Page A4 / The Joan
De Arc Crusader / Wednesday, December 25, 2024
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The cosmic Christmases with Major Matt Mason
By J. Bueker
G.I. Joe got the action-figure party started precisely six decades ago this
year, decisively changing the face of boomer childhood forever, and it
didn’t take long for America’s ambitious space program and flourishing pop
culture to influence the emerging toy fad in a big way.

By the time Mattel introduced the Major Matt Mason action figure in 1966,
kids my age were sitting transfixed before the boob tube each week immersed
in “Lost in Space” and “Star Trek,” witnessing NASA space flights occurring
in real time, and nurturing dreams of becoming star-hopping astronauts
ourselves. The time was certainly ripe for a 6-inch flexible rubber
astronaut action figure with a crew cut, blue eyes, and removeable helmet
with adjustable orange visor. Originally
marketed as “Mattel’s Man in Space,” Major Matt’s spacesuit design, helmet
and early vehicles were all based on NASA protypes, conferring an attractive
realism to the new toys. The toy line would ultimately include a total of
four astronauts with identical bodies but different heads and suit colors,
along with a few exotic alien beings thrown in for good measure.
All of the Matt figures were molded from "Plastizol," a polymer-based
rubbery material that Mattel also utilized in their wildly popular "Thing
Maker" products. The substance was molded over a wire armature that was
unfortunately susceptible to metal fatigue through use and age. Once that
wiring breaks, the limb in question becomes instantly and perpetually
flaccid and inert, a genuinely traumatizing event as our beloved astronaut
has now permanently lost the use of one of his posable limbs.
Christmas 1967 was upon us and I was by that time firmly established as a
bona fide space fanatic and prime candidate to make my first acquaintance
with the Major, who had already emerged as a notably popular toy. That
particular Christmas I regard as my most treasured of all, the year I
received my beloved Sears reflector telescope, but Santa also generously
gifted me on that Yuletide a Major Matt action figure sealed on a blister
card packaged alongside two very important accessories: the space sled and
jet pack. The space sled was a wonderful
vehicular prop that I enjoyed immensely even though it had no actual
mechanical function whatsoever in and of itself. It just looked really cool,
with the astronaut standing atop the sled and controlling its “movements” by
manipulating a control column with handles, somewhat reminiscent of a
motorcycle steering apparatus. But the sled could also be used in
conjunction with the remarkable jet pack, which I consider the defining
piece of Major Matt Mason equipment. Major
Matt’s jet pack was an inventive idea and a cleverly designed mechanism that
actually enabled the astronaut to fly through the air by means of a
spring-loaded string running through the unit that could be attached with a
hook to door tops and the like. Matt’s flight was enhanced by the cool red
and black spiral design on the rear of the pack that turned rapidly as the
astronaut zipped along the string, creating an almost hypnotic effect
bordering on the psychedelic. The jet pack elevated the Major Matt play
experience in a dazzling manner, but unfortunately the device soon proved
problematic: the string became all too easily tangled and eventually
unusable as annoying tiny knots formed that proved nearly impossible to
extricate. Like his cousin G.I. Joe, Major Matt
came replete with additional (and not inexpensive) merchandise available for
separate purchase including an elaborate but misnamed space station that was
actually a moon base. Some of the Major Matt contraptions were really quite
ingenious though, like the extraordinary Space Crawler vehicle with its
spiked wheels, the Uni-Tred Hauler with Space Bubble, and the Firebolt Space
Cannon, none of which materialized under the Christmas tree for this boy. I
did however make the most of the space sled, jet pack, and other standard
items that were included with the action figures Santa did bestow upon me.
Oddly enough I seemed to be the only kid on Joan De Arc Avenue blessed with
Major Matt gear and I was therefore pretty much on my own when it came to
Major Matt play. Fortunately I was equipped with a good imagination and a
pretty solid understanding of astronomy and space science for a 9-year-old,
and I was the sort of kid who spent a significant amount of playtime engaged
in solitary activity anyway, and so Major Matt soon became one of my routine
play companions. My dearth of cool peripheral
Matt equipment was actually a boon in one sense as I was forced to dream up
compelling scenarios and action using the limited materials with which I had
to work. Whereas Matt was initially conceived by Mattel as a mere lunar
explorer, I found this mission grossly inadequate and took the initiative to
sharply expand his horizons, sending our hero off to Jupiter, the outer
planets, and ultimately interstellar space itself.
My fondness for the Major did not escape my mother’s notice and so
the following Christmas I received a second round of Matt toys in the form
of Matt’s “space buddy” sidekick Sgt. Storm, who sported blond hair and a
red astronaut suit. Sgt. Storm came to 3219 packaged with a white Cat Trac
vehicle, which like the Space Sled was a prop piece with no inherent
mechanical function. I now had a pair of intrepid astronauts for my amazing
interplanetary adventures. Interestingly, Mattel
canceled production of the Major Matt Mason toys in the early ‘70s at the
height of their success, perhaps anticipating the public’s dwindling
interest in the space program following the historic pinnacle of Apollo 11.
