ANAMOSA, Iowa - Long before you threw a leg over a real motorcycle or drove a car, you may have practiced with a tin or cast iron toy version on the living room rug, or ran your pedal car on the sidewalk. Toy motorcycles and cars set the stage for our passion for real vehicles. Now the National Motorcycle Museum can help you re-live your youth with a great expose of these small machines from the 1900's in an exhibition entitled "Little Wheels".
Makers like Marx, Vindex and Hubley plus other European and American makers fired our young fantasies with police, racing, touring and even some trick machines. Over 400 motorcycle toys now live in the collection of the National Motorcycle Museum in Anamosa, Iowa. You'll get a chance to take in examples of great "motor toys" in a special expanded exhibit that opened November 20, 2009.
Lenders to the Museum will also assist in making this a show great with some very unique and rarely seen toys. And while some of us put a lot of miles on our toys, maybe "ran the wheels off them,” others put away the original box with all its interesting graphics and placed the toy on display on a shelf out of harms way. Great examples of how the toys looked and worked in their original form, and packaging will part of this display as well.
"This show, just in time for the holidays, is a great chance for parents and grandparents to show their kids what they played with.....long before the microchip became commonplace," says Museum Director Jeff Carstensen. "If you have ever been curious as to the range of toys made, or want to go back and see some of your favorites again, this show is also a perfect historical reference."
The show will be featured on the upper level of the museum through April 2010. "Little Wheels" is one of many exhibitions you will enjoy at the National Motorcycle Museum. On display are over 225 motorcycles and thousands of pieces of memorabilia including posters, apparel, photographs, awards, plus feature exhibitions on celebrities like Von Dutch, Evel Knievel, Peter Fonda and Dennis Hopper of Easy Riders fame.
The National Motorcycle Museum is a non-profit 501(c)(3) corporation. For more information, contact the National Motorcycle Museum at 319-462-3925 or visit them on the web at www.nationalmcmuseum.org.