Just randomly I happened to find a very treasured item that I thought was gone forever. I was looking for something else entirely when I found this old envelope in an old file folder.
The envelope is from around 1984 or 1985 I wager, when I was around 7 or 8 yrs old, based on the address it was sent to. Inside the envelope was a short note on a single sheet of looseleaf and my G.I. Joe Mobile Strike Force dog tag. The note reads as follows: “Dear Chris, Hi, I was to Keji about a month ago, and found your chain and thought you’d like it back. Well, here it is. Bye, Susan.”
First off, for those of you who aren’t from around here, “Keji” is the local vernacular for The Kejimkujik National Park in southern Nova Scotia, which is now also a National Historic Site. I went camping there quite regularly with my fam as a kid. I would have definitely taken my G.I. Joe gear with me and obviously dropped this dog tag there on one trip. Susan was nice enough to mail it to me! (This was a day and age when people took the time to write a note, put it in an envelope and take it to the mailbox to return stuff they found that wasn’t theirs. Imagine!)
So, as for the dog tag itself. This would have been one of (if not the) earliest mail-in promotions that Hasbro did with G.I. Joe. It was part of the “Mobile Strike Force Team” package, which as a kid, was a truly incredible package. You mailed in, and then they sent you an introductory newsletter, a military style belt with the G.I. Joe logo on it, an official Membership Card, a cool poster (that I think was a thin plastic type material, and around 11x14 in size, and featured the image that I’m pretty sure was also the cover of Marvel’s G.I. Joe #1), A G.I. Joe iron-on logo, AND your own personalized dog tag that had your name and address on it. Phew!
Well lemme tell you, that all was a HUGE deal to me when i was that age. That offer would have come out when I was 6 and lined up with the first year of G.I. Joe being on the market - 1982.
I can’t tell you what a joy it was to find this old dog tag that I completely forgot was returned to me years ago! It is VERY worn and the writing engraved is a bit hard to read at this point, but it’s been 30+ years! I hope to possibly come across some of the other pieces from my Membership Kit but if you wanna see pictures, 3Djoes.com has a great page to show you all the items: http://www.3djoes.com/1982-gi-joe-mobile-strike-force-team-blockbuster-membership-kit.html
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