Ultimate 80s school accessories

Ready for those words that used to make us all wake up in a cold sweat? "It's back-to-school time!"

Don't worry, my fellow '80s fritters. For most of us, the days of donning concert shirts and designer jeans and wolfing down Pop-Tarts and Jolt Cola on the way to the school bus are long over. These days we just get to torture the next generation with that nightmarish proclamation.

To celebrate the season, fellow '80s fanatic and TBT writer Sharon Kennedy Wynne (who'd make a great addition to the Stuck in the 80s podcast team) has penned a fantastic article comparing retro '80s-era school supplies with today's fare. Click here to read it.

While you're perusing amnesia lane, here's a list that will move you to tears about yesteryear. Many of Sharon's beloved tools are included.

TOP 10 SCHOOL ACCESSORIES OF THE 80s:

10. PENCIL TOPPERS: Garfield worked great. So did an Ewok. I can't imagine a Jar-Jar Binks pencil topper. Some trends are better left buried in time.

9. SCENTED MARKERS: Red was cherry -or watermelon-scented, green was usually apple. Just avoid the licorice-flavored black markers -- it reminds me of Jagermeister.

8. LIQUID GLUE STICKS: Really, did we ever use them? Umm, for gluing purposes, I mean. I bet I have a half dozen in a box next to the box with my high school diploma and scientific calculator.

7. METAL TV-THEMED LUNCH BOX: "Mork & Mindy" was always golden for these, since you were able to unscrew Mork's head from the Thermos bottle.

6. DIGITAL WATCH: With big huge numbers that only lit up if you squeezed the button on the side. Space-age technology at the time, especially if you had a built-in calculator.

5. BOOK COVERS: Oh sure, you could use paper grocery bags to wrap your books, but it's so much cooler to spend a buck a piece on a "Dukes of Hazzard" one for that ratty science book.

4. DENIM NOTEBOOK: Perfect for writing "Steve & Alisa Forever" (yeah, that worked out great) or drawing that beloved Van Halen symbol all over it. ("VH Rules!")

3. MECHANICAL PENCIL: Replacing the tiny rods of lead was akin to working with plutonium -- one wrong move and whammo! ... you need another new rod. And they never worked on Scan-tron sheets. Seriously, why did we bother?

2. THE COMB: Flat with a big handle. Always stored in the back pocket. Simple, elegant, timeless.

1. TRAPPER KEEPER: The holy grail of 80s accessories and possibly the single-biggest contribution the 80s generation gave to civilization. That being said, it rarely held together in one piece past Thanksgiving break. Still, all hail the enduring power of Velcro. (Click here to relive the TV commercial.)

Comments

[specialk]

David P, still use those reinforcements. My daughter's middle school in Germany was full of anal teachers who required the kids to keep every piece of paper so we used them LOTS. I have found other uses for them as well because you know a million come in a package, I used them to make Christmas cards one year... they make a pretty funky looking Christmas Tree!

Boy did I love school supply shopping still do! Just bought my son his first package of 64 crayola crayons... the first year that they haven't dictated the number of crayons he was allowed to have! I loved getting new crayons every year; it didn't matter how good my last year's crayons were mom always got us a new box.

Oh how I loved my trapper keeper!

I loved to make my own book covers out of whatever I could find. Bop and Teen Beat were great for cover art. Had to share my love for Duran Duran with everyone!

[David P]

I remember using leftover, 70s-era silver wallpaper to cover at least one of my textbooks. And does anyone remember reinforcements (at least that's what I think you call them)? They're those white cheerio-shaped stickers you'd put around the holes on loose-leaf paper to, well, reinforce them.

[Michelle]

bwahahahahaha! I love it, John! I'll have to ask his teacher next week.

[John Hays]

Michelle - so you're saying you're giving your child dime bags to take to school? ;)

[Angie]

*boohoo* I never had a trapper keeper or a lunch box. My notes were always flying over the place. I did have the denim notebook though. In JHS there was a teacher who would airbrush it with pretty much anything we wanted. In HS I just pretty much doodled all over it.

