Rubik's Cube

An original early 1980s Rubik's Cube. The British Association of Toy Retailers noted the intense interest in the Cube upon its arrival in late 1980 and named it Toy Of The Year as a huge Cube shortage began. There simply were not enough to go round! In the spring of 1981, the nation was finally fully stocked and the Cube won Toy Of The Year for the second year running.

I can't. 

The Cube was invented by Erno Rubik of Hungary in 1974, and he called it "Buvos Kocka" - the "Magic Cube".

"A Simple Approach To The Magic Cube" by Bridget Last, published in 1980 by a small publishing company, Tarquin Publications of Diss, Norfolk - the first Cube book published in England. The print run was so limited (for what was then a tiny niche puzzle following) that finding a copy today is like finding gold dust. Middle pictures - old Hungarian Magic Cubes occasionally turn up on eBay. There are fascinating differences in the look, weight and feel of the Magic Cube when compared to the Rubik's Cube. Far right - a magazine ad for the Hungarian Magic Cube from March 1981, dating to the time of the worldwide shortage of the new Rubik's Cubes. The book and the Pentangle (a small UK-based company) sold Hungarian Magic Cube are mine. I daren't handle the Cube in case it falls apart! Pentangle, a small company who distributed small numbers of Magic Cubes in the UK, seeing major potential in the puzzle and themselves as continuing distributors, were hoping that the Cube would be mass manufactured (difficult to achieve at that time in Communist Hungary), but the rights were given to Ideal Toys and it was renamed and remanufactured before that happened - and it had any widescale impact on the UK and the rest of the Western World.

The first test batches of the Magic Cube were finally released in Budapest, Hungary, then very much "behind the Iron Curtain", just before Christmas 1977. In 1978, the Cube started to become popular in Hungary. 

Small numbers of Magic Cubes passed beyond Hungarian borders, individually, via enthusiasts like David Singmaster, and in tiny batches via a small niche puzzle company called Pentangle in England. 

Barrett Developments, housebuilders, were giving Magic Cubes away as a 'promotional aid' according to a March 1980 UK newspaper report, and there was interest amongst some academics and some puzzle fans who encountered it in the Western World. But the vast majority of us remained ignorant of the puzzle's existence. 

There was no World Wide Web (invented 1989, implemented early 1990s), so no social media.

Another problem was that the Magic Cube existed in no great numbers - not even enough to impact on the mainstream popular culture of a small nation like the UK. It must be noted that the tiny numbers of Magic Cubes distributed by Pentangle in the UK in no way constituted anywhere near enough to bring about any Magic Cube craze in that nation. Check any UK newspaper archive - newspapers eagerly reflect pop culture over the years, and use them to fill their columns. There was no Magic Cube craze. The vast majority of us had never even heard of it.

It's also important to note that speed cubing, one of the major crazes of 1981 in the UK, was very difficult with a Magic Cube - they were not designed for it. However, the 1980 Rubik's Cube was lighter and easier to manipulate.

David Singmaster and Pentangle's early involvement with the Magic Cube is sometimes rather over-stressed  - turning them into major purveyors of the Magic Cube in the UK and architects of the later Rubik's Cube craze, and has been since the early 1980s, resulting in confusion and misinformation. 

One major BBC TV series, I Love The 1970s, was led by misinformation on these scores to blot its copybook well and truly and confuse Rubik's Cube - the 1980 remanufacturing, renaming and international launch - with the earlier tiny seepage of the Magic Cube. The series went overboard with a host of clips from the early 1980s, including Top of the Pops, Not The Nine O'Clock News and Cube master Patrick Bossert, and claimed something yet to be renamed and remanufactured, with a UK patent date of 7 May 1980, was all the rage in 1979. 

The BBC's I Love The 1970s series was supposed to show us the UK pop culture of each year, the TV, the music, the fashion, the fads. But as several of the fads featured in certain years either didn't exist at that time or were old news, the show became a strange, reworked '70s that many viewers had trouble recognising.

A quick look through a UK newspaper archive would have shown the Beeb researchers what was 'hot' in each year. There is no mention of the 'Magic Cube' in the British National Newspaper Archive for 1979, and no Rubik's Cube, of course - because it didn't exist.

