{"product_id":"vintage-1980-galactic-battleships-vending-display-card-🃏-diamond-vending-supply-co-sci-fi-header-c-23-nos-hong-kong","title":"Vintage 1980 Galactic Battleships Vending Display Card 🃏 Diamond Vending Supply Co. Sci-Fi Header C-23 NOS Hong Kong","description":"\u003ch2\u003eRemember Standing at the Vending Machine, Quarter in Hand? 🚀\u003c\/h2\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eSize:\u003c\/strong\u003e 10\" x 8 3\/4\" ~ New Old Stock.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cdiv style=\"max-width:315px;margin:0 auto 20px;\"\u003e\u003cdiv style=\"position:relative;padding-bottom:177.78%;height:0;overflow:hidden;\"\u003e\u003ciframe src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/d2cLlPsvC58\" style=\"position:absolute;top:0;left:0;width:100%;height:100%;\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer;autoplay;clipboard-write;encrypted-media;gyroscope;picture-in-picture\" allowfullscreen\u003e\u003c\/iframe\u003e\u003c\/div\u003e\u003c\/div\u003e\n\n\n\n\n\n\u003cp\u003eBefore the toy aisle had endcaps and shrink-wrap, there was a smaller, stranger ritual: you stood in front of a coin machine at the drugstore, the five-and-dime, or the front corner of the supermarket, and above the coin slot and the little glass globe of capsules was a card exactly like this one, doing every bit of the selling with nothing but paint and a promise. This is that card - Galactic Battleships, card-stock and quarter-machine bright, and I'm glad to still have it around the shop to pass along.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003ch2\u003eWhat's Actually Printed on It 🌌\u003c\/h2\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eGALACTIC BATTLESHIPS runs across the top in bold white block letters over a solid black star field. Two silver-blue fighters with red trim streak across the scene, each one firing a long yellow laser bolt out ahead of it, a flat ship with a ribbed canopy trails twin white beams in from the upper left, and up at the right a helmeted warrior in chrome armor glinting red, with starbursts of light flashing off him, stands his ground with a ray gun of his own. Down in the corner a cratered tan planet curls up into the frame to ground the whole thing in deep space. \"C-23\" sits by the warrior's shoulder - this card's own catalog number - and a \"25¢\" is printed inside a little starred oval, the machine's old vend price at the time. The diamond-shaped DVS logo sits in the lower left next to the copyright line, \"Copyright © Diamond Vending Supply Co., Inc. 1980 All Rights Reserved,\" with \"MADE IN HONG KONG\" printed along the bottom edge. Faint dashed perforation lines run down the card in vertical panels. Flip it over and the back is just plain gray-tan stock, nothing printed on it at all.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003ch2\u003eWhat a Card Like This Actually Did 🪙\u003c\/h2\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eA header card rode above the coin slot and the capsule globe on a quarter machine - the drugstore, the five-and-dime, the supermarket entrance - and it did all the selling itself. No commercial ran ahead of it, no cartoon built the hype for weeks; the painted artwork alone had to stop a kid mid-step and convince them a quarter was worth risking on whatever tumbled out of that globe.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003ch2\u003eDiamond Vending Supply and the C-23 Card 💠\u003c\/h2\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eDiamond Vending Supply Co. put out more than this one design - a \"Bye-Bye Hand\" waving-hand vending card, dated a year later in 1981, carries the exact same diamond DVS logo and the same 25-cent badge, so C-23 was one card in a small house line rather than a one-off. It's one of those small vending-supply outfits that left its mark mostly on the cards it made.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWhere this one was made is right there along the bottom edge: MADE IN HONG KONG. That fits the times. Hong Kong overtook Japan as the world's biggest toy exporter back in 1972, and by 1980 it had over 2,000 toy factories with some 56,000 people working in them.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003ch2\u003eLanding Right in the Space Craze 🛸\u003c\/h2\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e1980 sat right in the middle of the post-Star Wars toy wave - Star Wars had hit in 1977, and The Empire Strikes Back opened that same year - and this header rides that wave under Diamond Vending's own copyright, with no studio, show or film named anywhere on it.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eLook closer at those ships, though, because the TV set got in here too. Anybody who watched Battlestar Galactica will know those white fighters with the red chevrons - the big one down low shows three glowing engines out back - and they're dead ringers for the show's Colonial Vipers, right down to the laser fire going out the front. And the trooper up in the corner, with the crested chrome helmet, the skirt hanging off his belt, the heeled boots and the rifle, looks an awful lot like a Cylon Centurion to me. Battlestar Galactica ran one season on ABC, September 1978 to April 1979, and then the fans wrote in and Galactica 1980 aired from January 27 to May 4, 1980 - the same year printed on this piece. The show sat so close to Star Wars that 20th Century Fox sued Universal over it, claiming Galactica had lifted 34 ideas from George Lucas's film. So this little quarter-machine header channels a bit of both.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"relatedBlock\"\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003e🔎 More From The Vintage \u0026amp; Antique Gifts Archive\u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003cul\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e\u003ca href=\"https:\/\/vintageantiquesgifts.com\/products\/vintage-1980s-clown-girl-gargoyle-dexterity-puzzle-game-hong-kong-nos\"\u003eVintage 1980s NOS Clown Girl and Gargoyle Dexterity Puzzle Game 🧸 Plastic Toys Made in Hong Kong Circus Ball Maze\u003c\/a\u003e\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e\u003ca href=\"https:\/\/vintageantiquesgifts.com\/products\/vintage-1980s-clown-mouse-dexterity-puzzle-game-hong-kong-nos\"\u003eVintage 1980s Clown \u0026amp; Mouse Dexterity Puzzle Game on Stapled Header Card 🎪 NOS Plastic Toys Hong Kong Dime Store Circus Novelty\u003c\/a\u003e\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e\u003ca href=\"https:\/\/vintageantiquesgifts.com\/products\/vintage-flintstones-jetsons-hanna-barbera-store-display-1980s-treasures\"\u003eVintage 1980s - 1990s NOS Hanna‑Barbera Flintstones \u0026amp; Jetsons 🦴 Vending Display Sign\u003c\/a\u003e\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003c\/ul\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Vintage and Antique Gifts","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":67890526847188,"sku":"VAG-8454442385640","price":24.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0685\/2309\/8324\/files\/il_fullxfull.5492926556_c62t.jpg?v=1792549071","url":"https:\/\/role-players.shop\/products\/vintage-1980-galactic-battleships-vending-display-card-%f0%9f%83%8f-diamond-vending-supply-co-sci-fi-header-c-23-nos-hong-kong","provider":"Role-Players","version":"1.0","type":"link"}