What made you start collecting?

[Gwangi]

I know there was once a topic on why you collect but I'm not aware of a thread that discusses what motivated you to collect in the first place. If so feel free to disregard this one. I'm talking about motivation here. Is collecting dinosaurs a holdover from your childhood? If not what made you start?

My story is probably not too different from the normal. I never stopped being fascinated and obsessed with dinosaurs since I was three years old. It kind of went away in my teenage years but never truly. I had a respectable collection of toys growing up that eventually was sold off at yard sales. You know, I was growing up and didn't have room for toys in my life anymore. That was my mother's opinion anyway and eventually mine too but teenagers never truly know what they want anyway.

In my mid 20's dinosaurs entered my life again in a big way. I think it was mostly from the effect of getting older and nostalgia kicking in hard. That and I was old enough that I no longer cared if people looked at me funny because I was still into dinosaurs. I didn't collect dinosaurs yet but I started buying books and did more reading on them than I had since I was 13 or so. It was at about that time that the internet world of dinosaurs opened up to me with all the fantastic blogs, forums and content that I wish I had access to as a kid.

It did not take long until I found the DTB and later on this place. At that time I was content to read reviews but one day I got my first look at the X-Plus Styracosaurus and that sealed the deal. Though I ironically still don't own one it was my "spark dinosaur" for sure and it in conjunction with the prospect of photographing dioramas ultimately lead me here and into this hobby.

So what is your story? Did you have a "spark dinosaur" too? If so what was it?

[Primeval12]

It was either learning about them in school, or my aunt buying me a bag of dinosaurs, I forget.

[tyrantqueen]

I'm not a hundred percent sure, maybe it was the nostalgia part of it. Dinos were a big part of my childhood, but the models I owned back then don't actually have much to do with my collection nowadays. When I was a kid, my toys were mostly inaccurate chinasaurs, and second hand Jurassic Park toys if I was lucky (none of my dino toys were first hand, my parents bought me stuff from jumble sales and the like)
When I was a kid, I liked to draw dinosaurs (I remember painting a big red tyrannosaurus in poster paint back in Year 1) and read all the dino books I could get at the local library.

I think it might be to do with my interest in sculpture and paleoart. I am really fascinated by seeing each individual artists personal depiction of how a particular species looks, and our scientific understanding of these animals evolved over the decades.

Also, my obsession over organisation (I'm autistic) might have something to do with it I like being able to organise and collect each species of dinosaur. All the different kinds of dinosaur (theropod, sauropods, ornithischians, thyreophorans etc) are fascinating to me.

There's also a bit of mystery involved. Unless we invent a time machine, no-one can ever truly say what did and didn't happen back then. I like to look at a model or fossil replica and imagine what happened to it.

My "spark" dino was the Papo Tyrannosaurus. I don't even remember where I first saw it, (maybe it was eBay) but I was amazed at the organic quality and sculpting details, and then proceeded to hunt down the rest of the line.

[Takama]

Sigh....This is a long story so, get comfy

I liked Dinosaurs when i was a kid, every now and then my parents spoiled me with various imperial, Ukrd, Jurrasic Park, and Chinasaur figures. It wasn't until i went to  Elementry school that i discovered a more serious line. Every year, the school would go through a Dino phase, and my Music teacher would decorate her desk with the first Carnegie Collection i ever Saw. Eventually, my parents took me to the Doctor(which was in a diffrent town) and took me to the local Toy Shop, and in that Toy Shop, was the Carnegie Collection.  I bugged my parents to buy me one because my teacher had them, but they were hesitant as they seemed to know that this line was something diffrent.

They eventually did buy me one, and it was the Corythosaurus, but i treated it the same way as all my other Dino's, and then forgot about it.  Eventually, i got to digging through my old toys and found it, and remembered that my teacher owned them too, so i bugged my parents again to buy me more of them.  Over the years the collection got bigger, and bigger, and in 2010, i decided to hunt down the real old ones that my Teacher had, that were retired when i was at that school.  I started to search online, and i discovered the blog, and the many other Toylines in existence.     Longer story shortend, this lead my to become the Dino obsessed man that my Mom raves about.

Here is that Coyrthosaurus that got my started in the first place. Miraculusly, its still in decent condition

 

[sauroid]

i've always liked dinosaurs and modern animals, so the next best thing to possessing them is to buy replicas (tho nowadays i can keep easily maintained exotic/domestic animals). but i've always liked dino/animal figures since early childhood, and my dad was a part of nurturing my fascination (i come from a family of animal lovers/keepers), because he had those vintage animal figures which he passed down to me as soon as i was at the age when i could play with them properly, my parents bought me unlimited toys, and from that point on, i started collecting them til this age. but there was a lull during my teenage years (14-20) when my focus was on other things. but as soon as i could afford them on my own, ive never stopped accumulating. so i could say that im a life-long collector. (the johnny-come-latelys and the flash-in-the-pans are curious aspects of the collecting hobby).