The show had to correct the Rubik's Cube information on its website when viewers complained in great numbers. As the BBC's I Love The 1970s had contained several other inaccuracies, as mentioned previously, this did nothing to enhance its reputation among serious pop culture researchers. The series had rather 'sucked in' pop culture from the 1960s and 1980s, and this was not due to confusion, but rather poor research and a desire to 'hype' the 1970s, it was claimed. UK newspaper archives, for example, are full of ads and articles about space hoppers and space hopper races from the spring of 1968 onwards (the release date), it immediately became a craze. But the BBC popped the hopper into I Love 1971 - prompting a load of echoing misinformation around the web. 

It was as though the BBC was trying to rewrite, redesign and repackage the 1970s as a hot product. I lost a lot of faith in the BBC via this series. If a major organisation like that couldn't accurately reflect pop culture from a few decades back, then I was unsure it deserved its renowned status.

The Rubik's Cube should, of course, have featured in the BBC's follow-up I Love 1980s series, either in the 1980 episode - when it arrived a few months before Christmas but was in short supply - or, more appropriately, as the series focused on pop culture, in 1981, when the UK became fully stocked and the craze raged. There were no Rubik's Cubes before 1980, and the Magic Cube was never the talk of shops, offices, and school playgrounds. I Love 1981 was a travesty without the Cube. 

The Pentangle angle, in particular, keeps coming back to an inaccurate, disproportionate degree, every ten years or so, as successive generations of Cube fans encounter the same misinformation, think they have discovered wondrous new information, then have to discover the truth. We don't know why. Who could it possibly benefit? Pentangle's involvement with the Cube apparently stretched on into the Rubik's Cube era, but ended unhappily for the company in 1981.

One site flags up Pentangle with a slogan about the 'first Magic Cube sold outside Hungary' - attributing that to the company. We can't possibly know that. The Magic Cube fascinated many mathematicians and some, like David Singmaster, as we know, were selling them, in small numbers, to friends and colleagues after visits to Hungary. 

We have no proof of who made that first sale.

Come to that, we have no proof of who made the first sale of the 1980 Cube.

David Singmaster and Pentangle are interesting facets of the Cube's history, like squares on a Cube, but there are many of those, and neither caused the Cube to suddenly burst onto the mainstream stage in the UK.

Best to remember that the Rubik's Cube was released in 1980 and the mainstream Cube craze then began in the UK when stocks allowed, as elsewhere in the Western World. There were no Rubik's Cubes before 1980, no large numbers of Magic Cubes, and no major advertising campaigns for the Magic Cube. 

All that being said, pre-Rubik's Cube memorabilia is highly collectable. If you have a Magic Cube (easily distinguishable from the first 1980 Rubik's Cubes) you might like to check out its value. Another thing is Bridget Last's book, A Simple Approach To The Magic Cube. This was published by small publishing company Tarquin Publications, of Diss, Norfolk, England, in a limited print run in 1980. 

Despite the small seepage beyond its borders, the Cube remained one of Hungary's best kept secrets, mostly tucked away securely behind the Iron Curtain as far as the general public in the UK and the rest of the Western World were concerned.

But things were about to change. In fact, the Cube itself was about to change, both in name and manufacturing process.

A deal was signed with major US Company Ideal Toys in late 1979 for mass distribution of the Cube in the West. 

The Magic Cube debuted at the international toy fairs of London, Paris, Nuremberg and New York in January and February 1980 - with Erno Rubik demonstrating his own creation. Reaction was good, but the Cube did not conform to Western manufacturing and packing norms. 

This had to be addressed. A new version was produced - lighter, stronger (I still have a 1980 Rubik's Cube in perfect working order - but my older Magic Cube is a brittle, delicate creature) - and easier to manipulate. This opened the way to Rubik's Cube contests - with amazing speeds being achieved.

Just prior to its Western World release, Ideal Toys decided to rename the 1980 version of the Cube. "Inca Gold" and "The Gordian Knot" were two of the names suggested, but "Rubik's Cube" was chosen.

Ideal also designated it 'The Ultimate Puzzle'. With a major company behind it, a new name, advertising and media attention, the Cube was about to enter its legendary era.

Mathematician David Singmaster wrote:

... the Magic Cube is now being sold as Rubik's Cube... [the Ideal Toy Corp.] has renamed the cube as 'Rubik's Cube' on the grounds that 'magic' tends to be associated with magic. 

