Hi all, new to the forum and cracker jack collecting in general.
I live in South Africa and I'm currently busy winning a bunch of charms on our local auction site, all of which were listed as cracker jack. After looking into the history of cracker jacks I'm pretty sure most if not all of these are in fact not Cracker Jack. If anybody has some info on some of these it would be much appreciated. It seems some of them are Kobe, some Gumball, but am not sure, any help would be appreciated.
(Sorry for any grammatical errors, English is not my first language).
Welcome to our Cracker Jack forums. We are happy to have you join us all the way from South Africa. And your English skills are excellent! I do not believe any of your little toys are Cracker Jack prizes. However, they are very interesting little treasures. Maybe some of our collectors who are more knowledgeable than I will be able to give you more information.
Do come and visit us again and I hope you will soon add many Cracker Jack prizes to your collection.
The little charms you have are made of celluloid, an early plastic. For the most part, these were used as bread ties--the clue is the short silken cord that is attached to them. These same charms were also available in peanut and gumball machines. While not Cracker Jack, they are still cool little toys and often sell on ebay. Speaking of ebay, there are tons of dealers who will tell you that their items were Cracker Jack prizes, when they aren't. Lots of people think any small toy of unknown origin must have come from Cracker Jack. If you are not already a member of the Cracker Jack Collectors Association, you can join us for a small membership fee and then you will be able to access the entire forum. You will learn a ton and meet some neat and helpful people. Happy Collecting!
Thank you so much for the warm welcome and kind words Cyndy and Dianep2. I really appreciate the information and welcome!
Thanks for the info on the bread ties, will be looking into that!
But I'm really interested in getting some cracker jacks for a collection, so will be keeping my eyes open and posting here from time to time if I have any other questions on little treasures!
I'm not currently a member of the CJCA, but as soon as money allows I'll definitely be joining the group!
Again, thank you, and anybody with some more info on these little prizes, it will be greatly appreciated!
I've looked high and low trying to find a website devoted to these "bread tie" prizes. If anyone has come across one, please pass it along. I find it interesting that there are so many of these things out there, yet no collector website about them.
Snipsa, welcome to the CJCA forums. What kind of Cracker Jack prizes are you looking to collect? Is there a particular decade you're interested in, or prizes made by a particular company, or are you looking to collect variations of an item, such as every toy elephant?