The popularity of the toy line however has never really receded and today
the Major Matt toys remain in demand as decidedly pricey collectibles. There
was even a Major Matt movie starring Tom Hanks once in the planning stages
that unfortunately failed to materialize. My
dear late Uncle John was responsible for my happy reunion with Major Matt
Mason many years later in the 1980s. John sold collectible toys and other
such nostalgia out of a quaint little shop on Cave Creek Rd. called Antique
Alley and I occasionally helped the man with organizing his inventory and
working the periodic toy shows held at the state fairgrounds.
At times Uncle John would compensate me monetarily for my assistance, but
more often than not he simply allowed me to grab something cool from his
display case at the Alley or his stash of merchandise at home. I pretty much
relieved the man of his entire stock of Major Matt items which included
three of the action figures and several of the iconic vehicles like the
Space Crawler and Uni-Tred Hauler with Space Bubble, accessories I could
only dream of owning as a kid. I made the acquaintance of astronaut Doug
Davis, who sported a yellow space suit, in addition to my reacquisition of
Major Matt and Sgt. Storm, and I even acquired a mysterious transparent
green alien called Callisto. Best of all, there was nary a broken
wire to be found in the lot! Major Matt Mason
inhabited an intersection of our childhood idealism and the seemingly unlimited
optimism engendered by the success of the space program. Just eight short
years after Kennedy set the goal, Apollo had reached the lunar surface, and
we all felt pretty confident that Major Matt’s moon station would
materialize in real life soon thereafter. Almost anything seemed possible in
those days; I had little doubt that I would see within the space of my
lifetime opportunities to visit for myself the moon and perhaps even Mars.
Things sadly didn’t work out quite the way we envisioned during that
exhilarating era, but the ingeniously conceived Major Matt Mason toys
did provide a memorable catalyst for many a wistful boomer childhood dream
of travelling into space and unfolding the secrets of the universe.
Hopefully without losing the use of a limb.
The Bueker bottle of Jade East: The Christmas Gift Theory
By J. Bueker
 I’ve no idea
how the thing has managed to survive the ravages of time and turmoil in the
nearly half century since the Buekers departed
Joan De Arc Avenue, but I somehow find myself still in possession of an
ancient bottle of Jade East cologne that resided for many a year in the
medicine cabinet of the middle bathroom at 3219. To my knowledge this is the
only toiletry item from our old home still extant in the possession of a
Bueker family member, making it a Joan De Arc artifact of some considerable
interest. So this got me thinking. How, when and
why did we originally acquire this cologne? What is its overall significance
in the history of the 1960s in general and the Bueker family in particular?
Was it a popular product of that era or relatively obscure? I ultimately
decided to focus the considerable resources of the Crusader research team on
these frightfully important historical concerns and present here my report.
Launched in 1964 by Regency Cosmetics, Jade East was an Oriental
Fougčre cologne for men that combined spices, musk, vanilla, cedar, and
exceptionally pronounced citrus notes into a concoction that soon earned a
reputation as a notably potent fragrance, a fact I can definitively confirm
in 2024: while only roughly 5 percent of the original bottle contents
survive, the scent remains startlingly powerful these 60 years later.
Now it would be absolutely unthinkable to discuss Jade East without
mentioning the similar but much more famous Hai Karate, another ‘60s
oriental-themed men’s cologne noteworthy primarily for its memorably clever
advertising campaign that recommended aggressive techniques of self-defense
against overzealous females attracted to its supposedly irresistible
fragrance. But Jade East was no mere HK knock-off -- it became a
significantly popular product in its own right and even maintains a
following to this very day. So when exactly did
the Buekers obtain a bottle of this stuff and why? My brother Charles
theorizes that the Bueker bottle of Jade East was originally purchased as a
Christmas gift for our father Carl, who I do recall was quite tickled by
those inventively silly Hai Karate television commercials. Perhaps we kids
were unable to scrounge up enough capital to purchase the real thing and
settled for the comparable but significantly less pricey cologne? This is a
compellingly plausible conjecture for the Bueker bottle of Jade East,
although I’m confident the ultimate truth of the matter will remain forever
obscured in the mists of ancient family lore. As
it turned out, Carl Bueker was evidently not terribly enamored with the Jade
East fragrance and the bottle in due course found its way to the kids’
bathroom at 3219 for the use of my brother and myself. I do recall
administering the scent a few times as a teenager, but Charles for his part
doesn’t believe he ever bothered with it at all: “I remember it being
around, but I don't remember ever using it,” says he. This distinct
disinterest neatly explains how the bottle settled into my permanent
possession rather than my brother’s.
Jade East is still sold today in a significantly reformulated version
that is apparently a mere shadow of the original, with a fragrance decidedly
less potent and imperishable. Nonetheless, our research indicates the
current version does have a scent somewhat similar to the old classic and
the fragrance still sells in respectable numbers. Perhaps the brand name
alone yet carries some cachet after all this time.
I have for some years maintained an annual ritual of self-administering a
small dab of this treasured, fossilized family fragrance from Joan De Arc
Avenue each year on Christmas Eve as an exercise in scent-based holiday
nostalgia. To my siblings who are reading these words on that very evening,
please feel free to walk over and have a whiff, just for old time’s sake. I
will try to refrain from any violent acts of self-defense upon your
approach.
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________
JDA
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