Vintage Disney Valentines - 1970's

Well, it's February. That means Valentine's Day is just around the corner!

These vintage Valentine's, are from "boxed sets" which my mom purchased for me, back in the 1970's. Almost every year that I was in elementary school, I gave out Disney-themed Valentine's to my classmates. And I always ended up saving the extra ones, which weren't used:

It appears that someone left off Minnie's eyelashes on this next one. At least, I'm assuming that's Minnie.

I remember a few of the Valentines had very old-fashioned sayings on them. For example, this next one says, "You'll Be Sitting Pretty"....that phrase was outdated, even when I was a kid! I remember another Valentine featured Daisy Duck, knitting something from a ball of yarn and the caption said something like, "It's no yarn! I want you to be my Valentine." My mom had to explain some of the phrases to me!

I've saved all of these Valentines for decades, now. However, I only recently "reacquired" this one. After my dad passed away, I found this Valentine with some other cards he had been saving. Printed on the back is, "To Dad. Love,...." and then my name. I'm not sure how old I was when I gave it to him, but I'm guessing by the way I had printed my name, that it was some time between Kindergarten and 2nd grade.

The Valentines above were large and had to be folded, in order to fit into the provided envelopes. As the years went on, they made the Valentines smaller.

Note the "Dumbo" Valentine below, addressed to "Teacher." The boxed sets of Valentines usually included one special card, to give to the teacher.

And these Valentines were even smaller and required no folding at all. I believe these were from when I was in sixth grade, which was my last year of elementary school and also the last year of a classroom "Valentine exchange."

I found some boxes of Valentine's on ebay, which are very similar to the kind that I gave out. The cellophane wrapper around the boxes always had a clear area, where you could view some of the cards inside.

With this package, you can even see a portion of the "Goofy On Roller Skates" Valentine (as seen above), through the clear window.

In every grade throughout elementary school, my teachers always had us make a folder, to hold the Valentines we would be receiving from our classmates. We made the folders out of construction paper. (I wonder if they still do this in elementary schools today? I wonder if they even exchange Valentines today?) My mom saved every single folder that I ever made. Here is my Valentine folder, from when I was in Kindergarten:

Happy (early) Valentine's Day, everyone!

****Post Update!****

I decided to look for (and scan) some of the Valentine's that I received over the years, from fellow classmates. These span a period of seven years (Kindergarten through 6th grade).

First, we have a few more Disney Valentines:

These are two of my favorites, just because of the wonderful graphics. These were printed on heavier card stock and each card has two slits in it, which were used to hold a sucker.

Another one of my favorites, is the Valentine with the mummies. Now I'm wondering if they ever made sets of Valentines, entirely with monster graphics. I bet they did!

I'm a little surprised by the slightly adult text, "You Turn Me ON!" and "Let's Do Our THING Together!" But hey, we were kids. We were innocent. I think it just went over our heads!

Some of these are definitely, "of their time"....like the Valentine below, which claims, "You're GROOVY!"

Hallmark made these next four Valentines. These were larger in size and printed on a paper that was thicker than the "die-cut" Valentines (like the ones above). These could be folded over and actually "sealed" by placing the bottom edge of the card, into the three slits along the top edge.

I went to school with "Robbie," from first grade through twelfth grade. He was at our last high school reunion and won the award for, "having the most children"......NINE!!!

Hallmark also made this "puzzle" Valentine. I think this was a neat idea. You didn't know what the front of the Valentine looked like, or who had signed the back of it, until you put all of the pieces together.

Here's another Valentine with the, "YOU'RE GROOVY" sentiment. I wonder if in the eighties, these companies made Valentines which stated, "YOU'RE RADICAL!" or "YOU"RE TOTALLY TUBULAR!"?

I'm familiar with the Scottish use of the word "bonnie," but I just had to look it up for it's exact definition, which is "pleasing to the eye; handsome; pretty." So whoever was giving the Valentine on the far left, was asking the recipient (me) to be their pretty (or handsome) "luv!" Again, too adult, in my opinion! But it sure went past me, as a kid. And "HI, HOT STUFF!"???? Okay, I'm sure I'm just reading too much into these.

I think these Valentines are much tamer! ;-)

The back of the "caveman and cavewoman" Valentine below, was signed "From A Friend." And I found another Valentine which just had, "From Me," on the back. It appears that a couple of my classmates, were attempting to be wisenheimers!

I can't remember if I was able to figure out back then, who it was that didn't sign their Valentine. The person who gave me this, might have slipped it into my folder, along with another Valentine that they did actually sign, just to cover up their tracks. I wonder if they did this to other people in the class, or just me?

I still remember the little girl in Kindergarten, who gave me the "Teacher" Valentine, below. I also remember wondering why she gave it to me. I don't think I asked her. Maybe at that age, she wasn't able to read the word, "Teacher"?

These next three sets of Valentines (as well as some individual ones seen earlier in this post), appear to have used an older style of graphics. In a comment left below by Mike Cozart, he states, "I recall as a kid being aware that many of the designs seemed “old style” or reprinted designs."

