Ayyyyyy Mego Museum Christmas Contest

[Nostalgiabuff]

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I remember the one Christmas where Captain Kirk took me out with a flying knee kick. I was dead to the world, LOL

[Jason Saville]

My first MEGO memory, the one that forged my MegoLove... I was just a few years old, in the time when medical science was doctors in lab coats sucking on an unfiltered Lucky Strike, my simple migraines were misdiagnosed as some immune disorder. For months I was forced to live in an oxygen tent... A bubble. Yes, I was a 70s bubble boy. And my Worlds Greatest Superheroes weren't considered sterile enough to join me in the tent. But, I had to have them, had to. So they were on a table next to my bubble. Imagination is a wonderful thing. But, how much fun can it be to stare at them through plastic. A wonderful orderly with a great sense for kids found the perfect way to get me feeling upbeat... Shazaam was my fave character, and this orderly used to take his body suit off, put it on his hand such that his fingers were the arms, and his legs. He put the boots on, the cape. And just doing simple finger puppetry... Shazaam came ALIVE! I can never adequately describe the sheer magical effect this had on me. A 4 year old in a plastic sterile tent can get pretty down... In those moments with the orderly... He made those heroes come alive and they saved me. They literally saved me. MEGO is a brand filled with magic. As an adult, I can admire their business accumen and the positive way in which they made a living by offering joy and fun, but it is always overshadowed by just that sheer pit in the stomach "magic" feeling I get when Mego are near.

[knight errant00]

So many, but . . .

First story: I remember the first time I saw Megos, at age 7 or so, in the toy aisle at Target. I was a huge fan of '66 Batman (in perpetual reruns at that point) and I still remember having an instant vision of having the Batman and Robin figures (RC Batman but painted mask Robin, both in Window boxes) and hanging the pair of them posed batrope-walk style on the wall next to my bed.

Which eventually, following my birthday and Christmas, I did.

Second story: I longed for the Batcave playset, but my parents always refused saying it was too expensive and a waste of money at that price. And as my Mego interests expanded to Star Trek (my other favorite TV show at the time), so did their refusals on the bridge playset.

Until one afternoon, when my mom came home from Kmart and asked if I'd want the Mego Star Trek Bridge playset.

Evidently, the Kmart near us was blowing them out on clearance, and they were about a third of their regular price. The only catch? I had to pay for it myself. Which was no problem because I was that kid that always put some of his uncle and grandparent birthday and Christmas money away, and I had a few bills stashed in my sock drawer.

I remember Mom driving back to Kmart with me and then walking into the store to see two pyramids of boxed Bridge playsets stacked at the front of the store. I walked up and took one that was at my eye level, and we brought it the register and checked out. I can still remember unboxing it when we got home, and carefully applying all the stickers before populating it with my crew of Kirk, Spock, Scotty, and McCoy, who were then sent on their first mission planetside using a transporter that didn't exist solely in my imagination.

[boss]

I remember realizing what a carded Mego looked like when wrapped under the tree... probably around 1977.

[Duncan]

I remember getting my Wonder Woman figure. My Mom took me to a Gimbels in Philly, and the toy department was right next to children's shoes. The Megos weren't on a shelf. We had to go back to an office, or maybe a closet, where the top 1/2 of the door opened. Pretty sure one of the guys from Shoes came over to help us.

[PNGwynne]

I'm envious that you had a Wonder Woman, and even more so that it was specially handed to you across a dutch door.

[rodkeith]

When I was about to turn 7, somehow I figured out that my Mom hid birthday presents for me in the back of her closet. I remember pushing past shoes where I happened to find, in a white shopping bag, a Captain Marvel (ahem, Shazam) figure in his blue box. Somehow I must not have covered my incursion well enough, because she knew I went in there. Mom told me never to look for my presents. As a punishment, I suppose, I did NOT receive that figure the following week on the day. In fact, I didn't EVER get it-- she brought it back to the store. :^(

Until I was an adult, of course! Now I have three. :^)

[Obibob]

