Vintage Micro Machines

One of the cardinal rules for parents is to never buy a toy for your child that you wouldn't want to step on in bare feet in the middle of the night. Obviously, given the ubiquity of LEGO and countless other toy brands, most parents ignore this rule, flaunting common sense at the expense of their feet. Like LEGOs, you wouldn't want to step on any of the hundreds of Micro Machines manufactured between 1987 and 1999, either. Manufactured and distributed by the Galoob toy company, Micro Machines were invented by a couple who ran a toy store in Wisconsin. The plastic toy cars were 1/10th of the size of diecast Matchbox cars. Under Galoob's ownership, Micro Machines mostly had a good run, but by 1999, Hasbro had purchased the company, which makes the vintage cars, trucks, and military vehicles from the Galoob years the ones that are most sought by collectors. In that first year, Galoob offered 11 collections, including hot rods (a '57 Chevy, '64 Sting Ray, '65 Mustang, and two vintages of Camaro), off-road vehicles, military aircraft and boats, and service vehicles such as police cars and fire trucks. The following year, the number of Micro Machines vehicle collections more than doubled, including one devoted entirely to Corvettes, another for convertibles, and another featuring construction machines such as back hoes and bulldozers. The first two years of Micro Machines also saw the short-lived Trophy Series, in which a plane, ship, and automobile were placed on a trophy-like stand and sold as a set. Four Trophy sets were available in 1987, but only one made it into toy stores in 1988. Galoob got perhaps a bit too cute with its franchise in the early 1990s, when it released cars with crazy paint jobs (see the Classy Chromers and Super Sparklers), as well as vehicles adorned with alligators (the Swamp Beast collection) and sharks (the Great White collection). These gimmick vehicles had run their course by the middle of the decade, when Galoob offered collections based on manufacturers (Ford, Chrysler, General Motors, Ferrari) and use (Highway Truckers, Alpine Search & Rescue, Mass Transit). After Hasbro got a hold of the brand, Micro Machines themselves became vehicles for licensing deals with television shows and films. That's why, in the early 2000s, kids found themselves collecting Star Trek, Star Wars, James Bond, Indiana Jones, Power Rangers, Babylon 5, and Biker Mice From Mars figures and vehicles.