I clearly remember having some Bonanza toy figures as a kid, getting them one Christmas. Maybe Little Joe, Hoss and a horse. They were brilliant toys with soft plastic accessories. Very Marx like the Best of the West.
Westerns like Bonanza were such a huge part of TV in the Sixties and Seventies. High Chaparral became my favourite of them all.
Did you have any Bonanza toys? Did you like Westerns on TV?
There were so many great Westerns on TV in the 1960s, and in to the 1970s, plus lots of old movies. I had a couple of cap gun revolvers, a clicking rifle, hat, vest, and a plastic star. Some Timpo cowboys and Indians, the Britains Trapper canoe and cowboy raft, and a very hard and brittle plastic stagecoach - I had to be very careful with that one.
ReplyDeleteAirfix took their standard set of small cowboy figures, and replaced one of the normal sprues with a sprue of character figures, and released this as a High Chaparral set.
Have you still got any of those treasures Paul?
DeleteMy Dad was a big fan of western films but not the TV shows. I did like Alias Smith and Jones and have the dvd boxset.
ReplyDeleteThey were great Alias Smith and Jones!
DeleteOh yes, and as for modern westerns, Deadwood is truly magnificent!
ReplyDeleteWhat's Deadwood on Kev?
DeleteIt's an HBO series, it was on Sky Atlantic, I think. Not sure what other channels might show it. Whilst it is brilliantly written and even almost Shakespeare-like at times, if you edited out the swearwords , each 1 hour episode would last about 7 minutes! I've got it on DVD.
DeleteDon't think I had any Bonanza toys, but seem to remember having an annual.
ReplyDeleteI too liked 'Alias Smith and Jones', and had both horse opera TV show themes on vinyl.
Horse opera! I like that!
DeleteI remember that Bonanza Annual!
DeleteWhile we watched Bonanza and The Big valley in my household, I had no cowboy toys apart from some Best of the West figures.
ReplyDeleteThat said, once a month or so Dad would take Mom and me to the Ponderosa Steakhouse for a meal. You'd get a massive steak cooked as you wanted, a baked potato and a salad. Seating was just long tables and benches and of course it was all western themed.
The Ponderosa and Bonanza steakhouse chain is still around today but has a quite different menu.
That steak place sounds wonderful Lance. I don't think I ever had a steak as a kid. Just wasn't common in Blighty. I had a super thin steak canadienne when I was a teenager. I made my mates sandwiches with them at our house. Great fun!
DeleteApart from the cap guns, which broke, and ended up being thrown out, I still have most of these items. I will see what I can dig out. British toy makers made a lot of Wild West toys - there are several sets in the Timpo book you featured recently. I fear I may be falling down another rabbit hole.
ReplyDeleteQuick Paul, grab hold before you fall in!
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