Red's: For Those Who Just Can't Live Without an Archie Bunker's Grandson Doll

I'm forever ranting against the 'good old days' that never really existed. I make it a point to be as anti-sentimental as possible, but a link to bigreds.com changed all that for the half hour I spent scrolling down a virtual memory lane. Seemingly everything from childhood looks like shit through adult eyes. The great big places you remember turn out to be depressingly small, the places where you spent time have been replaced by Walgreens and Shitmarts, you can't even stomach 5 minutes of the movies you revered the most--it's the natural progression of things. It all rings true except for Red's.

Red's is a dusty warehouse store near Kings Plaza in Brooklyn, containing everything from above ground pools and supplies, patio furniture, sheds and the most random selection of old and shitty (AKA collectable) toys ever assembled. For example check out this awesome Welcome Back Kotter Sweathogs Rock Guitar:



The real attraction was the guy who ran the place: Big Red. To put it kindly, Red was a gruff and impatient man who had no time for imbeciles. In child of the 1980's math: Messed up store + combustible grouchy owner= Hours of entertainment. Myself and my friend Vince would constantly try to get a rise out of the big man by asking about the latest Nintendo games like The Legend of Zelda, knowing full well that he wouldn't have it and would try to sell us a King Kong Bundy figure, then throw us out when we burst out laughing. We'd always ask him "Hey Red, what's on sale today?" to which he'd roboticly shout "everything is on sale at Red's" before realizing we were breaking balls and throw us out. We'd do anything in his store to fire him up: shoot hoops, throw footballs around and harass our friend Spiro who worked there.

It makes me really happy to see that Red's is going stronger than ever thanks to the internet, nostalgia and the fact that one man's trash is another man's treasure.

Red in 1946:


The Red We Knew:


THE LEGEND OF BIG RED

The saga is related from generation to generation. It is said
BigRed started his collection when he was 6 years old,
that was 1927.

Scouring bookstores and toystores from one side of town
to the other, BigRed accumulated quite a collection for a
young boy.

His father, a tailor, had a small shop on a substreet level.
The shop was 10 feet by 8 feet. BigReds collection grew,
using the dressing room from his fathers tailor shop to store
his collection. Soon, his father had to give up the tailor
business, the collection took up the whole shop.

It is said BigRed once had 100 copies of Superman #1, and
sold them in the early 50's.

Legend has it that BigRed once had 50 copies of Playboy #1
and sold them in 1954.

BigRed's latest! The newest folklore is BigRed had 50
Beanie Babies Humphrey Camels and sold them for $4.99.

Well. BigRed did hold on to a few pieces of his collection
and this site is dedicated to BigReds collection, which is
now offering for sale exclusively on the internet for the
first time ever.

Remember, the quantities are limited so choose wisely.