2004 Skelly Family Christmas
Dear Santa ...
The tradition of exchanging presents is as old as Christmas itself. But giving is kind of an adult concept, and everybody knows that Christmas is for kids. When I was little, Christmas wasn't about Peace on Earth or Silent Night, Holy Night. It meant I would be getting toys.

One of the true harbingers of the holiday season was the arrival of the Christmas store catalogs, chock full with new toys. They took up the whole back page and worked their way inward, page upon page, back toward the center. My earliest-remembered window on important trends in technology: state-of-the-art toy development. In living color.

Those catalogs were my Advent. I gave myself up to their seductive promise with a lust and abandon more complete than ever I would devote later to the pages of Playboy. Football helmets and six-shooters and board games, sure. But also those special toys, the life-defining objects of desire upon whose ilk Abraham Maslow built his theory of self-actualization. 		Toys I'd never even dreamed of but, once having seen, could not live without past Christmas. Toys that could make you the envy of all the other kids. Or at least gain you enviable admittance to a club of peers. I will never forget the look on my daughter's face when she got her first Cabbage Patch Kid. She would at last be on a par with the older girls on the street. This would fix everything.

Later that day in the car, I caught a glimpse of her in the back seat holding and cuddling the doll, and as I watched, she bent over, a serene and beatific smile on her face, and planted a loving kiss on its forehead.

Dolls are supposed to be hot again this year. According to www.hot-christmas-toys.com, these are the big sellers of this Christmas season:
  1. Nintendo DS
  2. Apple 20 GB iPod
  3. Microsoft XBox 2004 Holiday Bundle
  4. iQuest (Purple)
  5. V-Smile
  6. InteracTV Dvd System
  7. Little People: A Little People Christmas
  8. E-L-M-O Dancing Plush
  9. Nitro Battlerz Starter Set: Battle Dome with 2 Cars
  10. Little Mommy Baby Doll Gift Set with Carrier, Stroller and Swing
Below is a list of seminal toy developments that have made the heart pound and the blood race down through the years. And a couple of links to sites that will take you through the history of these, and other, toy technology milestones and chart our progress as surely as other metrics of science or commerce, and more surely so if you happen to be under 12 years old (as many of us still are). Just glancing over the list, I know my own pulse is quickening.

The Great Idea Finder/Toys and Games History

The History Channel.Com

Blockbuster Christmas Toys Through the Years
Year Introduced Toy
1767 Jigsaw Puzzle
1895 Schwinn bicycles
1902 Teddy Bear
1903 Crayons
1910 Lionel Trains
1913 Erector Set
1914 Tinker Toys
1915 Raggedy Ann Doll
1916 Lincoln Logs
1928 Mickey Mouse Doll
1929 Yo-Yo
1936 Monopoly
1943 Silly Putty
1943 Slinky
1948 Scrabble
1949 Lego, Candy Land
1950 Frisbee
1952 Mr. Potato Head
1958 Hula Hoop
1959 Barbie Doll
1960 Etch A Sketch
1965 GI Joe
1966 Hot Wheels
1969 Nerf Ball
1972 Pong
1973 Dungeons & Dragons
1986 Cabbage Patch Kids
1993 Beanie Babies
1997 Teletubbies

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12/23/04