[Michelle]

This year, my third-grader needs lined Post-it notes, Ziploc bags, Kleenex, hand sanitizer, bottles of white glue, glue sticks, a clipboard and a Ziploc bag full of change (six to 10 each of quarters, dimes, nickels and pennies).
Money, of course, will be returned at the end of the year. ;)

[John Hays]

Forgot about book covers...good stuff.

Steve, don't you mean licorice-scented, not flavored? Just what were you doing with that marker?

[sjdrj (julie in nc)]

jeff in vegas: i have no use for any office supplies as i'm a stay at home mom. :(

melissa: i freakin' love 'the breakfast club' JCPenney commercial! i love that my 11 year old says, "what's so cool about it?" wait 5 years buddy, you'll see! ;)

additions to my list... I had a swatch watch with the swatch protector (twisted of course). however, i preferred my coca-cola watch to my swatches. i also had the swatch twin phone. you know the one that your friend would pick up the part of the phone with the numbers and another receiver was built in... in theory if your boyfriend had one, his friend could get on the phone and all 4 of you could talk at once. WOO HOO. good times. in high school i couldn't live without my new kids on the block locker mirror. ;)

[Marissa]

Prefers the Ticonderoga.

[Sharon]

Oh Brad, how can you defend the mechanical pencil? If you do finally get the tip the right length and work away, you risk it wearing down and UGH the metal scratching the paper. *shivers* It's about as bad as that pencil with the 6 little tab tips that you pulled out of the end of the pencil.

Why does anyone think they need to engineer a pencil? It's a beautiful example of timeless design. Simple, easy to sharpen, timeless. There's nothing more elegant that a beautifully sharpened No. 2 pencil.

[Blaine]

Drawing band logos on folders and notebooks is classic. Anyone else ever do it by taking a pencil eraser and effectively "writing" via erasing the color on the covers?

And how about locker decorating? While I did not go interior-design like some kids, I always enjoyed putting up something to do with a favorite music group.

[Bassnote]

The B-52's are on Conan tonight! Must see TV.

[Bassnote]

I never liked the trapper keeper. I liked plain folders that I could draw the logos of my favorite bands all over. I was so good at it, my friends would ask me to draw on their folders too.

[CHAD]

anyone remember the combs that were circular and had a hole in the middle for your middle finger. i also used to get the goody family pack of combs, so i had my choice of different sizes. i also had my hair feathered back, part in the middle. good god, i cant look at my high school pics and not shake my head in disbelief.

[jane]

Good eye on the girl in the Staples commercial -- that is indeed her. Alice Cooper and David Duchovny are her TV dads -- quite a quinella.

[chase]

Hey, I'm STILL in school, back pursuing a master's, one class at a time, and I don't buy text books ... I rent 'em.

Yep, Chegg.com, rent the book for the semester, and then mail it back. Love the Internet.

[Blaine]

This is one sweet thread - I would need to dig up my old digital watch w/ built-in calculator and boot up the TI-99/4A to compute its cool-ness.

You couldn't beat the excitement of shopping for the back-to-school supplies and picking an outfit for the first day. Of course, by day two of the school year, the novelty of everything had worn off.

Were any of my fellow Midwesterners like me and my classmates? Circa '83/'84, we sported a lot of OP apparel despite being nowhere near an ocean. And what was the deal with those Coca-Cola rugbies which became popular a few years later?

One of my all-time favorite pieces of '80s garb is this Swatch rugby shirt I procured at the then-Lazarus department store. I actually wore it this decade, but fear it may be a bit "snug" by now...

[Spears]

The girl in the Alice Cooper commercial -- she's the daughter in Californication, right?

[Michelle]

I didn't get my first Swatch until 1996--and then it was an Olympic Annie Leibovich version. Ten years too late to be cool.

