When I was seven or so, I fell out of a tree in our front yard and suffered a large gash on my leg. As part of my recovery program, a new toy appeared in my bedroom to help take my mind off the pain.
Tonka introduced this stamped steel VW Beetle in 1965, and made minor variations through the early 1970s. The shade of blue in which my car started life places it in the 1967-69 timeframe, consistent with when I got the car.
The movie The Love Bug premiered in 1968, and like many a youngster, I fell in love with “the little car.” It was a natural to repaint my toy, and as you can tell by the patina, it got a lot of loving attention from a very active boy.
Like many a young lad, I collected a number of other Hot Wheels and Matchbox cars over the years, but it seems the only ones that managed to avoid being discarded were the VWs.
For the most part, my collection includes few rare or collectible editions – they’re just common VW toys that happened to catch my eye.
Herbie turns up frequently in my collection, including this Pinewood Derby car. The small red Beetle (which I believe dates back to the 1960s and was made by Wiking) was given to me by a friend who bought it in Germany.
Finishing up the collection is my attempt to recreate The Mayfield Belle in scale.
Toy cars can easily become a “gateway drug” that sparks an interest in cars for a kid – my Tonka Beetle may well be the reason I’ve driven VWs for the past 25 years!
Oh, Man, you have a real air-cooled monkey on your back! I had a Tonka Beetle too. It was yellow. I remember it well.
I had that same Tonka VW. Mine probably started as blue as well. With the little metal tabs holding the body to the floor pan, it was easy to disassemble for painting. It ended up gold as that’s what my folks had handy. I really liked the car as it had a very stock appearance, and it seemed like many toys had a custom look.
I still have my red one (same color as Mom’s), sitting on our Gorilla Rack in the garage. It’s in decent shape, too — I was easy on my toys.
I had a Tonka Beetle in the late 60’s, and was turquoise/green, but I painted it red, but looked awful,
Long lost to living with family of 7 and toys getting lost/trashed/thrown out, 🙁
I have an red Beetle Avon perfume bottle that my Mom gave to me when I was a kid to play with. We always were a VW family. I’m amazed the plastic cap is still there:
Bottom of bottle still has the label.
Mine is blue, still has the label, contains the cologne, and is stored in the box. I didn’t realize they came in red.
Try again to post pic
I’ll give it another try.
Mine is black and still has the juice in it.
saw a Kombi clock at a jewelers getting my watch fixed recently, I didnt buy it
One does have to draw the line somewhere… (c:
Count me in as one of the many who had one of those. I don’t remember for sure, I think it may have been red. Same story as many others, hard life with me and my brothers, handed down to nephews and then who knows where…
Man, that Tonka looks like it’s led an “interesting” life. 🙂
In the mid ’60’s, one of my brothers got a red battery powered Bug with working headlights. IIRC, it would drive until it bumped into something and then reverse and go off in a different direction. We learned that you could push it when the switch was off and the headlights would light up.
A sub shop in my neighborhood has a display case with all kinds of novelties, including TWO copies of that same red VW.
Love it. Now please do Our Man Ed the courtesy of having fell, not “feel,” out of a tree. 🙂
Woopsie! how did I miss *that*?
(fixed)