1976 was a very special year, and not just because it happens to be the year of my birth. 1976 also marked the 200th birthday of the United States. In celebration of the Bicentennial, the US issued commemorative coins and sponsored other events such as fireworks displays in an attempt to whip the country into a patriotic fervor.

In The Collectible ’70s: A Price Guide to the Polyester Decade, Michael Jay Goldberg devotes an entire chapter to the Bicentennial. All kinds of items were produced during this time period to commemorate the occasion (and to cash in on America’s fascination the Bicentennial). From Betsy Ross linen wall hangings and official NRA Freedom Bicentennial belt buckles to Liberty Bell-shaped cookie jars and commemorative Bicentennial air sickness bags, one couldn’t escape the Bicentennial fervor that was gripping the country.

But wait, there’s more! Check out this psychedelic video produced by the United States Information Agency specifically for the Bicentennial:

Happy Fourth of July, all!

For today’s Wordless Wednesday post, Heather Weaver from Geek Mom Mashup has provided a picture from her youth - from the year 1989 to be exact.

Is it just me or does Heather look a little like Molly Ringwald from her Brat Pack days?

Its a shame that Heather did not submit this picture during The RollerBlog Eighties Photo Contest as this picture would have definitely been a top contender!

If you want to share your seventies (or eighties) pictures with the world feel free to send them my way and I’ll add ‘em to the collection

Thanks to Heather for sharing this great photo.

It’s been almost a year since I started The RollerBlog, and I finally own my first book about the 1970s. The book is called The Collectible ’70s: A Price Guide to the Polyester Decade by Michael Jay Goldberg, and it is a veritable compendium to the entire decade. The Collectible ’70s is especially geared towards collectors, and includes details on what one would expect to pay for various seventies treasures from Tupperware catalogs and mushroom-shaped wall hangings to bongs and leisure suits.

Even though I am not much of a collector (yet… anyways), I have enjoyed browsing through the book and learning more about my favorite decade (sorry eighties - you are a close second!). The first chapter of the book, Around the ’70s House, describes the high tech and earthy/natural styles that were both popular around the seventies home. Molded resin wall clock with mushrooms and ladybugs? Check. Lava lamp? Check. Shag carpet rug rake? Check. Hi tech plastic 8 track player? Check.

The Collectible ’70s continues with a chapter on nostalgia for the 1930s, 1940s and 1950s that was commonplace during the 1970s, as well as counterculture (underground comix, Monster T-shirts, pinback buttons) to pop culture items influenced by the sexual revolution and drug culture. The book also includes chapters on the handicrafts craze (embroidered wall hangings of daisies and owls, anyone?) to fads such as kung fu, CB Radios, mood rings, smiley faces, and Sillisculpts.

One of my favorite sections focuses on TV collectibles. Apparently I have only scratched the surface of seventies television so far on The RollerBlog - I haven’t even thought about All in the Family, Laverne & Shirley, Three’s Company, The Bionic Woman, Love Boat, Mork and Mindy… the list goes on. To my delight, the book also includes an entire chapter on Sid & Marty Krofft’s shows (Land of the Lost plastic dinosaurs) and another one on The Muppet Show (Fozzie the Bear hand puppet). Not to mention midnight movies (Rocky Horror Picture Show poster), music (a memorial Elvis bust), punk & new wave (a 1978 Patti Smith Group record)… and an obligatory chapter on disco (collectible Saturday Night Fever trash can!).

So, all in all a good read. I expect I’ll be referring to The Collectible ’70s in the future whenever I need some seventiespiration.

A big thank you to Jim Sutherland introducing me to this book and for providing me with a copy.

Remember Pop Rocks?

My brother and I used to get Pop Rocks in our Christmas stockings. We’d get other candy and nuts and fruit too but I have a clear association in my mind with Pop Rocks and Christmas. I do occasionally see Pop Rocks around at toy stores and other specialty shops so now I carry on the tradition and make a point to put Pop Rocks in RollerBoy’s stocking every Christmas.