The Rubik's Cube trademark was registered in England on 7 May 1980, but due to a shortage, supplies did not start arriving here until just before Christmas. By then, it had appeared on television, Jonathan King had taken one on to Top of the Pops, hailing it as the latest craze in America, and many of us were aware that it was very much one of the 'Next Big Things' in UK popular culture. Many people who were not habitual puzzle fans were entranced by it - it was an attractive and intriguing object with a highly intriguing name, but the shortage stretched on into 1981 and it was spring before the country was fully stocked. 

A few cheap imitations appeared to cash in on the shortage.

Hungarian actress Zsa Zsa Gabor presided over the launch of the Rubik's Cube in America in 1980, but, as with the UK, the shortage of Cubes meant the USA also had to wait to experience the full force of the craze until 1981.

The puzzle celebrated 25 years as Rubik's Cube in 2005.

Detail from the 25th anniversary Rubik's Cube, 2005.
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Erno Rubik's wonderful puzzle made it on to the cover of Scientific American in March 1981, with a "computer graphical display" image of the Cube and, inside, an article by Douglas R Hafstadter.

Interestingly enough, although the Scientific American article refers to the puzzle being marketed as "Rubik's Cube" (as it was from 1980 onwards), most of Mr Hofstadter's references are to the "Magic Cube".
 

Like most of us, 13-year-old Patrick Bossert had trouble obtaining a Rubik's Cube when they were first released in England in late 1980. There was an acute shortage. He finally secured one in March 1981 and had soon gained a bit of a reputation as a Cube Master at his school. You Can Do The Cube followed - it was published in June 1981 and became the year's bestseller. By the end of the year, it had been reprinted (at least) fourteen times, and Patrick went on to make a cube-solving video. 

The man himself - Erno Rubik. 
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The Sunday Times Magazine "photo-review" of 1981.

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The Cube certainly made a monkey out of me!

From the Cambridge Evening News, England, 15 July 1981. The Rubik's Cube craze had swept through Cambridge schools earlier in the year, and now it was time for a competition.

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From the Daily Mirror, 12/8/1981. The article reminds me that "Rubik's Cube" was just as commonly known as "the Rubik Cube" back then. The official name, chosen by Ideal Toys back in 1980, was the former.

A how to solve the Rubik's Cube video from 1981...

... featuring a leggy, lip-glossed female Cubist...

... an in-depth explanation of what makes a Rubik Cube twist...

... and two little boys - the dark haired one looks rather as though he's wearing hairspray to me.

The helpful narrator reminded us that we were watching a video tape (fat chance of that for most of us back in 1981) and so could rewind it if we missed any points, and a cheap disco soundtrack kept the whole thing groovin'.

By the way, I followed the tape's instructions and my Cube still ended up a mess.

As well as a plethora of "how to solve the Cube" books, there was also this...

Joan Smith's Great Cube Race was a 1982 children's story about a school's Rubik's Cube contest... 

"I'm over half way there," said Ollie pleased, going through the moves again between mouthfuls of fish pie. Brr-ik, Brr-ik went the Cube confidently.

"Not while we're eating please," said Dad. "I can't stand the sight or sound of that toy."

"They say it helps with maths," said Mum.

Ollie thought this meant that it was safe to go on and he ran through the pattern once more putting the blue and yellow edge in place. Brr-ik. Brr-ik.

"PUT THAT DOWN," shouted Dad, "or I'll scramble you up so thoroughly that even the winner of the race couldn't put you straight again."

Ollie put the Cube down beside the salt, but Dad could not bear to have it so close to him, and hid it behind the curtain.

People were doing the Cube absolutely everywhere - as this newspaper article from the "Sun", May 13, 1982, shows! 

If you were not particularly clever, not at all mathematically minded, but managed to solve the Rubik's Cube, and were sitting there, all smug and complacent, 1982 had a surprise in store for you - the release of the even harder Rubik's Revenge! Happy days!

ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED 03 FEBUARY 2010. UPDATED 27 OCTOBER 2024

Rubik's Cube, 7 May 1980 - An Important Anniversary...

I'm writing and posting this article on the seventh of May 2020, and it is a very important anniversary. On this day, the 'Rubik's Cube' trademark was registered in the UK back in 1980. Not that we were suddenly flooded with Cubes - no, there was a shortage and that is the reason 1981 was The Year of the Cube rather than 1980, but it's still an important date.

Although they were in very short supply when they started arriving here, just before Christmas 1980, the British Association of Toy Retailers noted the interest shown and declared it 'Toy of the Year'. As the craze raged after we were fully stocked in the spring of 1981, the association named it 'Toy of the Year' for 1981 too!

