Kellogg’s Pep Cereal Pins
Battle Creek: Kellogg Company, 1945-1946. Hardcover. A complete set of all 86 original newspaper cartoon character pins found 1 per box in Pep cereal. Fine. Each is 13/16” and each has the character’s name. Unintendedly deviceful, postmodern art, capturing wholly and forever the first generation of these beloved personalities. Replicas and worn originals are out there but our set is vintage 1st editions in bright, fresh condition. Framed and glazed. The auction record for a set as fine as ours is $1,314.50 in 2006. fine. Item #485
From mid 1945 to mid 1946, American children nagged their parents to buy Kellogg’s Pep (an instant, vitamin fortified, whole–wheat, breakfast cereal) in search of these beauteous little pinback buttons. Millions of bowls of Pep were consumed in the enticing search for a complete set, but few were assembled because the buttons were issued in 5 series progressively, and each series ended when the next one began and was never produced again. Hence, even the steadfastly determined were stymied, and most kids settled for a few and wore them out on a coat or cap. And the Superman button was issued with each series, so at 5 times the number of the other pins, and Kellogg’s didn’t just trust accidental discovery to drive eagerness. Pep sponsored Mutual Radio’s The Adventures of Superman series where the cereal and its prizes were hyped to a cohort of innocents who didn’t realize that there even was such a thing as hype. In 1948 Topps issued their first bubblegum trading cards, and children’s collectibles entered a new era, as “youth” became a recognizable (and valued) class of consumers.
Price:
$1,000.00