[Marissa]

This just in!
JCPenney is using "DON"T YOU FORGET ABOUT ME" in their back to school ads. Kids re-enacting The Breakfast Club. ARGH!

[Marissa]

Now that I think about it I was in junior high when I was sporting the groovy comb in the back pocket of my LEE jeans. Naturally, too short. Remember, I was Olive Oyle in blue jeans ... with wingading hair.

[Michelle]

PaperMate's erasable pen was the worst! It smeared, globbed and generally was gross to write with.

[jane]

Two great Staples/Back to School commercials that never, ever get old:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mPIIMbG9R4w

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OqI4xfsdv7Y

[Sherrie]

I always saw the trip to buy school supplies as a chance for a clean slate, a new start. A fresh, spotless new Trapper Keeper at the beginning of the year gave me a sense of limitless possibilities and a thirst for greatness. Yeah, I was a tremendous nerd.
Just last week, I tackled the vast school supply list for my son's upcoming entry into 6th grade... over $100 later, all I can say is what in the world will a sixth grader do with the freaky required supplies such as 1,000 index cards, baby wipes and contact paper? I'm convinced these things are put on the list by vindictive teachers just to mess with us!

I think every adult in the US is nostalgic about new school supplies, don't you?

[MN]

Regarding Kleenex, I think it is just that otherwise, the teacher would be buying them out of his/her own money.

[Lori]

Check this out! The RCA Selectavision. If this isn't classic 80's style, I don't know what is.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UEd5h4wci70

I think this is the only purchase we ever made on the newer end of ANY technological advancement, and look how well it worked out!

[Blaine]

Trapper Keepers and Swatches rule.

Remember the hype when Papermate or some such came out with the "eraseable pen"?

[Michelle]

Jane- I still have my X-acto and metal pica pole (comes in handy for my scrapbooking/cardmaking).

I get a kick out of the fact I have to send boxes of Kleenex to school.
I guess kids are too sensitive these days to use the one-grade-above-pulp no-brand-tissues that our teachers kept on the corner of the desk.

[Jeff from Vegas]

Yeah, I remember those. Amazingly, they didn't hold as much information as the much smaller DVDs. Go figure.

[Jeff from Vegas]

I majored in computer science, too. When I started (in '81), they were phasing out the card punches, but we still had to submit our first five FORTRAN programs on punched card "just so we could see how terrible it was." After that, it was CRTs with white characters.

[Lori]

Yeah, but much thicker and heavier.

[Jeff from Vegas]

Lori: Are you talking about those huge videodiscs that were about the same size as an LP?

Awesome!

[Rick]

My wife just got home from school-supply shopping with
our two kids... My son's prize "scores"?

A Transformer backpack and an Incredible Hulk Thermos.

Regeneration indeed.

[Lori]

I'm with ya, Rick, obviously! College graduation was 1981.

Majored in math and computer science. Started my comp sci education on card punch machines. No white out works there when you make a mistake! The actual computer, of course, was in a huge room next door.

And the first movie player that my husband and I bought was a disc player! Rented the discs (disks?) at Erol's. Anybody remember those? Kind of like the 8-track of movies. I believe the VCR came out shortly after our big purchase. Our timing was most excellent.

[jane]

Rick, I'm with you on having to go back to the '70s for similar memories. Give me a Partridge Family lunch box, some Wacky Pacs and a couple of copies of Dynamite Magazine and you have a snap shot of my lunch/recess break.

Ditto paper. The smell. The light purple color. The often-unintelligible type. Classic.

[Jeff from Vegas]

For those of you not familiar with Pee Chee folders, here is a short Wikipedia entry with pictures of the outside:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pee_Chee_folder

Nearly everyone enhanced the illustrations on the outside in some way. They weren't as "sexy" as Trapper Keepers, but they got the job done.

[Lori]

And on another note: I still have to get used to Jeff From Vegas. I keep thinking Jeff in Cuba is visiting Vegas.

