Wednesday, January 18, 2017

Doll-A-Day 2017 #18 Steve Scout by Kenner

  Yesterday we saw Craig Cub Scout, since Cub's Scouts come before Boy Scouts. So today we're looking at Steve Scout, the Boy Scout doll, by Kenner.

  As I told you yesterday, there were four Scout dolls in the line: Steve and Bob Scout,(Bob was an African American), and Cub Scouts Craig, and Dave, an African American.(The two African American figures are harder to find.)





 At 9" tall Steve is 1/2" taller than Craig.



  Steve's Scout uniform includes the shirt, pants, attached belt,neckerchief,shoes.
He has the Scout emblem on his shirt and belt buckle. His belt buckle is starting to corrode.

The Scout emblem is on the back of his neckerchief too. His belt is sewn to his pants in the back.
  The body articulation is very similar to GI Joe.
His right hand is in the Scout salute position. Poor Steve's head has become very loose, and can't hold a pose any more. But his hip joints are super tight. So are Craig's so I think it's just the way they are. And I mean SUPER tight, as in, hardly moveable.
His hair is painted but with molded detail.

 
 The line began1974. It seems to have run for at least two years. There were an awful lot of things produced for a two year line! 

I mentioned yesterday that there were alot of playsets produced for the Scouts. When I said alot, I meant A LOT. There were over a dozen sets, and most contained a fair amount of items.
Pretty cool. I would have loved this set, and my kids would have too.
These guys aren't old enough to drive are they?

There's a load of good stuff in this set,including a campfire, a lantern,a sleeping bag, and cooking equipment.
There was a Scout command post that was nearly 3' tall. Kenner really went all out on this line. In addition to playsets,(Which came with a comic book adventure based on the set.) like 'Avalanche on Blizzard Ridge', and  'Warning from Thunderhead Weather Station', 'Danger at Snake River', and 'Search for the Spanish Galleon',there were also accessory packs like 'mountain medic', and 'metal detector'. I mean, this was some good stuff.

  Supposedly there was a series of  adventure costumes made called the Historic American Series. It included a couple of revolutionary  war era outfits called The Patriot and Drummer Boy, a cowboy outfit called Out West, and a fringed 'Frontier' outfit. I'm not really sure the outfits were actually produced, because I can't find any details about them, or any pictures besides the drawings in the booklet included with the dolls. I know there were plans for Civil War uniforms, both sides, but the line ended before that happened. But at least I found some mock ups for the packaging for those.

  The line only lasted a couple of years, from what I can tell. The general consensus seems to be that Boy Scouts were a dumb idea for action figures. They weren't as heroic and worldly as soldiers or science fiction guys. But looking at all the great adventure sets they made for the Scouts, I really don't think that's fair. If kids could identify with the Scouts, they could put themselves in their place and live the adventures through them. Maybe it just made their own Scouting adventures seem pretty pathetic. I will also admit that the complaint that alot of the Scouts adventures were things that would probably not  happen to real Scouts,(like rescuing people in the mountains,etc.),have some truth to them. But isn't that the point of play? One of the Scouts competitors was The Bionic Man. Now that stuff wasn't real either, but nobody seems to have a problem with The Bionic Man. Some things just aren't fair.

"Hey! We can rescue people!"
  Join us tomorrow for another doll.

5 comments:

  1. Sorry, I know this entry is 2 years old (Great looking blog BTW. Glad to see there are those out there still blogging), but I've only recently become aware of this line. I collect 70s/80s toys (action figure lines and their accessories mostly) but I'd never heard of this line before stumbling on it via a totally unrelated search (For a Kenner Star Wars Biker Scout, which I lazily entered as Kenner Scout, thinking that would be good enough). I was in Scouts and love 70s/80s toys, so this line grabbed my heart right away. So far I've picked up a Steve Scout and recently won the Pathfinder, a Jeep-like vehicle complete w/Canoe.

    This is a neat line w/lots of cool, adventure themed sets. Sort of a G.I. Joe Adventure Team Jr. Definitely recommend to anyone who loves larger figures/dolls from the era and/or were in Scouts. Really surprised there wasn't a concurrent Girls Scouts line.

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    1. Don't worry about the time.It's never too late if I'm still at the blog! You're right. This line had some great play sets! The guy would have been a lot of fun. Unfortunately I was just at the age when they came out that I thought I was too old for this sort of thing. If it had come out a few years earlier I would have been all over this stuff though.

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  2. Yeah, it was a bit before my time (I was born in '74), so I was never aware of it despite being a bit of a Kenner aficionado. I have toy lines from the late 80s/early 90s that I collect or plan to collect that I was similarly too old for at the time, but have discovered since.

    Thanks for the response, and again, great looking blog.

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    1. I was the opposite. I've always been a huge Planet of the Apes fan,but when all the toys came out (the year you were born!) I thought I was 'too old' at 12! I have since become younger and caught up with collecting them! Nowdays I'm not too old for anything I like. And thanks for the compliment on the blog!

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    2. Lol! Well you're in good company. Seems like we spend our teens trying to be "grown up" and when we actually grow up we realize it's overrated :p. And I'm a fellow Mego POTA collector myself. Well, I have Dr. Zaius, but I have plans to pick up more. It's an awesome line, as so much of classic Mego is.

      I have an appreciation for Bloggers. I've had/been part of several over the years (sadly now all defunct). Yours is fantastic. Best of luck to you and thanks for the replies!

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Thanks in advance for your comments.