My first Mego was a carded Aquaman from a now-defunct chain of department stores called Clarkins; specifically the one located on the corner of State Road and Steels Corners in Cuyahoga Falls, OH. Sometime in the early 70’s I saw him hanging on an end cap while at the store with my Dad. I of course immediately asked for it, but my Dad said “no” which was somewhat unusual since I didn’t normally ask for much, but when I did (and assuming it didn’t cost too much) he usually said “yes” Anyway, I sulked (pouted?) around until we got home at which point my Dad asked me to go get him something from the fridge, I don’t remember what, maybe some Vernor’s or Wink (remember those?) and there was the Aquaman sitting on the shelf! Dad was pretty sly about such things and constantly did stuff like this! In fact, one of the reasons that I adore the movie “A Christmas Story” and why it resonates with me so deeply is that my Dad was always doing stuff like hiding the BB gun that Ralphie wanted until the last gift was opened...he always seemed to know what I wanted the most for Christmas each year and always faked me out until the very last moment. Most of the time, my Mom didn’t even know what was going on...I lost my Dad back in 2003, but I still have a lot of great memories (and my first Mego) thanks to him! Merry Christmas Dad!

[Hedji]

Great thread. I am really enjoying taking the time to read these. Honestly, some of these ought to be published in a book of Mego memories.

[monitor_ep]

Mego Christmas 1977

As far as I can remember it was 1977 and for Christmas my brother & I would stare and drool at the toy ads from Sears, J.C. Penny's and Montgomery Wards. It was in one of those ads was the Mego Wayne Foundation. At this time we were watching reruns of the Batman 66 along with other Super-Hero shows and really wanted this playset. Growing up we we had to stretch money and could not ask for alot. Dad worked two jobs and Mom worked one and even put in a garden to help in the food budget (it was my job to take care of it), even Mom sewed button down shirts for us (said it was cheaper). As it got closer to Christmas we both wanted Megos but knew not to ask. Well then came Christmas and we woke up with a big surprise. The Wayne Foundation, Batmobile, Superman, Spider-Man, Batman, Robin!!
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That was the year of Super-Hero TV shows and that Christmas my brother and I will never forget the year our parents surprised us with this large gift. We would watch Batman 66 along with The Amazing Spider-Man, The Incredible Hulk, The Shazam/Isis Hour with our Megos. Eventually we would add the DC Villains and Super-Gals, Spider-Car, and a few more to flush out our collection. To this day I still have my original backboards and most of the furniture from the Wayne Foundation.

[UnderdogDJLSW]

I m loving these stories. The couple of pictures are great, too! For me, I've told this story before, but it is such a strong memory for me. I had an Action Jackson already, but I still remember not connecting the similarity of the figures together. My mom and I were at a Toys R Us. I don't remember why, but she was the one who saw the end cap and said it was OK to open the solid box to see what they looked like inside. She agreed to get two of them and I really wanted Robin, too. I remember thinking how cool he looked. I couldn't get him back into the box. Then my mom had trouble and I think she didn't get it closed correctly, so then finally relented and got the three. (at least that is how I remember it). My luck on getting three solid boxes was all because my mom saw that end cap and I still have the three and their boxes today.

[justzeg18]

Awesome! Thanks for doing this.

[TRDouble]

Every year, I got multiple Batman and Robin Mego figures because of stories like the one below.

Despite having multiple Mego Batman villains, sometimes I wanted to be the villain. This one time, I was a giant that had to be stopped by the Dynamic Duo. After putting them through all kinds of trials and tribulations, I set a trap and captured Robin. I tied up Robin, stuffed him inside a empty plastic butter cup, filled it with water and... stuffed him in the freezer! It was a cruel punishment, but I had to put Robin on Ice!

Eventually, Batman found me, defeated me, and rescued Robin from his icy prison. Unfortunately, when the ice thawed and Robin was pulled out of the cup, his limbs were the consistency of a Pinocchio marionette.

My Father ended up taking me up the road to Sears, back when they were in the city, to get me yet another replacement Mego Robin.

Merry Christmas, fellow Mego Museum’ers!!!

[YoungOnce]

It was actually on a Christmas that "Santa Clause" brought my first Megos. I remember thinking it was funny that Santa shopped at K-mart because the price stickers were still on them. (It might have been a Grants at that time; I know it was a K-mart after Grants... sometime in the early to mid 1970's).