For those of you deprived souls that have never had the pleasure of experiencing this taste sensation for yourself, Pop Rocks is a carbonated candy that produces a unique sensation after placed in one’s mouth. This candy doesn’t melt in your mouth, it explodes in your mouth - accompanied by popping sounds, fizzing, and a tingly tongue. I haven’t had Pop Rocks in years but I remember exactly what it tastes feels like.

First introduced in 1975, Pop Rocks used to be ubiquitous but I don’t see it around much these days. There is a Pop Rocks Urban Legend that claims Little Mikey (of Life Cereal fame) died in a freakish accident by mixing pop rocks and soda, causing his stomach to literally explode. The legend claims that is the true reason why Pop Rocks were taken off the market in the early eighties. Seeing as how Little Mikey is still alive the legend is obviously not true. Hmmm… maybe I’ll have to try it

For today’s Wordless Wednesday post, Kathy from The Junk Drawer has graciously agreed to share some Christmas photos from her childhood. She has two pictures; in the first one she and her siblings are glasses-free, and in the second one all three of them are sporting a pair of glasses.

As she put it, 1972 was “A Good Year for Ophthalmology”

Christmas, 1971: Michael with good eyes, Ann with good eyes, Kathy with good eyes.

New Year’s Day, 1973: Ann, Michael, and Kathy with glasses.

If you want to share your seventies (or eighties) pictures with the world feel free to send them my way and I’ll add ‘em to the collection

Thanks to Kathy for submitting these great pictures.

My family has a love affair with the movie Fiddler on the Roof. Every family has its own unique traditions, and one of ours is to settle down for a viewing of Fiddler every Thanksgiving after we have gorged ourselves on turkey, mashed potatoes, cranberry sauce, and my mom’s famous blackberry pie.

Thus I was somewhat surprised to find that Topol, the actor who plays the lead character Tevye the milkman in Fiddler, also has a prominent role in Flash Gordon. Topol plays Dr. Hans Zarkov, an eccentric scientist who is ridiculed for his theories about the destruction of the Earth by an unkown entity. As I watched the film I kept expecting Zarkov to break into a jig and belt out an invigorating rendition of “If I Were a Rich Man” or “To life! To life! L’chai-im!”. So it was a little difficult for me to take Zarkov’s character seriously in Flash Gordon.

Actually it was hard for me to take anything seriously in Flash Gordon. And that is the beauty of the movie - it is an unabashedly campy, over-the-top film. Starring Sam J. Jones as New York Jets quarterback Flash Gordon, Melody Anderson as Dale Arden and Max von Sydow as the evil Emperor Ming the Merciless, Flash Gordon is the lastest movie that I am happy to add to my “So Bad It’s Good” collection.

Flash Gordon begins with Ming the Merciless, Emporer of the kingdom of Mongo, who decides to wreak havoc on the utterly unimportant planet Earth out of boredom. The Earth is beseiged by a series of natural disasters, including huricanes, typhoons, meteor storms, tornadoes, earthquakes, and volcanic eruptions… not to mention the deadly hot hail and the dastardly strange craters in the wilderness. This turn of events forces a small airplane carrying Dale and Flash to make an emergency landing, and they manage to land safely in Dr. Zarkov’s laboratory. Zarkov tricks them into launching into outerspace in his rocket so that they can confront the evil entity that is convinced must be attacking the Earth.

The trio lands on the planet of Mongo, ruled by the evil Emperor Ming the Merciless. Ming rules with an iron fist, and by encouraging feuds between the rival kingdoms in his domain. Ming puts Flash to death, but he is promptly resurrected by Ming’s spoiled daughter Princess Aura (Ornella Muti) who smuggles him out of Mongo and tries to seduce him.

