The 3D View Master!

I'd hate to use a cliche like the "you kids today with your blah blah blah" gag, but I can't think of a better way to start a blog about the View Master. The View Master is a fun toy that seems to be really outdated. You don't see 3D iPods or HD plasma screens. And we're still using the same reels from the fourties. Still, I had one or two as a kid, and I want to share a few memories.

I had a red, plastic 3d View Master, most likely like the one in the picture I posted here. My sister and I had several packs of reels, and we mostly had ones based on whatever cartoons we watched as kids.

I can't remember too many, but the one that stick out in my mind was one from a Pink Panther cartoon. It had the inspector, and his partner was drinking a potion that turned him into a Mr. Hyde monster. The cartoon was a couple minutes long, but the reel compressed the story down to, "Inspector's sidekick drinks potion. Sidekick becomes monster. Inspector gets punched. Inspector runs away." It's really interesting watching someone tell a story with seven pictures.

Sadly, my memory isn't being too helpful, but I'm sure I also had reels starring He-Man, Loony Tunes, and Winnie the Pooh. I wouldn't be surprised if I also had a ton of Disney related ones. Like kids books, I stuck with more fun, comedic reels instead of reels that were more serious. (In fact, I remember a Black Hole pack, which I never cared for. I don't think I've even seen the movie, and my parents seem to like it.)

The reason why I may not remember too many is because I think that after a while, you kind of get bored of the same reels. We had several packs, but I think we got them all at once, so without fresh packs I probably burnt out before too long. Still, even if you get bored of the content, I do remember spending a lot of time just playing with the stereo effect. I would often close one eye, and then the switch eyes just to see what would happen, and to see what the heck was the poin of using both eyes. I would also play with the handle just to mess with the stereo effect. Sometimes I would view an image, and then view an image really close to a lightbulb just to see what the difference would be.

Eventually, the reels started to fall apart. You basically stored your reels in paper wrappings, and the reels were also flimsy, so it was easy to bend them. Several of the pictures would get scratched, too. I remember one time I was looking at a stereo image and I had to different scratches competing with each other. Another thing about View Masters is that they're more fun too look at if you don't wear glasses. You really need to be able to almost poke your eyes out to enjoy those things. I think at least one of our View Masters broke, and we probably lost or threw away several reels.

Later on, after the View Master was kind of forgotten, one of our aunt's died in 1990. We had to spend several years going through her house. One of the things we found just happened to be a View Master, and this was a much sturdier model. We also found several old reels from the fifties, when the View Master was meant to show people sites from around the world. As primitive as it seems now, and probably as primitive as it was in the eighties, I learned how big it was back then. I didn't look at too many of the reels because there weren't too many sites that interested me, but it was nice that I could experience the fun of a View Master again. I'm sure I still have at least the View Master somewhere.

Later on I found a projector when we were moving. I always thought those things were neat when I was a kid. This projector was probably also rescued from my aunt's house, because it was really old. It was a dumb thing to do, but I plugged and used one of the old reels. Instead of seeing some far off place of old on the wall, I saw a blurry picture. Worst yet, the projector started to smoke, and I immediately unplugged the projector and threw it into a sink. I probably would have started a fire if I had left it on a tiny bit longer.

Of course, one of the most famous contributions of the View Master was that it allowed people to make fun of Nintendo when it released the ill-received Virtual Boy. But I really enjoyed it as a kid and I they'll continue selling it for a long time.