Curiosity Shop

Oddities and curiosities today kids!

1965 (or close to it) saw the creation and possible test release by Topps of two old movie staples: King Kong and Flash Gordon.  These black-and-white sets were either tested or just printed up for internal use and are fairly legendary rarities today. A seller on eBay purports to have proof boxes for both but I think, at best, they are mockups and I'm not 100% convinced they were created by Topps at the time the sets were being considered for release, although the odds greatly favor it I think.

Here's King Kong, with folded-over indicia:

Whatever happened to Fay Wray? She was up there with him I thought.

No info on the bottom here:

The blank end flap on one side seems like a mockup beacon, no proof would look like that:

This end flap is better but the look of Kong plastered there is kind of rough:

Clear magic-markering signs on the inner flaps (and all over the place, really):

Meanwhile, well across the sci-fi universe:

Again, I'm not sure the indicia should fold over like that.  These may have been slapped together for internal use very quickly and then the test bubble burst before anything further could be made up.

The box bottom, if this actually is from 1965, has the old Postal Zone code for Topps, two years after ZIP codes came out to play.

There is one barren end panel:

The other panel is better but this looks pretty wonky even for a Topps mock up piece:

You can see the magic marker work quite easily on the inner flaps:

I will say the look of both is eerily similar and it is thought the sets may have been developed at the same time.  

Neat stuff, with some questions still to be answered....