Cereal Packet PC

 I was thinking about making stuff with card as a kid. One thing was a cereal box computer.

I remember it involved wooden skewers and hole-punched cards. A card would fall into the he at the bottom of it was the right answer.

But how on earth did it work? I've forgotten.

Do you know readers?

Have you had your Secrets of Space?

 I love these old Secrets of Space cards from Weet-bix I saw online.

There's even a Moon Prospector!

This is 12 of the 20.

There's even a poster as described below! Wow! Anyone got one?

I love how you could swap with Sanitarium themselves! 

The Moon Suit, no. 13, is a really gorgeous card.

Is Weet-bix the same as Weetabix here in Blighty?

Kelloggs Sugar Smacks: Space Mission Badges Ad

Courtesy of the British Film Institute:

https://player.bfi.org.uk/free/film/watch-kelloggs-sugar-smacks-space-mission-badges-1970-online 

Anyone got these badges?

Kevin's Gerry Anderson and Space Cereal Toys

I'm doing my best to collect the lovely little toys that dropped into your breakfast in the 60's. 

 I'm nearly there now, only need the Atlas rocket on its gantry and the LEM ascent stage.

They'rrrre great!

Kevin

UK

Cereal Killers: Nabisco Shreddies Prehistoric Creatures

Here is a video from Cerealmad, on the toys that came in packets of breakfast cereal. In this case, the Prehistoric Animals, by Nabisco Shreddies, from 1958.

This was a set of 20 semi-flat figures – mostly dinosaurs, and a few Ice Age mammals. There are close-ups of all the figures.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1qDuNmL1QoA

Paul Adams from New Zealand

Sugar Puffs Famous Puffers

MC recently mentioned the You Tube channel Cerealmad, which looks at various lines of cereal packet toys. Here is another one, featuring a series of Lenticular cards.

Quaker Sugar Puffs Famous Puffers from 1973, was a series of four cards, which showed a famous steam locomotive moving across the card as you tilted it. The locos moving in three stages.

The Rocket (1829), The Jenny Lind (1849), Central Pacific Locomotive 1867, and The Coronation Scot (1937). A great looking series.

Have you got anything like this?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xzFcXqji03E

Paul Adams from New Zealand

 

Aces In Action Lenticular Cereals Cards

Hi Woodsy,

Here is another set of Lenticular cards from packets of breakfast cereal. This time from Nabisco Spoon Size Shredded Wheat.

From 1980 (40th Anniversary of the Battle of Britain), the 'Aces in Action' Magic Picture Cards. A set of five cards depicting famous RAF fighter aces shooting down enemy aircraft in the Battle of Britain.

Each card shows the action in three stages. Honestly, the images are not great, and the aircraft are not well drawn, but a very interesting set.

This You Tube video from Cerealmad shows all five cards, as well as the front and back of the boxes. The back of the packet even had a mail-away offer for two Airfix kits.

For £2, plus two box tops, and 60 New Pence postage, you got a Spitfire and a Messerschmitt Bf-109. The offer closed 31st December 1980.

The kits are described as the 1/48th scale Airfix Spitfire Mk.Vb, and the Messerschmitt Bf-109E. but Airfix did not do a Bf-109E in 1/48th scale at that time, only a Bf-109F – both this and the Spitfire Mk.Vb were far too late for the Battle of Britain.

Both the Spitfire Mk.Vb and the Bf-109E were available in 1/72nd scale, so something is amiss. Does anyone have any further information on this mail-away offer ?

The advertisement says 2 Models for Only £2, Save £1. This does indeed suggest the 1/48th scale kits, which were in Series 4, rather than the cheaper 1/72nd scale models which were in Series 2.

But neither of the 1/48th scale kits depicted aircraft from the Battle of Britain era, as both the Spitfire Mk.Vb and Bf-109F entered service in 1941. I have no idea what sort of packaging the mail-away kits came in.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aX-_W2dGGR4

Paul Adams from New Zealand

SUGAR SMACKS SPACE AGE MODELS

 

This is a neat short about the space age cereal models by enthusiast Cerealmad I found on You Tube.

Have you got these models?

Post Count Off Punch-Out Space Models

I just found this old TV ad for Post Count Off breakfast cereal on You Tube. You could send away for a book of punch-out space models – all it took was two box-tops from Post Count Off.

This looks like a really nice set. I doubt many of them have survived since the 1960s.

What do you think?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OKSVBcv2j9g

Paul from NZ

 

MOON AND SPACE ORBITER

 

I've deffo never seen this space toy before. You?

Its the Space Orbiter that came free with Nabisco's Great Honey Crunchers.

Looks like its a blow pipe with a levitating ball.

You can find out more on New Hampshire's amazing Timepassagesnostalgia site, from where I borrowed the images.

POST SUGAR CRISP LINCOLN B-58 MAIL-AWAY

Hi Woodsy,

I found a You Tube channel called Classic Airliners & Vintage Pop Culture, devoted to airliners, and toys related to airliners.

One video includes an old TV ad for Post breakfast cereals, and a mail-away offer for a Convair B-58 Hustler Supersonic Bomber kit, and SAC Wings.

Post Sugar Crisp and Raisin Bran cereals carried the offer. The B-58 kit was yours for a box top, and 50 cents.

