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| My first look at a Hot Wheel up close was one Christmas morning while I was still in grade school. In between the flying wrapping paper and chaos, the cool red-orange flames and chrome mags flashing on the package caught my eyes and I was hooked. It was an orange Custom Fleetside (I still have it) and when I tore it out of the blister the weight of it in my hand and the bright color and detail just seemed so cool. It was so much more sophisticated than my other toys up to this point, and a lot more valuable in my mind. I carried it around all day and never put it down. I even took it to my friend's house down the street to show it off. Later, when I would visit my cousins, they would start to collect them and we would set up track and have races in the living room. I never, ever played with them outside; these little cars were different than the other toys and so I would regard them as such. I would usually take one along with me to school and show it off to the other kids at recess and lunchtime. One day while I was at my cousin's house in Torrance, this guy came around with a bunch of cars that he had collected from the Mattel factory dumpster! He let a half-dozen or so kids grab an armful of loose redlines out of this box and that is what started my collection. I still have the pink cars and the loose parts of cars that I saved. The cars are still in a C-9 condition today like they were when I pulled them out. As the years passed, I lost or gave away all of my old toys but always kept my large 72 car collector case filled with redlines as well as other cases. I collected Rrumblers for awhile in '72 and '73. When Mattel discontinued the Spectraflame colors I lost interest in the "flat" colored redlines. I later bought a few 'Real Riders' when they came out in the '80s but that was it. In 1990, I was checking out a collectible toy swap meet and saw all the redlines for sale and that sucked me back into collecting. I spent all the money I had that day and brought home a dozen cars or so. From that time on, I have been looking everywhere for redlines and enjoying the great finds on the internet and on eBay. My collection has grown considerably to 300 cars at least, all loose. No blisterpacks for me; I am a "hands-on" kind of guy. My favorite cars (since I was a child) are the "Customs" and my favorite color is Antifreeze. I have managed to collect all the Antifreeze cars that were made except the Beach Bomb. After all these years, I am still amazed to see a car in a shade of color that I have never seen before and judging by the prices of the cars today, it appears many other folks feel the same way too. |
| Happy Searching, Beatnik Bandito |
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