In that first batch was a Batman, a Robin, a Joker, and a Dracula. I had no Batcave so I made one of my own out of the shoebox that my new sneakers came in. Turned on its side, it was just tall enough for the Megos to stand up inside. I cut a hole in the "roof" and tried to glue a straw to the "floor" to make a Bat-Pole but I could never get it to stand up straight. I drew the best Batcave scenery that I could on the back of the box by copying from a Batman coloring book that I had.

In our early adventures, Dracula worked for The Joker. I remember wishing that I had one of those cool villains from the Batman TV show, but in absence of a Riddler or a Penguin, Dracula would have to do. The fights were pretty even up until my birthday that next May when I got a Spiderman. After that, the good guys almost always won.

[MRP]

This story may horrify some, amuse others, but it is the story of the fate of my original Megos and my first attempt at customizing before I knew what customizing was or that it was a thing. It was 1981, I was 11 going on 12, and had just been introduced to D&D at Christmas the year before. I was big into Star Wars and Tolkien, Conan and fantasy in general as well and my interest in action figures/dolls/toys was waning a bit (except for Kenner Star Wars) because we moved every few years and I was forced to downsize how much I had every time we moved. A bunch of my Megos had gone in the summer of 80 when we moved to Maine from CT that year (and when we moved back to CT in '82 all my remaining toys would go).

Playing D&D introduced me to painted miniatures, but they were beyond my family's means to get any, so I decided to make my own D&D figures using some of my older toys and a bunch of stuff I found around the house (like the cocktail skewers shaped like swords, painted toothpicks, etc.) and my Testor's paints from my model making days. My raw materials were my Megos, some Super Joes I had lying around and other GI Joe Adventure steam stuff laying around. The Megos I still had were Conan, Thor, Green Arrow, Green Goblin, Lizard, Thing, Aquaman, a Klingon, Iron Man, Tarzan and Captain America. I had one Super Joe who punched when the buttons on his back were pushed, and an Intruder.

I stripped them down, did some kitbashing using the costumes and accessories, improvised using odds and ends and created an adventuring party and some monsters.

The Intruder became an ogre. I made a huge axe for him using a dowel, some paint and some pieces from an unused model kit to shape the plastic into axe blades and attach them to the dowel.

Lizard was a no brainer, he became a lizard man, wearing Conan's fur briefs and having a spear made from toothpicks glued together and painted..

Green Goblin got stripped down and became a D&D goblin using some tin foil for an chain mail shirt, some leftover Adventure team pants cut down for leggings and a cocktail skewer sword.

Thing was mostly unaltered and used as a Stone Golem.

Those were my monsters.

My other villain was their master, the Klingon, who became an evil wizard. Some oversized GI Joe clothes became kitbashed into a rob, a dowel for a staff.



My adventuring party-

Green Arrow became the swashbuckling Errol Flynn type fighter. He kept his hat, but had another tin foil mail short, Conan's pirate boots and a pair of Star Trek pants I had lying around. Add a cocktail sword and he was good to go.

Thor became another fighter, a knight. He had Conan's sword, Cap's shield (which had the sticker peeled off and a new heraldic design pained on it after it was primed white. Tin foil armor. I used Iron Man's gloves and boots for him, repainted, with holes poked through the gloves so he could hold weapons in his gauntlets.

Conan became a viking warrior. Tarzan's body suit, tin foil mail shirt, a cutdown GI Joe shirt for a vest over the armor, Thor's helmet, wristband and boots, and his axe.

Iron Man became the cleric. I used Iron Man's body suit, Cap's red boots. Thor's cape removed from his suit and stitched to Iron Man's, a holy symbol added to his chest (the chest piece on the Iron Man armor had been missing for years) of the masked god (that looked like Iron Man's head) and wielding Thor's hammer.

Tarzan became the thief. Using the Klingon's clothes,the shirt worn backwards for leather armor and using his own dagger for his backstabbing activities.

Aquaman became the ranger, wearing most of Green Arrow's clothes and using his bow with a cocktail sword added to a rubber band belt with a scabbard attached and a cloak made from a GI Joe uniform.

Cap didn't get used except for his boots and shield, his head was just to distinctive to use as a D&D character.


I played with these a lot for about 3 months, making up D&D adventures for them, replacing tin foil (much to my mom's chagrin) as it wore out and cocktail swords as they broke. It pretty much destroyed the original stuff I used as raw materials, so there was no going back to their original form, and a little while later, when we moved again, these would go away along with most of my other childhood toys.

-M