Need help identifying an old drawing toy

slc, I found this when I googled 70's writing toys:

Subject: a children's tool for recording temporary thoughts, images, drawings, etc
Category: Miscellaneous
Asked by: gotisbrown3000-ga
List Price: $5.00 Posted: 09 Mar 2005 22:02 PST
Expires: 08 Apr 2005 23:02 PDT
Question ID: 490904

I am looking for the name of a toy writing tool popular in the 70s and
80s. It is basically a clipboard with a sheet of laminate over a sheet
of carbon paper, with a plastic stylus that leaves no ink but, pulling
carbon off the carbon sheet, leaves an impression on the laminate.
Like an Etch-e-Sketch, it is by nature a temporary way of recording a
thought, image, or doodle: just lift the laminate, and whatever you
have written or drawn disappears. I remember having a Scooby-Doo
branded version of this tool. Did it have a generic name? If so, what
was it? And if not, can you recommend a phrase or name that, to the
average person today, would conjure up the right assocation? I'm
guessing there might be some on Ebay, but I have not found them.
Thanks.


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Request for Question Clarification by pinkfreud-ga on 09 Mar 2005 22:19 PST
Are you sure it involved carbon? I remember a popular children's toy
called a magic (or mystic) writing pad that involved a waxy surface
with a thin sheet of transparent plastic on top of it. Here's a
description:

"Mystic writing pads are children's toys consisting of a thin sheet of
clear plastic which covers a thick waxen board. The user can write on
it with any pointed instrument, even a fingernail. The tip of the
stylus presses through the sheet of plastic and makes a faint
indentation in the wax below which appears as a dark trace through the
plastic. When the plastic sheet is lifted away from the surface of the
waxen tablet beneath, the dark traces disappear; the pad is clean
again, like a blackboard just wiped off."

http://www.swin.edu.au/sbs/media/hypertext/derrida.htm

The Scooby-Doo version of this was called a "Scooby-Doo Magic Slate."

Could this be your toy?


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Clarification of Question by gotisbrown3000-ga on 10 Mar 2005 06:43 PST
scooby-doo magic slate is EXACTLY the thing i remember. thanks so
much. i'm 2 for 2 on google answers and pumped about it. thanks,
pinkfreud.

No problem--it was more a lucky guess than anything else. I saw your question and immediately knew what you were talking about but couldn't remember what the dang things were called either.

I recall the name as being just "Magic Slate", the sort of thing you'd find in your Christmas stocking or that another kid would give you as a birthday present.

Magic Slate. Hey, did you know you can still get those at the Dollar Tree? What about the toys who look like guys faces. You used a magnet to add beards, hair, etc. Weird, but fun.

magic slate - that' the name I remember

BrynnaC said:

What about the toys who look like guys faces. You used a magnet to add beards, hair, etc. Weird, but fun.

Click to expand...

Yes! I recently (March) bought each of my daughters one at Cracker Barrel, for $1.99 a piece.

I loved those! Except I wrote too hard and fugged up the wax... :[

Magic slate. That's what I used to draw plays on when I coached kindergarten soccer. Dry erase boards are a bloody mess in the rain.