THE CEREAL PRIZE PROJECT: GROUP 003
(Baseball Greats Trading Card, Willow Coin Trick, Bigfoot Stickers, The Great Waldo Peel & Win Game, Clifford Toothbrush)
#011 - Yogi Berra Baseball Greats Holo Card: (Kellogg's, 1986)
Additional Images:
Sealed in package.
It won't come as a shock to anyone to know that I don't watch sports, but that didn't keep me from collecting
baseball cards with fiery, jockstrapped passion as a kid. What started merely as a way to fit in with my
friends soon fed my born-with fixation on collecting anything and everything, and it wasn't long before I was
spending countless hours at card shops, wading through big binders, browsing Beckett and desperately trying to
seem knowledgeable - even if the only reason I kept buying Rollie Fingers cards was because I liked his name so
much. I can't tell you what teams he played on, but I can draw his mustache with my eyes closed down to every
last nuance.
Though gimmicky cards are traditionally the least valuable from a collector's standpoint (there were everything
from miniature baseball cards to cards so big you needed three hands even more than Benny, famous tit-fondler
from
Total Recall), kids never cared. Thus, Kellogg's holographic "Baseball Greats" - with images that
"moved" depending on which direction from which you looked at 'em - were as good a cereal premium as any kid
with a Wiffle ball set could stand. I plucked out Yogi Berra, just one of the many legendary players
immortalized as a flickering, alien baseball card shoved at the bottom of a Corn Flakes box.
#012 - Willow Magic Coin Trick: (Quaker, Cap'n Crunch, 1988)
Additional Images:
Sealed premium.
Shame, shame - I've still never seen
Willow. I know what it's about and I know who's in it, but for
whatever reason, the stars have never aligned between myself, my VCR and a copy of the movie. I'm going to die
never knowing what all that "YOU AWR GWEAT" shit from the old television ads was about. I can live with that -
I've been living with it for years. Likewise, while I've owned this
Willow coin trick gizmo for years,
I still have no idea how to use it.
I don't really
want to know, either. I'd like to save that lesson for a rainy day, when I'll actually
need something like a
Willow cereal premium to keep myself entertained. If you know how to use it,
please, don't e-mail me. Let me wallow in my ignorance. Don't teach me how to make coins mysteriously appear
and disappear within the item's slit-drenched plastic fold. Not now. Not yet.
Given out in boxes of Cap'n Crunch, the coin trick is just one of several
Willow-inspired magic toys
kids played with for thirty-six seconds in 1988.
#013 - Bigfoot Sticker Set: (Kellogg's, 1988)
Additional Images:
Sealed premium. Full sticker sheet - front. Full sticker sheet - back.
If cryptozoology was an accepted college major, I may have graduated. I love Bigfoot, and I love Bigfoot
stickers. Can't believe Kellogg's really
gave away Bigfoot stickers, but I ain't complaining. There
were three different styles available (Bigfoot shared the spotlight with two other monster types, though I
can't remember who), each consisting of one larger monster sticker and six smaller stickers representing that
particular monster's footprints. Not exactly to scale: In Bigfoot's case, his footprints are roughly four
times the size of his head. Maybe that's why he's called what he's called.
The beauty thing is, the stickers weren't tied to any movie, television show, comic book or toy line. On some
given month for whatever crazy drug-included reason, Kellogg's decided to pass out Bigfoot stickers just for the
hell of it. I can't imagine that they inspired many kids to try out a cereal they weren't otherwise eating
regularly, but for people like me, this was an Oh Fuck Yes moment -- Magnitude 9.9.
#014 - "The Great Waldo" Peel & Win Game: (Quaker, Life Cereal, 1991)
Additional Images:
Sealed premium. Unpeeled game piece.
The "Where's Waldo?" franchise, however less frequently thought of today it may be, will forever be a legend.
Who woulda thunk it was that easy to make fifty-seven trillion dollars? Who knew that all one had to do was
doodle really a cramped picture and make sure one of the 1,500 people in said picture was wearing stripes?
Inventions like these totally throw off the natural laws, the causes and effects and the aggregated curves
associated with failure/success ratios in creating stupid things and hoping somebody buys them. You could come
up with a hundred better ideas and never squeeze a nickel, but the guy who created "Where's Waldo?" now has
enough money to buy both your kidneys just to feed to his pet robot pig.
The "Great Waldo Peel & Win" toy search game was sponsored by Mattel, with 10,000 winners taking home one of the many new "Where's Waldo?" toys. I bet you can guess which company made them. The prize could've been anything from a board game to
a doll capable of haunting the dreams of even those who knew better. Marshmallow lovers beware: Contest pieces were only available in boxes of Life Cereal. Still on a rampage of revenge after so many people found Mikey, the people at Life HQ sold their souls to Mattel, fully knowing that nobody,
nobody, NOBODY ever finds Waldo. Shalom!
I lost. Good thing too, since the contest expired on New Year's Eve, 1992. Oh, the extra therapy sessions I'd have to book if I won a "Where's Waldo?" doll and nobody gave it to me. Once players cut their losses, they took home an also-included trading card. Concession prizes always suck.
#015 - Clifford Children's Toothbrush: (General Mills, Kix, 2002)
Additional Images:
Sealed premium.
Clifford, The Big Red Dog completely flew over my head throughout childhood. He'd pop up all over the
place -- book fairs, my friends' book reports, various educational posters warning that those who don't read
will invariable lead miserable lives -- but Cliff never pissed on my own personal trees of interest. I'm in
the minority, as any dog with this kind of longevity must be pretty rockin'. I tend to believe Clifford's fans
feel the way they do more because of his fiery red fur than the fact that he's taller than you-times-six, but I
know, I'm in no position to make such claims. You know Clifford better than I.
This fairly recent Clifford toothbrush premium was only available in Kix Cereal, about half the size of a
normal toothbrush, with a modified doggy figure serving as the handle. It's not much, but for a cereal so
overbearingly self-righteous about its straight-played healthy goodness as Kix, we're lucky we got anything at
all. Now go brush your teeth like a good dog.
--
Matt (6/13/05)