The video says the model is the Lindberg B-58 kit. A number of cereal companies offered various plastic kits as part of such a mail-away promotion.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M64Ai4I9-as

Paul Adams from New Zealand

BOWLS ROYCE: THE 1967 SUGAR SMACKS FAB1

Check this marvel out, the Sugar Smacks FAB1 on a great cereals premium site, Cereal Offers.

I'm not sure I've seen this FAB1 before.

What do you think?

 https://cerealoffers.com/Kelloggs/Sugar_Smacks/1960s/Lady_Penelope_Fab_1_Vehicle/lady_penelope_fab_1_vehicle.html

There are more Gerry Anderson premiums on the site too:

https://cerealoffers.com/Kelloggs/Sugar_Smacks/sugar_smacks.html

WILL'S GERRY ANDERSON MODEL MAILAWAYS

Hi Woodsy. Some of my recently acquired model mailaways. 

Enjoy,

Will O.

UK

Kellogg's Sugar Smacks SPV. 

Smiths crisps Thunderbirds.

Lyon’s Maid Airfix Stingray with paperwork.

50 Years of New Zealand Cereal Toys 1950-2000: A BOOK REVIEW

"50 Years of New Zealand Cereal Toys 1950-2000, Stephen Summers & Peter Fisher, privately published in August 2006, Wellington, New Zealand. A4 size, 185 pages, Paperback."

I remember seeing a mention of this book when it came out in 2006, but I did not get a copy at the time, although I did borrow it from the library. It was not until 2024 that I finally found a copy, and grabbed it.

Only the cover is in colour, the contents are entirely in black and white. Picture quality is enough to show the toys and what they looked like, but does not allow a lot of detail to be seen.

There are three pages of introductory material, covering the history of cereal toys in New Zealand, and the main players. These were Sanitarium, Kellogg’s, Timaru Milling, and Cereal Foods (later Nabisco).

The book covers mainly plastic toys, along with comics, and the cardboard cut-outs often featured on the back of cereal packets. Cards and stickers are not included.

Toys that were included with other products are also included, along with Sets of Unknown Origin. Some are one-piece mouldings, others are small kit sets.

According to the book, the toys included in NZ cereals were produced either in New Zealand or Australia. Some of the Australian toys originally made by Rosenhain & Lipmann were produced in NZ by Consolidated Plastics Limited in Auckland.

Generally the toys were produced in sets, and each toy came in several different colours, so there were plenty of different toy/colour combinations to collect. Each set gets either half a page, or a full page.

Each entry includes the name of the cereal company that issued the toy; date of issue; the material used; number of toys in the set; and known colours; along with Notes. Then the photos, along with a name and number for each toy.

At the back of the book are period advertisements, and the various cut-out toys that were often included on the back of cereal packets. Then the index.

As we mainly had toast for breakfast in my house, I had very few cereal toys growing up, except for those given to me by family friends. Looking through this book, it is obvious that many of the small plastic toys I did have came originally from cereal packets.

I was very pleased to add this book to my collection. I doubt it is easy to find today, even in New Zealand.

Paul Adams from New Zealand

MEXICAN MOONBASE CEREAL MODELS

 I saw these a while back on the Spanish auction site Todocollecion.

Seen once before years ago here on MC,

they are Mexican cereal models 

in the R&L space style.

These models appear to be

based partly on the space vehicles

and moonbase art

of Ed Valigursky, the NOVA rocket, the Booster Rocket, MEV2 and the Moonbase modules.

Below we see a chromed garage module with a ramp, which I believe to be a model of  Valigursky's rendition of this shown beneath it. I can see the MEV2 vehicle inside the chromed model.

A lovely lot and one which I'd love to see fully assembled.

WILL'S SUGAR SMACKS JOE CAR

My latest find… the Sugar Smacks Joe 90 Car .

Quite a nice one. Will O

Spacemen!

Dear Moonbase,

I thought that you might be interested to know that the spacemen that you show - in Wotan's C to Shining C - were given away as free gifts with Kellogs Rice Krispies; see:

https://cerealoffers.com/Kelloggs/Rice_Krispies/1960s/Spacemen/spacemen.html

They were designed by Len Carter, then the Executive Secretary of the British Interplanetary Society (of which I am a Fellow); the ship in the background in the advert above is the BIS Moonship; see:

https://www.spaceflighthistories.com/post/bis-lunar-mission

Oddly enough, instead of using the BIS space suit as a model, Len Carter used a suit drawn by Fred L Wolff for "Worlds in Space" by Martin Caidin:

Hope this is of interest!

Grif

UK

A NOVA GOOD IDEA

I've always liked the NOVA. It was my favourite SpaceX toy as a kid.

When I saw this small kit years ago on Ebay I snapped it up.

Its a Mexican R&L inspired mini kit, like the ones that were cereal free gifts.

There's a Booster Rocket too and Project SWORD-type Moon Modules, but they are harder to find.

There's often a NOVA floating around on Ebay com.

Have you got anything like this?

HOT STEALS

Hello Woodsy

At the weekend in a Connecticut supermarket I saw the attached cereal box.

Sadly no free gift, it's just a big tease!

What do you think?

Terranova47

USA

ED'S CUT-OUT 707 AIRLINER

For many years I was hot and heavy into paper/cardboard models but in all that time only ended up with one airplane. 

Here's a nice Boeing 707 Cheerios offered up back in the '60s. I scanned the artwork, printed it out on heavy cardstock, then made my own version. Hope you like it.

Cheers

Ed Berg

Las Vegas