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My largest single purchase of PUT TOGETHERS not put together

Posted: Thu Nov 08, 2018 1:00 pm
by Jeffrey Maxwell
Hello all!

I couldn't believe it until I saw it for myself. I have purchased as many as 50 mint unused put togethers before, (and many of those in prize wrappers), but this is the largest group I have ever purchased at one time. (And YES, I don't care what anyone says, I am counting that luggage tag of which everyone already has dozens.)

Happy Collecting!
Jeffrey Maxwell
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Re: My largest single purchase of PUT TOGETHERS not put together

Posted: Thu Nov 08, 2018 2:04 pm
by spudgy
WOW!!!! I just turned green with envy!!! I've never even seen that many unassembled put-togethers together in one picture. How lucky can you get???

Re: My largest single purchase of PUT TOGETHERS not put together

Posted: Thu Nov 08, 2018 3:32 pm
by Jeffrey Maxwell
Hello spudgy!

Thanks for your comment. I haven't counted yet, but I think I might actually have more unassembled put togethers than I have assembled ones now. I have not been actively collecting used ones this year. I am working towards refining my collection to more resemble prizes as they came from the Cracker Jack packages -- mint or in/with prize wrappers. I will keep my assembled put togethers for now, because it is nice to have examples of of what they look like.
Trophy Put Togethers
Trophy Put Togethers
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You can see here I have enough of the small trophies to have a separate Riker mount from the assembled ones. Whenever I have acquired a duplicate, I have used it to show the reverse side in my display. That reminds me. I need to put my new not assembled large trophies that arrived today in there.

Have fun!
Jeffrey

Re: My largest single purchase of PUT TOGETHERS not put together

Posted: Thu Nov 08, 2018 4:47 pm
by spudgy
I started out collecting fifties prizes but it is rare that I find one I don’t already have, so put-togethers have now become my favorites and unassembled put-togethers are at the very top of my list. IMHO, These are some of the most unique, ingenious little prizes ever produced by Crackerjack. New ones keep popping up (some quite literally) so I have no idea how many different designs there might be. I wish I could find more info on them, like who designed and produced them.

I usually display them by having an unassembled piece beside its corresponding assembled mate and if I only have an unassembled piece, I don’t assemble it, no way!

Thanks for sharing the pictures. Much appreciated.

Re: My largest single purchase of PUT TOGETHERS not put together

Posted: Thu Nov 08, 2018 6:31 pm
by Jeffrey Maxwell
Me too. I started collecting 1950's prizes, in particular plastics. I didn't stop at collecting one of each. I collect them in every color I can find. Of course I was best known as a collector of alphabet theme prizes, because of my website in the late 1990's. I am still into plastics, but now that I have returned to collecting after a break, I have a much more rounded collection of prizes from 1948 to 1997.

STORIES OF PUT-TOGETHERS:
Here are a couple of stories from my childhood regarding put-togethers.

THE UN-PUT-TOGETHER:
When I was a young school boy, my Dad bought a box of Cracker Jack and the three of us boys had to share in the back seat of the car. I'm not sure how I ended up with the prize, but it could be because I was older, or maybe because I was bigger. But when I got the prize and my father saw it was a model, he told me I cannot put it together in the car. I still don't know why he would care about this little piece of plastic, but he wouldn't even let me put it together when we got home. He told me that I would not know how to do it. Finally when we were brushing teeth before bed, I asked one more time. He took the prize from me; took the pieces apart; put the pieces together; and handed it back to me. "But I wanted to put it together." I never have understood why he would not just tell me how to do it.

THE PUT-TOGETHER LIBRARY:
When I was in Seventh Grade, we lived in Woodward, Oklahoma. I read a lot as a child, so I was always in the library. One day I went up to the check out and there was a new display in the glass case. It was a collection of plastic put-together Cracker Jack prizes. I remember the librarian told me while I spent several minutes staring at the plastic wonders that they were owned by a high school senior who worked part-time in the library who had collected them. There were several of them, with unassembled ones beside assembled examples of each prize in the case. I returned to the library several times while the display was there, and always stopped to spend some time viewing it. This would have been about 1976, so he would have been young when he (or whoever) collected them.

I will be honest, I was a reluctant collector of put-togethers, because it really is hard to get a handle on different sets, etc. And when I would get home with prizes, I would discover a piece missing or broken because of the small parts. But I think I have found my track for this collection, and I look forward to future adventures in this area of collecting.

Happy Collecting!
Jeffrey

Re: My largest single purchase of PUT TOGETHERS not put together

Posted: Thu Nov 08, 2018 7:20 pm
by spudgy
Those are such neat stories and the kind of thing that makes this hobby (addiction) so much fun. I wonder what that high school senior would think today if he knew how much he influenced you. Now, I find myself (I was the smallest and youngest of my siblings) wondering which prize your Dad had the fun of assembling way back then.

Re: My largest single purchase of PUT TOGETHERS not put together

Posted: Fri Nov 09, 2018 4:28 pm
by Jeffrey Maxwell
I'm not sure what the prize was from my backseat car ride. But it had a number of pieces. I always love to tell stories of collecting whenever someone is interested. Some of the fondest memories of my wife are when we were collecting. I have recounted some of those stories in other threads in this forum. People often asked Diane if she collected anything, and she always replied that Jeffrey collects enough for both of us.