The Rubik's Cube made it on to the front cover of the Sunday Times Magazine's review of 1981 - and is listed just below the Royal Wedding of Prince Charles and Lady Diana Spencer. A special Cube depicting the union flag and the faces of the Royal couple, was produced to commemorate the occasion in July 1981.

The Cube was such a craze - it made a legend of its creator, Erno Rubik of Hungary, and saturated popular culture from late 1980 to 1982.

From the invention of the Magic Cube prototype in 1974, to a change of name and mass manufacture to Western World safety and packaging specifications in 1980, seems a short leap. Many inventions take much longer to come to prominence. But the world was very different back then. Hungary was very much 'Behind The Iron Curtain' - and the Cube's penetration of that Curtain was very noteworthy indeed - particularly in such a short amount of time. When you consider that the first test batches of the Magic Cube were not even released in Hungary until late 1977, its progress to the West seems even more remarkable.

There had been a small seepage of  Magic Cubes from Hungary to the West, but in minute numbers (there weren't that many to begin with), and without any major backing to provide publicity. The 1980 Rubik's Cube was a remanufactured version of the Magic Cube, lighter and easier to manipulate (allowing for speed-cubing), and with Ideal Toys behind it, trusted purveyor of many previous toys and games, couldn't fail to become a hit.

The remanufactured and renamed Rubik's Cube was a huge success. Perhaps its launch at the start of the new decade helped with that - new decades are eager for new fads - but the Cube was entrancing in its own right. It was aesthetically pleasing, bright primary colours with black edgings, it looked like a child's toy - surely easy to complete? (HUH!) - and it took over many lives.

Daily Mirror, 12 August, 1981: The craze was raging. Cube mania was rampant!

Ours sat on the sofa and we twirled it whilst watching the telly. We couldn't leave it alone!

Now it's as much a part of early 1980s memories as Duran Duran, synth pop, hair gel and the ZX Spectrum.

In fact, it has become an icon of the entire decade.

Happy anniversary, Rubik's Cube! Read all our Cube data by clicking on the 'Rubik's Cube' label below.

1981 - Mr Rubik - The Barron Knights

 

The Barron Knights gave us the album Twisting The Knights Away in 1981, and reflected the year's main craze on the cover and in one of the tracks - the Rubik's Cube! The Cube blasted out from behind the Iron Curtain, Hungary to be exact, where it had been known as Magic Cube, to become Rubik's Cube in 1980 - re-manufactured to Western World safety and packaging norms.

Small numbers of Magic Cubes had seeped into the West, but there were never enough to spark any major craze, and the Magic Cube was not pliable enough to allow speed cubing, which would become a major feature of the Rubik's Cube craze. The small seepage of Magic Cubes caused some confusion and even the mighty BBC to slip up in its 'I Love...' series, when it claimed the Rubik's Cube arrived in the UK in 1979. It did not actually exist then, and the small numbers of Magic Cubes which seeped over here via a small niche puzzle company largely passed unnoticed. Just check out any UK newspaper archive. The BBC was inundated with complaints and moved the Rubik's Cube to 1980 on its 'I Love...' website. 

As the series had also goofed with the space hopper (UK newspaper articles reveal it was a huge craze from the time of its release in the spring of 1968 and not thrilling and new in 1971) and several other items, pop culture historians now approach the series with extreme caution.

But in the case of the Rubik's Cube, the BBC can't be wholly blamed: rather misleading tales that the tiny niche puzzle company Pentangle in England launched the Magic Cube in the UK in 1978 had been circulating since the early 1980s - taking no account of the tiny numbers available and the Magic Cube's differences to the 1980 Rubik's Cube. As we say, the UK newspaper archives are a great recorder of past crazes, as are magazines of the time.

From the cover of the Sunday Times Magazine's review of 1981 - the Year of the Cube in the UK.

Sadly, the 1980 Rubik's Cubes were also in woefully short supply at first. Although the trademark was registered in the UK on 7 May 1980, the first of them did not arrive until later in the year - and still stocks were low. In the spring of 1981 more Cubes arrived. The craze flamed, and was so ferocious that the colourful little object become one of the main icons of the 1980s. 

Hear the Barron Knights' humorous Rubik's  Cube song below, with some clever modern day Cube animation that just suits the mood - and evokes very powerfully the spirit of 1981! Mr Rubik was, of course, the puzzle's inventor, Erno Rubik, and much more can be read about the Cube by clicking on our "Rubik's Cube" label below.