[docronnie]

From Grade school to Medical school, I was a coin and stamp collector.  I bred tropical fishes too from Grade school to Medicine.

My father collected coins too, but not so serious.  He breeds dogs, but his Champion dogs were German Shepherds.  He still breeds Shepherds and mini-pinschers today at the age of 79.

My uncle is also a coin collector and an antique collector.

So, I would say that collecting is in our blood and started most of us at a young age.

My coin and stamp collection are still with me, but my interest in them have died down.  I became a serious Toy Collector in 2007, although I did collect a few in 2002.

I always wanted to learn what dinosaurs were, but I was always pre-occuppied with other interests, until my youngest daughter began to like dinosaurs, just last year! 

I would say, that my daughter re-kindled my interest in dinosaurs.

My favorite dinosaur during my childhood was the Triceratops, which is my first dino figure. 

[Gwangi]

Great stories everyone. It is nice to get the inside scoop on how we all came into this hobby.

[Nebuloid]

As a kid I was a big dinosaur fan, thanks to some documentary that was on tv once a year ( think it was dinosaur! with Christopher Reeve...) Then it was this book but in Dutch :


And then ofcourse came Jurassic Park which I saw in the cinema at my 10th birthday party, still remember that.
About 2 years ago I found that old encyclopedia in the attic. Started reading it, ordered some dinosaurs, found this forum, the rest is history !

[Gwangi]

It is amazing what the impact of one well made movie, documentary or book can have on a child. That "Dinosaur!" documentary no doubt had an impact on me too. I recorded it and re-watched until the tape wore out. Jurassic Park no doubt sealed the deal for me too but the first movie I ever actually remember seeing was the original "Land Before Time". I'm sure that may be where the initial interest came from.

Would you believe that before "Jurassic Park" came out this was my favorite dinosaur movie?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lYkrg02yGL8

[Nebuloid]

It is amazing what the impact of one well made movie, documentary or book can have on a child. That "Dinosaur!" documentary no doubt had an impact on me too. I recorded it and re-watched until the tape wore out. Jurassic Park no doubt sealed the deal for me too but the first movie I ever actually remember seeing was the original "Land Before Time". I'm sure that may be where the initial interest came from.

Would you believe that before "Jurassic Park" came out this was my favorite dinosaur movie?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lYkrg02yGL8

I DO believe it ! And I also forgot to add the tv-series Dinosaurs and Land of the Lost  to my list,  watched those a lot.

[Gwangi]

Yes, I also watched "Dinosaurs" and "Land of the Lost", the 1990's version anyway.

[Balaur]

I was in love with dinosaurs ever since I was four years old. I lived in Arizona for three years, and at the museum there, me and my friend saw some of the Carnegie collection. I knew he collected dinosaur toys and so I credit him for having me start to collect dinosaurs, starting with Carnegie. Then, at around eight or nine, I lost my interest in dinosaurs (so much so, that I told my mom to throw away my collection, good thing she didn't listen to me and hid them elsewhere) However, one day, probably a year after I lost my interest, I found a dinosaur that I thought I lost (it was a Carnegie Triceratops) and somehow that rekindled my interest. I didn't become a serious collector until about two years ago, when i really started to collect more lines. Now, i cherish it like my cats. Then, around the same time I became a serious collector, I discovered Version 1 of the Dinosaur Toy Forum. I looked around it every once and a while, but never joined. Then, a year ago, I realized that a second version of the forum was created. I decided to stop stalking the forums and join it. Joining this forum made me collect a wide variety of dinosaurs than just Carnegie and Safari, and I was astonished to find people that where actually very knowledgable about dinosaurs. It felt like I was amongst my own kind, and so I continue to stay here.

So that is my story of how I began to collect and how I joined the forum. 