[Lori]

My kids were in elementary school in the late 80's and 90's. To this day, I can't read or hear the words Trapper Keeper without seeing this:

NO TRAPPER KEEPERS!

For some reason, it was a hugely emphasized rule at their elementary school, written in capital letters numerous times on their school supply lists. Four kids times six years of elementary school each: you can see why the words are etched onto my brain.

But I don't know what the heck PeeChees are. Course, maybe I had them myself back in the day, but it was so long ago that I have forgotten. Come to think of it, much of past is very vague....

[Rick]

I remember being editor of a small group term paper. I say "term paper" but it was a book with chapters and everything. As editor, I got stuck typing up everyone's chapters on Ditto Master paper! And no mistakes allowed! I think that the inventor of the Ditto, much as we liked the smell of fresh copies, is roasting in hell as I type this.

It was a horror.

George Jetson may have been happy for a future with flying cars. Me, I'm just happy it has printers and word processing software.

[Rick]

Jeff, I'm Class of '81 too. Gets a little weird around here when the "kids" get to chattering about TrapperKeeper and the like, doesn't it? ;-)

I have to reach back into the 70s for similar memories, which
leaves me feeling disqualified entirely. Though how many of them were dancing in clubs to The Romantics and Flock of Seagulls?
(Tho admittedly envying those with 2 & 3 Swatches on their wrists.)

So, you can keep your Ewok pencil toppers... Eat your heart
out, kids. LOL

[Jeff from Vegas]

One thing I hated about buying college school supplies was having to buy my textbooks. The selling price was always uber-inflated and when you tried to sell them back, you got next to nothing for them.

I also hated the "extra" stuff I had to buy for some classes. For instance, for the one engineering class I was required to take, I had to buy special engineering paper to do my homework on. That's the only paper they allow engineering students to use. Naturally, it was more expensive than a regular pad of paper.

[jane]

Onion skin paper -- oh yeah. Totally remember that. And White-out strips that you'd have to line up just so with the typewriter to erase, well, typos. Plus fingers totally stained from too much handling of the ribbon. I had a portable electric typewriter that I schelpped everywhere. Heavy as lead and hummed like a bad barbershop quartet warming up. Good times, good times.

[Rick]

I was solidly in college and/or out and working my first post-grad job. And while in school, I was so poor I was scrounging discarded and or forgotten spiral notebooks. And my calculator was one I got free for opening a checking account! I actually got downgraded for a short story I turned in because it was typed (yeah, typed) on onion skin (that ultra-thin airmail paper).

But I had my MTV!

Does anybody remember when video rental stores actually rented the VCRs as well as the cassettes!?

[Jeff from Vegas]

sjdrj: Here's what you need to do. Go to an office supply store like Staples or Office Depot. Who knows, you might even find the coveted red stapler.

[sjdrj (julie in nc)]

**sniff** I love my trapper keeper. I was one of those obnoxious people who kept their keeper in perfect condition. I also had my locker organized by class.
As far as I am concerned, the best part about school are the school supplies.
I am thrilled that I get to take my three children (one at a time) to get their school supplies every August.
I look at the supplies and actually wish I was taking a class or two.
Sick isn't it?! ;)

[Jeff from Vegas]

Temporarily hijacking the thread here...

For those of you who came out here for Regeneration 2008, I thought you might like to know about that big construction project sort of across the street from Planet Hollywood: http://www.citycenter.com/.

...and now back to school supplies.

[Jeff from Vegas]

I graduated HS in '81, so most of my '80s school supply memories are also college memories. Take watch calculators, for instance. By the time they showed up, I was already taking math classes where they were almost completely useless.

[Brad]

Do not be hating on the mechanical pencil.

The mechanical pencil is a thing of joy and beauty, presenting an evenly-sized tip to the user at all times.

I wouldn't have gotten through school without them. Wooden pencils? You might as well be doing your homework on the back of a shovel with a chunk of coal, a la Abe Lincoln.