz Biz and Aussie cards will have a Kidz Biz sticker, usually top right.)
Now I bought some loose Black Card figures from NZ around 1999, 2000 including the Warrior and Rude, and saw a few other for sale; semi-regularly, including a number of Warriors. Superstars of Wrestling stayed on TV in NZ well past it's finish in Australia - well into the 90s - and there were exclusive NZ trading cards sets.
I always felt that the Black Cards were likely to have been distributed in NZ due to the disproportionately high number of later series Superstars available in a country so small and remote as NZ with its ongoing interest in the WWF. (I don't accept the proposition that Black Cards were only just sold through mail order but I do of course believe that they didn't get sold through traditional distribution channels of the other LJNS. A longer explanation can support this.)
Anyone from New Zealand on the forum? Also I am happy to start this in a different thread and happy to take advice from forum veterans and mods on this.
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michaelc
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Post by michaelc on Nov 19, 2017 23:55:08 GMT -5
I got Jesse and Davey Boy at target on clearance. Someone had opened the packages so they were loose in plastic bags That's interesting. I wonder if Davey Boy was from a singles pack originally - we'll never know!
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michaelc
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Post by michaelc on Nov 16, 2017 22:16:17 GMT -5
I wish I could help. I was so young at the time of their release I can't possibly remember. I'm surprised I can remember scenarios that place me at age 4, which was a year or so after the first set came out. In my earliest memories, I already had Hulk and a couple others and no clue where they came from <3 That's totally understandable Ozz at age of 4!! I have tracked down a raft of identical articles in US newspapers from Feb 12 and Feb 13, 1985 that are essentially a 1985 Toy fair PR piece that was used as syndicated copy. That's about where I place the 'launch' origin, plus time lag for release and distribution, until proven otherwise, I just want to turn an assumption into a presumption in the absence of primary evidence.
Putting the picture together piece by piece.
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michaelc
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Post by michaelc on Nov 16, 2017 20:16:36 GMT -5
So what do you guys, who were actual 'kid' collectors then, think about this. So from my research I put the original release of LJNs about March-April 1985 - that is the first wave of 5-backs. Stands (open to debate) come out with figures a bit later.
How accurate do you think that release timeline was? Can't track an actual release date. We have the article from the WWF magazine referring to the American International Toy Fair in Feb, 1985 and advances on that?
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michaelc
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Post by michaelc on Nov 16, 2017 19:56:20 GMT -5
Yeh I didn't know about the erasers until much later and only about the fullset in recent years. I probably got the info from Ozz in some digital guise.
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michaelc
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Post by michaelc on Nov 16, 2017 8:26:34 GMT -5
Little LJN Adrian Adonis rules!
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michaelc
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Post by michaelc on Nov 15, 2017 7:20:08 GMT -5
In 'bring home all the action' , Macho Man opening his cape to reveal....dozens of little Macho Men is absolutely gold, Mene Gean!
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michaelc
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Post by michaelc on Nov 15, 2017 0:57:51 GMT -5
Is it this one? My eyes might be bad but I can't figure anything in there to be LJNs. Yeh I had a few goes but could only ID Hasbros, etc. All blurry images have that later logo. But it is a pretty funny commercial.
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michaelc
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Post by michaelc on Nov 14, 2017 0:07:52 GMT -5
Great work Chris, well done. I'd never seen the Australian LJN ad version before!
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michaelc
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Post by michaelc on Nov 13, 2017 23:39:17 GMT -5
How about this from The Animal re; his figure! "GEORGE STEELE: If you look at my action figure and the heels of the boots are worn out, and the butt's got some paint worn off of it, you and I have a problem. If the toes are worn out, we're in good shape. That means if the heels are worn out, you let me get pinned. If the toes are worn out, you let me do the pinning." From www.cbssports.com/general/feature/25275707/wwe-in-1985-an-oral-historyBy Denny Burkholder August 20, 2015
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michaelc
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Post by michaelc on Nov 13, 2017 23:37:53 GMT -5
That's interesting ozz as you would have seen a lot at the time.
I saw the first four tag teams in Super K-mart Northland (once again for Aust readers) in about 86. I was surprised at the size of these and how much shelf space they commanded. Next to them were AWA tag-teams. I remember seeing Road Warriors, a team with Flair and perhaps the Freebirds but can't be sure (also not sure if they were 2packs or 3packs so that could rule the Freebirds out). The AWAs looked diminutive compared to those big blue boxes.
I was also surprised that Hogan and Hillbilly were a set! Although I was a young adult at the time, there was no way I could have afforded these, as I was at uni. And it was definitely not cool to collect action figures unless you were a kid. And in fact people didn't 'collect' them back then, they played with them!
Incidentally a near MIB Dream Team arrived for me from the states yesterday. Only need the Harts now for the tag sets (missed out as the 2nd highest bidder on a Hart Foundaiton set a few months back - I wont tell you the price unless asked!!!!!)
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michaelc
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Post by michaelc on Nov 13, 2017 22:53:08 GMT -5
The only figures I ever got at the time (apart from the aforementioned Bundy bendie) were Hogan about 1985 Christmas, for $11.95 AUD and then a discount store in Smith Street Collingwood (for the Aussie readers) in 88 or 89 had Mene Gene for $2 and the Bendies pack of Albano and Steele for $2.
Ok so Muraco was not so easy to come by and SD not so hard at all! And Kirchner was a staple for every patriotic youngster! Did anyone ever see the Bulldogs singles cards?
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michaelc
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Post by michaelc on Nov 13, 2017 22:49:10 GMT -5
There was a video of LOD going into a Toys R Us with Mean Gene and that particular TRU having pegs and pegs of bendies and Slick and Bob Orton LJNs. I wonder if that was the real stock of TRU or if WWF had just sent a bunch of leftovers for the taping. Around the same time, the local TRUs had LJNs but it was one here and there, never bunches. That's worth some research to try and find
...Did just find a video of LOD with Meme Gen in ToysRUS but I couldn't ID any LJNs. But that could just be me?
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michaelc
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Post by michaelc on Nov 13, 2017 9:15:36 GMT -5
...also for those from the UK. We're there any LJNs that ever made it over there at the time?
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