Thursday, January 15, 2009

1977 Nancy Drew TV Show Watch Part 2

I received the watch today! I'm including photos of it.

Including the front, face, sides.

It states on the face, 1977 Universal City

Studios, Inc. I'm wondering if this watch may have been sold at the theme park?! It's a child's watch as the band is very small. No other markings. I even checked it out using my trusty magnifying glass as any Nancy fan would ;) haha!

Since it was for a child, it would have been marketed as such so in some child mags, fan mags, or like I'm suspecting, at the theme park itself.


If anyone has any clues, I'd love to hear them:) There may have also been a counterpart for the Hardy Boys sold at the same time.

Jenn:)

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hi Jenn!!

Awesome watches! You lucky gal, you! I'd have gone for it if I'd known about it; sigh.

I'm a big Universal fan as well as a Nancy Fan. I collect the original classic monsters. As a side note, Universal Studios (City, Productions) was started in 1915 by Carl Laemmle. He made the first Dracula films, etc so his name is plastered on the earlier posters.

Anyway, I did some searching and I suspect that the watch(es) were sold in LA, California in a gift shop at Universal City. By the 1970s the Theme aspect of Universal was pretty new. Universal opened up to the public in 1964, and they only had some studio tours in the beginning, and, no doubt, gift shops. This might explain the rarity of the watch(es). Millions visit the Theme Parks today, but I imagine only thousands did back then. I'm guessing that these sold for a short period and that was it. But, I could be wrong on that.

But one thing is certain: Universal City is in LA and includes the studios as well as the Theme Park today. So the fact the watches say "Universal City" tells you that these came before the Parks became a big deal for tourists. I'd say these are really nice collectibles!

Kim W.

Jenn Fisher said...

Kim,

This is really neat information, thanks so much for providing it! Interesting history on Universal Studios and City!

Jenn:)