Collect Them All

Collecting junk goes back to my childhood, when boxes of sugary cereal held goodies that we would fight each other for. 

My little brother, Paul, (not so little now) was a big baseball fan, so naturally, he collected baseball cards. Topps, one of the companies that printed sports cards, saw there was a market for kids who wanted to collect but weren't into baseball. They began producing collectible cards that featured TV and movie scenes.

I fell right into their demographic.

Soon, I was collecting cards that celebrated the Monkees, Man From U.N.C.L.E. and other favorites of mine. One of the gimmicks they used was printing pieces of a puzzle on the back of each card. So when you'd collected them all, you could turn the cards over and arrange them to form a poster-sized picture. Inevitably, there were one or two cards I couldn't seem to acquire, so my puzzle had gaps. But it was still fun to try.

Groovy.

Then, one day Wacky Packages arrived. They were pure genius, because they appealed both to me and Paul. It was something we could both agree on, a true rarity in our formative years.

The gross-out humor appealed to boys, but I appreciated the play on words. "Bear Aspirin, Headache Relief for Bears." And "Raw Goo Uncooked Spaghetti Sauce." And "Pupsi-Cola, the Soft Drink for Dogs." Not all of them were winners, but enough of them were to make collecting worthwhile.

Mr. Ginley recently alerted me to an article in Retro Fan, a magazine he borrowed from the library. It had an article about the history of Wacky Packages. I didn't know that Art Spiegelman, writer of the award-winning graphic novel Maus, was one of the writers for Wacky Packages. As was Zippy cartoonist Bill Griffith. 

What a cool gig!

If you, too, were a fan of Wacky Packages, there's a website, hosted by a guy named Greg Grant. The web address is WackyPackages.org. I'm going to stop by later and pick up a chuckle or two.

That reminds me, I need to stop at the store for some Quacker Oats, Cap'n Crud and Harm & Hammer.