I was also aware that some of the Valentines I was receiving as a kid, had an older style to their artwork. I'm assuming that some of the manufacturers, continued to print the same Valentines for many years, while other's updated their designs with a more "modern" look. If you look closely at the Disney Valentines in the first half of this post, you will notice a change, even in their style. The Disney Valentines had remained the same for many years, but by the time I was in 6th grade, they had completely changed their designs and style of artwork.

This Valentine reminds me of Knott's BERRY Farm and the old Knott's BEAR-Y Tales ride (which is actually making a return to Knott's this year, after a 34-year absence!) Whoever designed this Valentine, should have really completed the "double pun," by including a berry somewhere in the artwork!

The small bouquet of flowers in the basket (on the right), is inserted into a slot in the card and is actually removable.

My best friend in elementary school, gave me these Valentines in 5th and 6th grade. They originally had a bit of a 3-D aspect to them, but have been flattened from years of storage.

I hope everyone had a wonderful Valentine's Day!

The 1969 Tournament of Roses Parade

Happy New Year, everyone! I thought for today, we'd travel back to January of 1969. While I have never been to an actual Tournament of Roses Parade, my family has gone a few times to view the "parked" floats after the parade, and this was one of those years. My dad took the color snapshots of the floats, included in today's post.

The parade's theme was, "A Time To Remember."

This Dr. Pepper-sponsored float was titled, "Playmates" and featured the characters from the story of Pinocchio. Walt Disney's Pinocchio was reissued in 1962 and 1971, so this would have been in between re-releases. I wonder if these were not supposed to be the Disney version of the Pinocchio characters?

A photo of the float, appeared in the Los Angeles Times.

Here is the original artwork for the float, taken from the Official Parade Program. The artwork definitely looks like the Disney characters.

After writing last month's post, I thought it would be fun to show some childhood toys (again), that relate to the floats in my dad's pictures. Here is my brother's Pinocchio marionette, which we saw in last month's post.

My brother and I also had a few Pinocchio children's records. Each of them included a song "From The Original Soundtrack" on one side, and "A Story From Pinocchio" on the other side. I've always liked the artwork on the Disney 45 RPM record sleeves.

We also had this "non-Disney" Pinocchio record.

Next, we have the Sunkist Growers' float titled, "Return of Doctor Dolittle." The original version of Dr. Dolittle (with Rex Harrison playing the title character), had been released in theaters thirteen months earlier, in December of 1967.

My brother and I had quite a few Colorforms sets, including this Doctor Dolittle set. Does anyone remember the jingle from the Colorforms commercials?

♪♬ "It's fun to play, the Colorforms way!" ♬♪

For those of you who aren't familiar with Colorforms, Wikipedia gives this description of them: "Colorforms is a creative toy named for the simple shapes and forms cut from colored vinyl sheeting that cling to a smooth backing surface without adhesives. These pieces are used to create picture graphics and designs, which can then be changed countless times by re-positioning the removable color forms."

Colorforms are still manufactured today. For a decade by decade history, check out their official site at: http://www.colorforms.com/history/

Here's the background for the Doctor Doolittle play set.

And here are some of the pieces. Unfortunately, a few of the pieces were lost over the years.

This photo from eBay, shows what the complete set would have looked like.

The instruction booklet gave an example, of how you could arrange the pieces.

Getting back to the parade, the "Friends of Dr. Seuss" float was sponsored by the City of South Pasadena and featured The Cat In The Hat, as well as other Dr. Seuss characters.

The Cat In The Hat book was written by Theodor Geisel under the pen name, Dr. Seuss and was first published in 1957. This float would have been appearing in the parade two years before the book was adapted into an animated television special.

My mom enrolled my brother and I, in a "book club" for the Dr. Seuss books. I can't remember the frequency, but every so often (maybe monthly?), we would receive a new book in the mail.

Back then, the books came with dust jackets. It appears that the original books, with their dust jackets still intact, go for big bucks on ebay!

St. Paul, Minnesota sponsored a float titled, "Minnesota Fun - Winter and Summer." The float featured a giant "jack-in-the-box," representing Minnesota's Winter Carnival.

My brother had a generic "clown" version of a jack-in-the-box toy:

And I had a "Flipper" version, which was given to me on my third birthday. Neither one of our jack-in-the-box toys survives today, but I found the ones that we had, on eBay.

This Universal Studios-sponsored float was titled, "Remember When." After the parade, the float was taken to Universal Studios and could be viewed by guests on the tram tour. This photo is used here, courtesy of "Matterhorn1959" (and originally appeared on his blog, "Stuff From The Park," in September of 2012.)

I'm including a few other pages, from the Official Parade Program.

The 1969 Tournament of Roses Royal Court:

Information on post-parade viewing of the floats in Victory Park:

Various advertisements from the Official Parade Program:

The back cover of the program:

Once again, a VERY happy New Year to all!