On prior articles we’ve got discussed how bobbleheads, particularly the personalized type have turn out to be quite well-known lately, and we also elaborated around the topic of resemblance, and the elements that affect it.
In this post we take a step back and try to offer a quick recount of how bobbleheads came into pop culture, starting with all the look of vintage bobbleheads within the 1960s. We’ll skip the bobbleheads created in ancient China and Japan simply because there is not sufficient recorded material to inform the story with adequate detail. It must however be mentioned that customized bobbleheads have existed for hundreds of years.
So let’s dive straight in to the topic.
The 1960s produced the first bobblehead boom into pop culture. This was a time when the United states was seeing a different type of athlete seem inside the Baseball Scene. Stars like Mickey Mantle produced their look as well as the sport was larger than ever.
It is not only baseball that used these bobbleheads to market the sport. American football and ice hockey were close followers as well, and when created, the editions typically covered all of the teams within the skilled leagues.
The teams that had been covered inside the first production run from the baseball league bobbleheads made in 1961 and 1962 had been: the Anaheim Angels, Baltimore Orioles, Boston Red Sox, Chicago Cubs, Chicago White Sox, Cincinnati Reds, Cleveland Indians, Detroit Tigers, Houston Colt 45’s, Houston Astros, Los Angeles Angels, Los Angeles Dodgers, Kansas City Athletics, Milwaukee Braves, Minnesota Twins, Mineapolis Twins, New York Mets, New York Yankees, Philadelphia Phillies, Pitsburg Pirates, St Louis Cardinals, San Francisco Giants and ultimately the Washington Senators.
Not all these bobbleheads have been created alike. For instance, certain teams had mascot bobbleheads, namely the Orioles, the Cubs, the Reds, the Indians, the Tigers, the Braves, the Pirates and also the Cardinals.
Of the long list of teams made, the rarest bobbleheads right now are considered to be these from the Anaheim Angels, which possess a paper label over the Los Angeles Decal, the Minneapolis Twins and the boy of the Baltimore Orioles.
Other curious particulars include the cowboy hats worn by the bobbleheads from the Colt 45’s and also the Astros, the white or green base option from the Cleveland Indians and also the Detroit Tigers, as well as the dark or light uniform option for the New York Mets figurines.
To create matters much more complex, there were two separate series made simultaneously. One of them is known as the mini series of baseball bobbleheads (by the way, the term bobbing head is much more well-liked in these vintage models) and the other one is know as the white base series.
Finally every team comes in two different variations, either holding a ball or a baseball bat.
These two series incorporated the first two expert baseball players to become represented as bobbleheads, Mickey Mantle and Roger Maris, although all figurines truly looked the identical and those of Mantle and Maris didn’t truly resemble the players.
Aside from a head that bobbles, these vintage bobbleheads hold tiny similarity for the ones we see created right now. For a single thing the material they were produced of inside the extremely beginning was really paper mache.
The design was also substantially distinct. The body was produced with very small detail and in no athletic pose. It was rather much more like a single block with some nuances around the limbs and although each of the body models would look identical prior to painting, great care was taken to accurately represent each and every team’s uniform. This partly explains why you’ll find such avid collectors chasing right after them these days, and attempting to hold all bobblehead models.
The production technique meant that each bobblehead was most likely produced, but definitely painted by hand. The colors themselves often contain a pearlescent finish and are usually glossy. This includes the finish from the face, which combined with all the boyish appearance created a cherub-like result on the majority of them.
The lack of emphasis around the body carving, and little work in accurately representing any person star indicates that the focus back then was to promote the team, and given that these bobbleheads had a magnet under the base, they were positive to be proudly displayed on many car dashboards back in those days. And yes, dashboards have been created of metal back then, in case you had been questioning!
Right after the Mantle and Maris bobbleheads created, yet another two stars followed swiftly right after, which have been Roberto Clemente and Willie Mays. Needless to say those amazing bobbleheads didn’t look a lot like Clemente or Mays either.
One quick Google will reveal a handful of businesses committed to catering towards the collector of this sort of bobblehead. They may be not all priced equally, with all the costs ranging from 15 USD to the all time record breaking 17,000 USD, which will be the subject of a future article as we maintain discussing this short history of bobbleheads.