Remco
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Remco Industries, Inc. was a toy company in the United States founded in the 1940s. It was best known for toys marketed and sold in the late 1950s and early 1960s, like the 'Johnny Reb Cannon', 'Mighty Matilda Atomic Aircraft Carrier', 'Remco Voice Control Kennedy Airport' (which featured model airplanes of American, TWA and United Airlines, an album player and an album which played a voice giving landing and take-off instructions) and the tethered 'Electronic Falcon Plane' that "flies itself". The company's slogan was "Every Boy Wants a Remco Toy...And So Do Girls!"[1]
History
Remco was founded by two cousins whose names were Ike Heller and Saul Robbins. Armand Daddis soon joined the two as the company gradually moved from simple 'walkie-talkies' to a variety of sophisticated remote control toys. The name Remco comes from the two words "Remote Control". Originally located in Newark, NJ, the company later moved to nearby Harrison, NJ.
The boxes and toys were printed with just the company name and the city on them, but there were a few more clues as to the company's physical location on packaging. A street address listed on the back of the 1960 light bulldog tank box is "113 North 13th Street, Newark 7, NJ." The address on the instruction sheet for factory service return of the 1966 Lost in Space Robot is "Cape May St., Harrison, NJ." The Harrison location is now occupied by the Red Bull Arena, while the Newark location is now occupied by a furniture outlet.
In the mid-1960s, Remco acquired several licenses for popular culture groups and TV shows and proceeded to make a variety of toys. Some of these were the Beatles, the Monkees, Lost In Space, The Munsters, Batman and Star Trek. One popular toy in the early 1960s was the 24 inch long functioning scuba diver with mask, knife, utility belt, rifle, walkie-talkie, air tanks, and floating location buoy.
From the 1980s through the 1990s, Remco made a variety of generic diecast and plastic trucks and other vehicles, usually uniformly made about four inches long. Vehicles were attractive and sturdy, though not uniform in scale, and included a tanker truck, fire truck, delivery van, cherry picker truck, skid steer, Jeep, and many more. A few vehicles were larger, like the seven inch long "Tuff Ones" "Recyclable Waste Management Corp." truck with opening side doors for "cans", "glass", and "paper".
Bankruptcy
Remco filed for bankruptcy in 1971 and was acquired by Azrak-Hamway International, Inc. (AHI), a toy company, in New York, NY in 1974.
The company was known by toy collectors for their many Universal Monsters figures produced during the 1980s. These figures were a continuation of the license and figures first produced by AHI during the 1970s. Steel Tec was distributed by Remco Toys, Inc. of New York, NY, from 1992-1997 and was a division of parent company Azrak Hamway International. In 1997, Jakks Pacific acquired Remco from Azrak-Hamway.
Toys
- 1950s Space Commander Walkie Talkies [2]
- 1953 Medicine Chest
- 1955 Big Max (magnetic robot that picked off iron slugs from battery operated conveyor belt and placed them into slots)
- 1958 Giant Wheel Cowboys'n Indians Game
- 1958 Giant Wheel Thrills'n Spills Horse Race Game
- 1959 Coney Island Penny Machine (Combination crane game and coin bank)[3]
- 1959 Flying Fox Airliner
- 1959 Little Red Spinning Wheel
- 1959 Movieland Drive-In Theater (consisted of cars, a drive in board with car spaces, a place to list "Featured Movies" along with blue and white double-bill cards that slid into the marquee; the "movie" was a film strip that projected by a battery operated light bulb onto a 4"x6" screen that attached to the drive in. Titles included Heckle and Jeckle, Have Gun Will Travel, Mighty Mouse, Farmer Al Falfa)
