Forgotten Breakfast Cereals

Here's three long forgotten breakfast cereals. One very cool, one very weird and one that should never have seen a table:

Croonchy Stars: Undisputedly the most wacky breakfast cereal box to ever grace a table. The Muppets' Swedish Chef got his own line of cereal in the late '80s with Croonchy Stars. The whole box was covered in wackiness: "No Artificial Colours, No Doorknobs". On the side of the box: "Table Of Contents: Place Contents On Table"

Punch Crunch: This cereal didn't last long in the late '70s. Because even in that more innocent age. many stores refused to stock it and many parents were upset about it because of the gaudy pink box and the even gaudier pink hippo in the sailor suit making googly eyes at the Captain (and God only knows what it was doing with it's left arm.)

Urkel-Os: This cereal should NEVER have happened. Whoever came up with the idea of turning the ANNOYING Steve Urkel of the TV show Family Matters into a cereal probably hasn't worked in promotions since. Secondly, the strawberry/banana flavouring was just AWFUL. The tastes just CLASH in the bowl. Which is probably why this cereal too disappeared soon after it was introduced.......

Classic TV PSAs From The '70s

Casey Kasem's American Top 40

Casey Kasem's American Top 40 was a legendary weekly American radio program.

The program was syndicated nationally and until 1989, and sent to radio stations in a box set of 4 vinyl transcription discs (records that contained the program and national commercials, with cue sheets for the disc jockeys on where to insert the local ad spots.)

Very few stations played this program directly off the records on the air, most stations taped them on reel to reel tape and added the local ads, station jingles, promos, et al to the tapes) prior to broadcast, saving them time, potential errors and the embarrassment of a potentially skipping or stuck record.

Each week when the show was finished, the records were to be returned, whereupon they were destroyed (by contractual obligation.) But this was rarely enforced. Many radio station personnel simply took them home and added them to their personal collections. Or sold them. Which is why they're fairly easy to find at online auctions and used record dealers.

Casey Kasem hosted the program from 1970 to the 2000s in various incarnations, American Top 40, Casey's Top 40 and Casey's Top 20 (for Adult Contemporary radio stations.)

When I was growing up, Casey Kasem's American Top 40 countdown show was MANDATORY listening for me. I used to write down all the songs in my notebook every week and compare them with songs in the previous weeks. Seeing which songs were rising, which ones were falling (I never bothered with the Long Distance Dedications or bonus songs Casey would dot his programs with.)

It was a sad day for me when he stopped hosting the Top 40 program. I never cared much for Rick Dees, Shadoe Stevens and certainly not Ryan Seacrest. Casey Kasem WAS the Top 40 for me.

The Amico AM Radio Wristwatch

Another watch I owned. It was an AM radio on a watch, circa 1979.

It didn't sound very good, coming from a two inch speaker. And in order to see the time, you had to press the lower right button, which the red digital LED display instantly caused a loud screeching noise that overrode the radio signal when the radio was on.

Reception was very limited (Seattle's KJR and KING, then Top 40 stations, which put in strong signals on most radios in the Lynnwood, WA area were barely audible on this radio. But the religious station two miles away in the nearby Edmonds area came in loud and clear.) 

It was also heavy and uncomfortable after a few minutes of wearing......

Crayola Crayons

Who didn't own themselves a box of THESE?

Remember these now retired colours?

Green Blue
Orange Red
Orange Yellow
Violet Blue         
Maize
Lemon Yellow   
Blue Gray
Raw Umber (WTF?)