JoeDios.com Forums - View Single Post - What's your G.I.*JOE History?

Re-buying your HISS tank is the best. Amazing! I keep wondering if I'll ever run into my repainted Stinger jeep (neon decals and muddy tires).

My history: 1982, I was a moderate Star Wars collector. For my birthday, I got Breaker and the JUMP. Dunno what possessed my parents to buy GIJoe except maybe because it was new and they didn't know what SW stuff I didn't have. Breaker was an oddball for a while. I remembered the fragile Micronauts from the '70s and was weary of too much articulation. But the basic olive drab uniform, headset and jetpack were really different (SW backpacks were really hard to come by). Plus, ingenious Hasbro included a full color catalog of all the figures and vehicles. I'd comb that thing daily, dreaming of a chance to get the VAMP or MOBAT. Slowly, Joes and their three meager Cobras took the place of Star Wars. By 1986, I had most of everything save the Flagg & TTBP. Of course, when I hit high school, it all went into the attic.

In 2008, I finally decide to clean out my remaining stuff from the parents' place. So I travel back to Texas, not really prepared for what I find. Discolored, often broken and covered with inches of dust, my boxes of Joes wait to be reboxed for shipping. Intimidated, I grabbed my '82 figure case and returned to Denver. Since all their O-rings were shot, I checked online for a way to replace them. Ran into the FAQ at YoJoe.com. That was it: once I repaired those guys, the love was back, and I went to get the rest of my collection. I planned to sell most of it and keep the original 13 and vehicles, but it didn't happen. Once I found JoeDios, the cool shots of unknown figures and vehicles led me to eBay, not to sell, but to increase my collection. Checking out photos and diostories here has really brought Joe collecting back to life.

I wonder how many collectors kept it up since childhood, without that "growing up" phase in the middle?

01-13-2010, 06:34 AM	#8
cyko Plastic Sciences, Ph.D Offline --> Posts: 2,002 --> Join Date: Sep 2008	Re-buying your HISS tank is the best. Amazing! I keep wondering if I'll ever run into my repainted Stinger jeep (neon decals and muddy tires). My history: 1982, I was a moderate Star Wars collector. For my birthday, I got Breaker and the JUMP. Dunno what possessed my parents to buy GIJoe except maybe because it was new and they didn't know what SW stuff I didn't have. Breaker was an oddball for a while. I remembered the fragile Micronauts from the '70s and was weary of too much articulation. But the basic olive drab uniform, headset and jetpack were really different (SW backpacks were really hard to come by). Plus, ingenious Hasbro included a full color catalog of all the figures and vehicles. I'd comb that thing daily, dreaming of a chance to get the VAMP or MOBAT. Slowly, Joes and their three meager Cobras took the place of Star Wars. By 1986, I had most of everything save the Flagg & TTBP. Of course, when I hit high school, it all went into the attic. In 2008, I finally decide to clean out my remaining stuff from the parents' place. So I travel back to Texas, not really prepared for what I find. Discolored, often broken and covered with inches of dust, my boxes of Joes wait to be reboxed for shipping. Intimidated, I grabbed my '82 figure case and returned to Denver. Since all their O-rings were shot, I checked online for a way to replace them. Ran into the FAQ at YoJoe.com. That was it: once I repaired those guys, the love was back, and I went to get the rest of my collection. I planned to sell most of it and keep the original 13 and vehicles, but it didn't happen. Once I found JoeDios, the cool shots of unknown figures and vehicles led me to eBay, not to sell, but to increase my collection. Checking out photos and diostories here has really brought Joe collecting back to life. I wonder how many collectors kept it up since childhood, without that "growing up" phase in the middle?