Rubik's Cake - A Very 1980s Birthday...

Today is my birthday - and thanks to my sister, her partner, and my two wonderful nephews for coming up with this home made surprise cake - with that ultimate 1980s icon - the Rubik's Cube as its theme!  When an obscure Hungarian puzzle called the Magic Cube  made its debut at international toy fairs in January and February 1980, nobody knew what was going to happen.

The Magic Cube was then manufactured to Western World safety and packaging norms and Ideal Toys decided a new name was needed. The Gordian Knot? Inca Gold? Hmmm...

How about Rubik's Cube, thus naming the puzzle after its inventor, Erno Rubik?

The first Rubik's Cubes were shipped from Hungary in May 1980, although arrival in  the UK was rather later, the first batches hitting our stores towards the end of the year. Even then there was a severe shortage until spring 1981.

"Have A Rubik's Day" as my sister has inscribed on the birthday cake tray.

And, from spring 1981 onwards, for  over a year, every day was a Rubik's day. I have never known a craze so intense.

Read all about the wonderful Cube here.

And, meanwhile, please excuse me whilst I get on with celebrating my birthday by tucking into the most delicious Rubik's Cube I have ever seen! 

Garfield, Garfield Everywhere...

Favourite fat cat Garfield, creation of American cartoonist Jim Davis, first appeared as a comic strip, syndicated in 41 US newspapers, on 19/6/1978. The illustration above, showing Garfield and Jon Arbuckle, is a panel from that first outing. Didn't they look different?! Especially Garfield. Gradually, the characters evolved. By the early 1980s, Garfield was recognisable as the Garfield we know today, but it still took some years before he stood up on two legs. Studying pictures of Garfield over the years is fascinating.

Garfield is greedy, cynical and lazy. He has a passion for lasagna, a love/hate relationship with Odie, the dog, and is pretty loyal to his not-terribly-bright owner, Jon Arbuckle, all things considered.

This advertisement appeared in a Cambridge, England, newspaper in December 1983. The local branch of Clinton Cards was introducing the city to a flood of Garfield merchandising. 

I have had several queries about the "1978" copyright label on some Garfield merchandise. This refers to the year the character was first copyrighted. If you have an early Garfield toy, mug etc, it will have been manufactured in the 1980s. As can be seen in the illustration at the top of this post, Garfield looked rather different in 1978! 

Garfield creator Jim Davis’ company, Paws, Inc, was founded in 1981 to take care of the creative side of the Garfield licensing business.
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This girly, wearing a "Frankie Say Relax" T-shirt with very fancy lettering indeed, nipped out to her local Bejam's one morning. On her way home, she spotted this major celebrity presiding over the re-opening of her local Post Office, which had been closed for a refit. 

Swoon, swoon!

Well, it seemed to be love at first sight, but in reality the celebrity had simply spotted the frozen lasagna in her shopping bag. We tried to warn her that it was only cupboard love - but would she listen?!

This card was received by me on my 21st birthday in 1986 and originally had a plastic "key to the door" stuck to the top right hand corner. I was quite a fan of Garfield back then and still enjoy reading the comic strip today. In the 1980s, Garfield posters adorned my bedroom wall, my tea was drunk from a Garfield mug and a Garfield cuddly toy lived under my bed. 

And sometimes in my bed, if I had nobody else to cuddle.

Did you take Garfield for a ride in your motor?!

A Christmas card from 1988.

The wit inside the card!

This Garfield phone was available in the Index catalogue from September 1989 onwards.

Shake Me - It's The SnuggleBumms...

Here are some SnuggleBumms, as featured in the spring/summer 1986 Argos catalogue. They had names like Warmly Kid, Poppa-Gently and Momma-Brightly and Snuggle Pets called Bumble and Lucky, and some glowed if you hugged them and some giggled if you shook them.

Lovely. 

Very different from my childhood days when I was lucky if Mum had an old spud to spare for a Mr Potato Head. How I wish I'd been a child in the 1980s!

Mind you, I'm glad I was a teen/twenty-something.

Trouble is, I WANT IT ALL - the full range of 1980s experiences from different age perspectives.

Including some SnuggleBumms.

Computers 1982

From Clive Sinclair with love... this year saw the arrival of the ZX Spectrum - remembered as the "dear old Speccy" today, but the thrill of the new in '82.