Flash and Aura travel to the Kingdom of Arboria, where Prince Barin (Timothy Dalton) imprisons Flash in a cage lowered into a foul swamp. Flash relies upon his wits and manages to escape from Arboria, only to end up in the Kingdom of Prince Vultan (Brian Blessed) and his flying hawkmen. Eventually Flash manages to get the feuding princes Vultan and Barin to work together to overthrow Ming. They all travel back to Mongo, where they interrupt Ming’s wedding to the reluctant Dale and save the day. Oh, happy day! Cue - Flash Gordon theme song!

And what a theme song it is. One of my favorite aspects to Flash Gordon is the soundtrack, entirely composed by Queen. The iconic theme song is the anthem for the entire fim - “Flash! ah-ahh! Savior of the Universe! He’ll save everyone of us! Flash! ah-ahh! He’s a miracle! King of the impossible! He’s for everyone of us!” After watching the movie now I’m just itching to get my hands on the Flash Gordon album.

Pathetic earthlings. Hurling your bodies out into the void, without the slightest inkling of who or what is out here. If you had known anything about the true nature of the universe, anything at all, you would’ve hidden from it in terror. ~Ming the Merciless

Hooray, I have won an award!

Actually, two different bloggers have bestowed the same award on me in the past week, Flo from Mama Flo’s Place and Henson from Henson’s Hell.

The award is the Arte y Pico Award. This award was created to be given to bloggers who inspire others with their creative energy and their talents, whether it be writing or artwork, in all medias. When you receive this award it is considered a “special honor”.

And so, following the rules of this award, I shall now pass along this prestigious award to five of my favorite blogs. There are also a bunch of other tiresome rules that you can read at the Arte y Pico blog (my Spanish is a bit rusty and seeing as the entire site is in Spanish I’m not exactly sure what it is about. However the rules for the contest are in English).

So, without further ado, I hereby bestow the Arte y Pico award to the following five blogs:

Zeitheist

Mini-Obs

Deb on the Rocks

Cromley’s World

Monkey Fables and Tales

Feel free to pass along the award to five other blogs, or not, as you see fit. Congratulations and keep on blogging the good blog!

—

Newsflash! The RollerBlog has won the Arte & Pico Award yet another time, this time from Buddy’s Fitness News. Thanks Buddy!

For today’s Wordless Wednesday post, I have an ADORABLE picture of fellow blogger Saphrym from Saphrym.com. He submitted the following photo from his Canadian citizenship ID, taken during the 1970s:

Cute, huh?

If you want to share your seventies (or eighties) pictures with the world feel free to send them my way and I’ll add ‘em to the collection

Thanks to Saphrym for submitting the picture.

Today is not only Father’s Day, but it the day that we are celebrating RollerReggie’s birthday. The Double Whammy. That means that the day has to be TWICE as special.

So this year, RollerReggie not only got a brand new record player (so that we can listen to our seventies records), but he also received a copy of the newly released book Wacky Packages. Wacky Packages (or Wacky Packs) were a series of collectible trading cards (a la Garbage Pail Kids) from the 1970s. The cards parodied consumer products and brands such as Tide detergent, Downy fabric softener, Skippy peanut butter, Land O Lakes butter, Wheaties cereal, numerous cigarette brands, and more. Each Wacky Pack card doubled as a sticker, so that you could either collect the cards or peel off the stickers.

RollerReggie recalls that Wacky Packs were all the rage when he was between the ages of seven and nine. He collected all of the cards, as did his friends. Sadly, RollerReg does not own them any longer. As a kid he peeled off all the stickers and stuck them to his bedpost.

Here are a few of his favorites:

Crust Tooth Paste

Hawaiian Punks Juice

Head & Boulders Shampoo

Peter Pain Peanut Butter

Today is the birthday of my better half, my best friend, my one and only RollerReggie!

Please join me in wishing him many happy returns. Happy birthday sweetie!

RollerReggie in 1986