[postsaurischian]

Pure love !
_{There can be no intellectual reasons because I wasn't old enough for these.}

[sauroid]

Pure love !
_{There can be no intellectual reasons because I wasn't old enough for these.}

very true

[Patrx]

Right, so I'm a little late to posting here, but I do have a story of sorts.
Not unusually, I've been fond of dinosaurs for, literally, as long as I can remember. Between Jurassic Park and Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers, I essentially had no choice in the matter; it was the 1990's after all. I received quite a few dinosaur-themed toys - a knockoff Marx playset, some JP stuff, the Tyco Deinonychus, Playskool's Psittacosaurus, and the like. After awhile, though, the dinosaur mania sort of faded into the background. My collection, as it is now, started because of a visit to the Dinosaur Depot in Cañon City, Colorado circa 2009. It's a small museum, with relatively meager resources, and I noticed they were using plastic dinosaur toys alongside their fossil casts to serve as life restorations:


This started me thinking - perhaps I, despite my own lack of financial resources, could assemble a museum of sorts myself. I began shopping for fossil replicas and such, and trying to find out which affordable plastic dinosaurs were of the greatest educational value. This led me to the Dinosaur Toy Blog, and in turn, the forum. Over the past four years, I've learned a lot about the state of paleontology, and assembled a little bookshelf-museum in which I do indeed feel a certain amount of pride.

[amargasaurus cazaui]

Growing up in the early seventies, I fell in love with dinosaurs actually watching The Flintstones, and then seeing "Valley of the Gwangi". At that time your choice for dinosaur figues was vastly limited...you could collect the hollow Tootsie toys, Marx dinosaurs and the Mpc dinosaurs. Carnegies and Invictas were not yet a twinkle on the horizon.I remember for Christmas being given bags of the Tim MEE style dinosaurs, always red, green and yellow. My favorite dinosaurs were the Aurora Prehistoric scenes dinosaur models, and the various dinosaur models released through Airfix, Pyro and many other companies. The leader of my dinosaur horder was Godzilla, of course!
  Lifes demands took me away from it all till the late nineties and then I decided to resurrect my long lost childhood collection. I now own again a nice practically mint Marx set (thanks Pam) an equally nice MPC set, a nice collection of tootise toys , and I still have my original Aurora models as well as other odd and end dinosaur models. When you see me posting those old dinosaur models from the seventies in the new acquistions thread, they are my original models, each being restored and repainted by Martin Garrat. ( And I am sure he wishes I had less of them )

PS great idea for a  thread Gwangi.

[Gwangi]

Great stories Amargasaurus and Patrx.

I too would like a little bookshelf museum of my own some day. My house is already littered with smaller fossils, prehistoric toys, animal skulls and pelts and even some taxidermy and preserved specimens so I'm getting there but some day I do need to get some respectable fossils in here.

[Patrx]

Well, I think Michael may well have outclassed my little "museum" with that awesome Psittaccosaurus of his! As far as "respectable fossils" go, I don't have much, mostly teeth, eggshells, and that sort of thing. I do have a Pstittacosaurus forearm, however

[amargasaurus cazaui]

Well, I think Michael may well have outclassed my little "museum" with that awesome Psittaccosaurus of his! As far as "respectable fossils" go, I don't have much, mostly teeth, eggshells, and that sort of thing. I do have a Pstittacosaurus forearm, however

Very kind thing to say Patrx. I am very proud of "Nim" my Psittacosaurus. We treat him like a member of the family here . I do also have the four eggs I have been able to acquire and a small collection of eggshell. I wondered what types of eggshell you have in your collection?
  I also collected various kinds of bones for awhile, from various dinosaurs so the entire effect is either that of a small museum, or more like a thrift store!!!.

[Chad]

I'm new to the forum so this seems a good topic in which to chime in. I can't remember when I became fascinated by dinosaurs, I just always have been. Someone gave me a book when I was 5 or 6 and I think I read it a couple of times a day until I was 12. One Christmas an uncle gave me a big box set of dinosaurs that came with a playmat and volcanoes (I think they were mostly Marx rip-offs) and, while I played the hell out of that set and really loved it, I was always kind of annoyed the figures were so ridiculously inaccurate. Fast forward about 20 years and, on a visit to the AMNH soon after I moved to New York, they were selling Battat figures in the gift shop and I thought, That's exactly what I wanted when I was a kid! so I bought a couple. I usually picked up one or two Carnegie figures whenever I'd go back and for Christmas my girlfriend would put a couple of figures in my stocking.  I was building up a fair collection but very slowly and without any real effort. A few months ago I was shopping for a gift for a friend's new baby and they had vagaceratops at the store and it really took be aback. They're making stuff like vagaceratops now? It led me to some googling about dinosaur figures which led me to discovering things like Collecta, Kaiyodo and so on and, naturally, this site, which has been a great resource. I recently made my first order for stuff from Shapeways and I have a big box of stuff coming from Japan so I know I'm in deep now...I do wish I had bought more of those Battats, though. I had no idea they'd ever be worth anything.