From ZX Computing - an article about the launch of the ZX Spectrum.

Complete with rubber keys...

Personal Computer Magazine - apparently the biggest selling micro magazine in the UK way back then.

Tempted by an Apple? Microcomputers at Laskys in 1982.

Your Computer, February 1982 - with info on the ZX 81 Rubik's Cube master...

The Cube twisting key tapping way to success...

Fancy a "real" computer from Texas Instruments?

Or "broader horizons" with the BBC Microcomputer System?

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This is a 1982 double page spread for Atari video games, from the News of the World Sunday magazine, dated Nov 7th. Note the little girl's windmill deelyboppers! For more about deelyboppers, see here.

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We didn't have any computers or gadgets like these in our house at Christmas 1982 - the computer bug had not bitten my family. But this was our final Christmas untouched by computer technology. How about you?

1989: Dancing Flowers

In 1989, the year that the World Wide Web was invented and the Berlin Wall came down, we plebs were hugely excited by what we called Dancing Flowers - AKA Rock 'n' Roll Flowers - ("copyright 1988"), from a company called Takara. My cousin bought one for her children and we... oops... sorry, I mean "they" were thrilled with it, bellowing their heads off with laughter as it jiggled ... er... I mean "danced" around to Technotronic ("Pump Up The Jam, Pump It Up..."), or whatever.

But it didn't have to be major dance hits of 1989 that got this little beauty grooving.

It even "danced" to my uncle's Charlie Pride LP.

Wonderful.

1989, like the rest of the 1980s, was not, as LP Hartley once wrote about the past, a "foreign country". It was a foreign planet!

Toys: Back To 1984 - Transformers, The A Team, My Little Pony, Postman Pat, Roland Rat and Knight Rider...

A skim through the toy selection in the Janet Frazer autumn and winter 1984/5 mail order catalogue - starting with some robots! Remember those "Transformers - Robots In Disguise" on telly - robots that turned into boats and things? Weird, eh? And what about the toys? Genius, or TV merchandising overkill? In my day, we were lucky if Mum had a spare spud for a Mr Potato Head...

Mind you, that's not to say there wasn't loads of TV-related merchandising in the 1960s and 1970s. I loved the Magic Roundabout, and you could buy Dougal house slippers, Magic Roundabout lampshades, Magic Roundabout biscuits, Magic Roundabout wallpaper, Magic Roundabout figurines, Magic Roundabout clocks, Magic Roundabout tea towels, Magic Roundabout curtains, Magic Roundabout mattresses, Magic Roundabout cuddly toys, Magic Roundabout annuals, Magic Roundabout storybooks, Magic Roundabout colouring books, Magic Roundabout dot-to-dots, a grand Corgi miniature Magic Garden, Magic Roundabout crockery, Magic Roundabout tablecloths, Magic Roundabout soap, Magic Roundabout bubble bath, Magic Roundabout umbrellas...

Most of these things I desired but couldn't have because my parents couldn't afford them. But certainly the concept of children as consumers was not invented in the 1980s.

A whole range of A-Team merchandise, including a toy "Mr T" - "HE'S BIG AND BOLD! HE'S THE BOSS!"

A My Little Pony baby walker - the little girl in the illustration looks thrilled with it, doesn't she?

He-Man and the Masters of the Universe - an animated TV series featuring the likes of the goodly Prince Adam and the evil Skeletor. Lots of viewers. Lots of associated merchandise - including here your very own Castle Grayskull - "fortress of mystery and power".

Snake Mountain - "ELECTRONIC MICROPHONE CHANGES YOUR VOICE INTO A SCARY 'VOICE OF EVIL'!" Ain't technology wonderful?

The battle between good and evil rages fiercely.

First appearing in 1981, Postman Pat was a tremendous success, earning many fans beyond the target audience of tiny tots. All together now: "Postman Pat, Postman Pat, Postman Pat and his black and white cat"!

Roland Rat - the ultimate '80s superstar. Look at all this - Roland Rat and Kevin the gerbil jigsaws, a stencilling kit, Roland, Errol the hamster and Kevin the gerbil toys and your very own RATMOBILE!

Knight Rider - a highly popular American children's series starring David Hasselhoff as Michael Knight and a very sophisticated car called KITT - had some very snazzy associated merchandise. Also in the picture is a battery operated Knight Rider push button intercom set that: "really works from room to room. Includes 30ft cable, buzzer sound and working light."