Baby Boomer Collectibles November 1993 Vol. 1 No. 2

Baby Boomer Collectibles November 1993 Vol. 1 No. 2 Cover
Baby Boomer Collectibles was an 8 1/2" x 11" magazine with glossy covers and black and white (with occasional color) interior pages printed on old-school comic book paper (the stuff that yellows a bit over time). The magazine angled toward the flea market and yard sale crowd featuring many images of collectible items such as Topps baseball cards, lunch boxes and of course toys. The second issue published in November 1993 had John Michlig's first published article "Can You Hear Me Major Matt?" which contains an interview with Joe Ferreira, who had just published his "Men from Earth" comic book. It also contains two ads (the magazine is full of ads, which I believe was its revenue model) regarding Joe Ferreira: on Page 20 a quarter page promotion for "Major Matt Mason & Me" and on page 30 a half page announcement for the comic book series by Future-Fun, Inc. (Joe's company).

Baby Boomer Collectibles November 1993 Vol. 1 No. 2 Page 20
Baby Boomer Collectibles November 1993 Vol. 1 No. 2 Page 30
Baby Boomer Collectibles November 1993 Vol. 1 No. 2 Page 50
Baby Boomer Collectibles November 1993 Vol. 1 No. 2 Page 51
Baby Boomer Collectibles November 1993 Vol. 1 No. 2 Page 52
Baby Boomer Collectibles November 1993 Vol. 1 No. 2 Page 66

The main article goes over the toyline, has some interview snippets and discusses oddities like the size of Capt. Lazer when compared to the other astronauts. John Michlig has the transcript of his article available on his substack (archive) The Fully Articulated Newsletter.

John's Notes:

  • John Michlig has been involved in the Major Matt Mason community for many years - he's probably best known for his work on the GI Joe Masterpiece Edition and the coffee table-sized book "GI Joe: The Complete Story of America's Favorite Man of Action." What I like best about his writing is that he applies his own experiences as a kid playing with the toy which provides a lot of perspective and makes the material much more interesting.
  • Back in the early 90's there were several magazines trying to cash in on the action figure craze, which was starting to crank up through sales on Toy Shop Magazines and at flea markets (that's always been a hotbed of old toys - sort of where all the old, discarded toys used to go). Baby Boomer Collectibles (later shortened to "Boomer" I believe) was part of a crowd of collectibles magazines and books that hit the scene. Back then I thought it inferior to the glossy pages of Action Figure Digest and later Fanfare and Go Figure! This is the only issue I've managed to save.
  • As with other guides from the time, the list of Major Matt Mason items at the end seemed to have been copied from Tomart's list, even reusing their  "MA-####" designation and inaccurate descriptions (Space Mission Team shows "Jeff Long" instead of "Sgt. Storm").
All Mattel images and captions are copyright Mattel and used without permission. All other content, including images and editorial, is Copyright © 1997-2024 John Eaton and/or contributors unless otherwise stated. If there are any comments or objections, please contact John Eaton.

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