Monday, November 27, 2017

Cracker Jack Toys

Thursday, November 30, 2017
Sunny with some cloud
3 C  38 F


Cracker Jack 
Toys



    I was on Liveauctioneers looking at the upcoming auction from American Antique Auctions, when I came across some interesting toys. Upon closer inspection, the toys turned out to be from Cracker Jack.

   For those who don't know, Cracker Jack is a famous candy that is molasses-coated popcorn. It used to come in a box, but lately comes in a plasticized bag. Also, there used to be a toy in the box, but in 2016, the current owner of the company , Frito-Lay decided to stop including a toy in the box. The company was  registered in 1896, and their famous slogan was "The More You eat The More You Want".

   When molasses is added to  popcorn, the popcorn sticks together.  The creator of Cracker Jack was  Mr. Frederick William Rueckheim, and eventually he bought out his partner in the company, and brought in his brother Louis. Louis found a solution to "stick popcorn" by adding a small amount of oil to batches of popcorn. This added a small coating to the popcorn kernels, and prevented them from sticking together. There was also peanuts in the boxes of Cracker Jack.

   If you want to read the fascinating story of Cracker Jack, please visit wikipedia at the link below:




Collider Image used from the Internet

   The toys that came in the Cracker Jack box were actually quite small, since they had to fit into the box.  The toys appear to be made from a soft metal such as tin. I would also "guess", that some toys would have to be bent into shape and assembled, since as you can see below, some of the toys are quite big when assembled.

    THe T
Below:

Groupings of Cracker Jack toys from the 1920's








    What's interesting to note is that as of today (I am writing this post on November 27, 2017), the starting bid for these groupings is set at $ 20.00 U.S. That's certainly interesting, since the  in 1915, a 1 1/4 ounce of Cracker Jack could be purchased for 5 cents (U.S.)! Now if you happened to inherit these toys from your grandparents and sold them, you could have made a great return on them!


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