I was obsessed with manta rays as a kid back on the Sixties. There was something just wonderful about them.
Huge, graceful and mysterious, they filled my daydreams already populated by frogmen and skin divers.
Its hard to say where this came from; maybe James Bond's Thunderball, maybe even Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea.
I do recall that there were loads of pictures of rays in books and educational comics at the time. They were part of popular culture back then just like frogmen.
I don't think I had a toy ray unless one came with an Action Man set. Maybe I had a rubber ray. I know I had a rubber octopus.
Here's the sort of amazing manta illustration I mean [by Mort Kunstler]:
Did you like rays as a kid readers?
Possibly, the flying sub from voyage to the bottom of the sea and the martian fighting machines from the Pal War of the Worlds are very manta ray like and I've always loved them!
ReplyDeletedefinately ray like Kev. Both of them and - so evocative of the time. Maybe even the subcraft that Marine Boy had too.
DeleteKevin's got a very good point about the Flying Sub and War of the Worlds (1953) fighting machines possibly being manta inspired. I gotta agree with that. Just googled Mort Kunstler. What a brilliant artist, Woodsy.
ReplyDeleteYep, I that love Manta ray art Tony! I also think it was those grainy pics of undersea life in the Junior World Encyclopdia that fired my young imagination like Book 5 http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_RsCCizsWvNw/SpAbsUZSMxI/AAAAAAAAEcM/EI5vqOF0kmg/s400/frogmen+009.JPG
DeleteMoby Dick was another draw for my watery mind!