The Collector

Meet the collector.  Oh sure, he's getting up there in age but still has a lot of life left in him. And compared to the age range of some of the collectors we've met over the years, he's still a "young fella" in the collector group. There are men (and some women I suppose) of all ages who find themselves bitten by the bug at some point in their lives so he's not really an exception in the toy world.

He sticks mainly to the vehicles, though did buy a few airplanes (they're probably not keepers as he tries to whittle down the collection); and then there are the food offerings (toys that came with kids meals over the years); and some oddities like the the California Raisins (heaven only knows why), or the M & Ms toys (he'll probably keep most of those too since one of our daughters collects them too).

I think he might actually have been born with this in his genes. Cleaning out his dad's garage he found a headlight from an old, old, old car (Model T maybe? I dunno). This would have been in the last five years so his dad kept it all these years. And that wasn't the only thing ... bank books from the 1940s onwards; odd stuff that probably hadn't seen the light of day in 50 years.  He came by it naturally. Oh yeah ... his parents did (at one time) have a car that went with that old headlight. I have to admit, this is one of my favourite pictures of his mom. Back when pants were not a thing for women, here she is strutting her stuff. She put herself out there at a time when a lot of women wouldn't have!

The Toyman was born and raised in Hamilton, Ontario and spent most of his life there, though for many, many, many summers of his childhood they "camped out" in the Orillia area (yeah, that's where Otaco was, and where the minnitoys were made) so his familiarity with the area and love for the town were fostered from a young age. He went to college in Hamilton, participated in high school and college sports, and worked for a while for the Ministry of Corrections at White Oaks.

When he moved to Orillia to take a job at the old Tudhope building (was Hunter Enterprises then I think) working with his uncle, he eventually managed to get hired at the Huronia Regional Center (that's the type of courses he took in college) where he stayed until he retired in his 50s. He continued working part-time in community group homes, and finally gave it up last year (2017) when he was 67.

He's not sitting on his laurels though. Now we spend the winters in Florida; he plays bocci ball, horseshoes, shuffleboard, and any other warm-weather sport he can get into (last year canoeing, this year we're kayaking).  He still gets around pretty well, and is focusing on enjoying life, and paring down the collections.