- 1959 Yankee Doodle Secret Rocket Test Center [4]
- 1960 Frogman the US Navy Commando
- 1960 Light Bulldog Tank #706 Montgomary Ward
- 1960 Whirlybird Helicopter
- 1961 Hippopotamus Electric Puzzle Game called Happy Hippopotamus Game
- 1961 Johnny Reb Cannon
- 1961 Mighty Matilda Aircraft Carrier
- 1961 Shark Remote Control Race Car
- 1962 Fascination Pool Game
- 1962 Arthur Showboat Theater Playset
- 1962 Littlechap Dolls
- 1962 Caravelle Radio Transmitter and Receiver[5]
- 1963 Barracuda Submarine
- 1963 USMC Bazooka
- 1963 Super Car
- 1964 Mr.Kelly's Car Wash
- 1964 Beatles Figures
- 1964 Hamilton Invaders
- 1964 Project Yankee Doodle
- 1964 Monkey Division
- 1964 Lyndon B. Johnson Doll
- 1964 Senator Barry Goldwater Doll
- 1964 Blippo Building Blocks
- 1964 Munsters
- 1966 Batman Wrist Radios
- 1965 Bulldog Army Tank
- 1965 Duffy's Daredevils
- 1965 Kennedy Airport Air Traffic Control Center
- 1965 Screaming Mee Mee-e Rifle
- 1966 Lost in Space Robot
- 1966 Pussy Meow Doll
- 1967 Mighty Mike Motorized Trucks
- 1967 Polo Pony
- 1967 Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea Sub sets
- 1967 Star Trek Astro Cruiser
- 1968 Land of the Giants Space Sled
- 1968 Astro Train
- 1968 Boeing United Airlines 727 Toy Airplane (4.7 ft long)
- 1969 Baby Sister Grow-A-Tooth
- 1969 Tru-Smoke Trucks[6]
- 1969 Tumbling Tom Boy Doll
- 1969 Frustration Ball[7]
- 1970 Speedrail Monorail
- 1970 Dune Buggy Wheelies
- 1970 Jumpsy Doll
- 1970 Mister Brain[8]
- 1970 Monkees Figures
- 1971 Finger Ding Paper Dolls
- 1971 Baby Laugh a Lot
- 1973 Partridge Family Doll
- 1975 Star Trek Utility Belt
- 1976 I Dream of Jeannie Bottle
- 1976 McDonaldland Playset and figures
- 1977 System 7 Rifle
- 1978 Energized Spider-Man
- 1978 Kiss Makeup Kit
- 1978 Mickey Mouse Candy Factory
- 1978 Bill Cosby's Kids
- 1979 the Incredible Hulk Instant Muscles
- 1980 Universal Monsters Figures
- 1981 Dukes of Hazzard
- 1982 Sgt. Rock for DC
- 1982 Warlord for DC
- 1983 Crystar Action Figures[9]
- 1984 Conan Action Figures
- 1984 Mighty Crusaders Action Figures
- 1985 AWA Remco Action Figures Wrestling Figures
- 1985 Firffels The "Original" Two-feature Creature
- 1986 Karate Kid Action Figures [10]
- 1987 My Sweet 16 Play Cosmetics
- 1992 Steel Tec Motorized Construction Set
- 1994 Swat Kats action figures
References
- ↑ "You Can Tell It’s Mattel… It’s Swell!", Tim Forbes, American Heritage
- ↑ Coopee, Todd. "Space Commander Walkie Talkies from Remco". https://toytales.ca/space-commander-walkie-talkies-from-remco-1950s/.
- ↑ "The Magic Market", Time, Dec. 14, 1959
- ↑ Coopee, Todd. "Yankee Doodle Secret Rocket Test Center from Remco (1959)". https://toytales.ca/yankee-doodle-secret-rocket-test-center-remco-1959/.
- ↑ Coopee, Todd. "Caravelle Radio Transmitter and Receiver". https://toytales.ca/caravelle-radio-transmitter-and-receiver/.
- ↑ Coopee, Todd. "Mini Tru-Smoke Diesel Mod-Pad Carrier from Remco". https://toytales.ca/mini-tru-smoke-diesel-mod-pad-carrier-from-remco-1970/.
- ↑ Coopee, Todd. "Frustration Ball from Remco". https://toytales.ca/frustration-ball-remco-1969/.
- ↑ Coopee, Todd. "Mister Brain, the Tru-Smoke Robot". https://toytales.ca/mister-brain-the-tru-smoke-robot/.
- ↑ Coopee, Todd. "The Saga of Crystar, Crystal Warrior from REMCO (1982)". https://toytales.ca/saga-crystar-crystal-warrior-remco-1982/.
- ↑ Coopee, Todd. "The Karate Kid from Remco (1986)". https://toytales.ca/karate-kid-from-remco-1986/.
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