Riding on Dino

 I'm back yet again with another post spotlighting a classic piece of Flintstones memorabilia. Today, I'm showing two of my favorites, both based around Fred's lovable pet Dino. Released by Marx in 1963, here are the "Flintstone Pals on Dino" wind-up toys. Both Fred and Barney were available as part of this collection, and I have to say, of the toys I've shared on this blog from when the original Flintstones was originally broadcast, these ones probably do the best job at capturing the look of the characters. The packaging is pretty nifty, too. The characters' expressions are lovely, and whoever did the art did a great job at staying true to their appearances in the show. Here's what they look like both in and out of box.

I'm not quite done talking about Dino yet, however. Remember, I did say I wanted to talk about two pieces of merchandise. Below is a battery-operated tin toy of Dino, complete with Fred riding him. It measures 21 inches long, and when activated, Dino bops his head around while going his merry way. He even whistles, which the box proudly touts. It seems to be one of the bigger toys Marx offered in their Flintstone line, and I imagine any Flintstones-obsessed kid would have been ecstatic to get this back in the day. As you can imagine, this is also one of the more expensive products to get ahold of nowadays. A quick look on Ebay shows that most offerings of the toy go for at least a couple hundred, while a boxed copy goes up to nearly a thousand! I don't think I'd be willing to shell out that kind of money on a toy, but I can't deny that it's a lovely piece of memorabilia.