Subject:
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1960's LEGO Parts Packs
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.general
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Date:
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Thu, 14 Oct 1999 19:06:35 GMT
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Viewed:
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312 times
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There is a wonderful assortment of 24 Samsonite LEGO Parts Packs on
EBAY, whose auction ended today. It went for a whopping $810 (rather
pricey, I would say).
I bring it to everyones attention to show you all what they look like.
The pictures on the boxes (4 different) are but a subset of the
different 1960's box designs. In my own collection I have 14 different
parts pack box designs (including the 3 different European Architectural
parts packs) from this 1958-65 era (1961-65 for Samsonite).
The Samsonite LEGO parts pack boxes were about twice the size of the
European versions, and usually contained a few more pieces (example: the
2x2 brick boxes had 20 pieces in Europe parts packs, and 33 in the
Samsonite parts packs).
The survival rate of the European boxes was greater than the Samsonite
ones. Even though these specific designs were discontinued by LEGO in
the mid 1960's, in Europe you could still find these well into the
1990's (in small town toystores), while in the USA, they were gone from
toy store shelves by the end of the 1960's.
Among these in the EBAY auction is one of the most valuable parts packs
of all -- the Esso Service gas pumps and signs (2 of each of these in
the Samsonite version, one of each of these in the European version).
I find it interesting to note that the old style (50's & 60's) flat
trees and bushes were different in the European parts packs as opposed
to the USA parts packs. The European version had 5 different trees and
one bush style. Here in the USA they had only 1 tree type (pine) and
the one bush style. And these didn't have the branches painted brown
(whereas the European ones did). That explains some of the mystery of
my childhood LEGO flat trees and bushes. I must have gotten Trees &
Bushes parts packs from both Europe and USA, hence the differences.
Anyway, these sets are a great reminder of some of the wonderful LEGO
Art that was produced in vibrant colors in the early 1960's. This is a
big switch from the rather bland sets that came in the late 1960's to
the present day polybags.
LEGO reused a lot of their pictures over and over again in different
sets and parts packs of the late 50's and early 60's. But with the
pleasing quality of the final product, one can hardly find fault in them
doing so.
Gary Istok
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