 Hello G.I. Joe fans, HCC788 here, and I am at the Tay-Y G.I. Joe Winterfest in Shepardsville, Kentucky. This is my first time at the show. I just stepped out so I can get a quiet space to record this little intro here. I'm going to show you the sweep that I did of the dealer floor. We will see friends, people that we know. We will see strangers. We will make new friends. I just wanted you to check it out. Let's go inside and check out Winterfest, including some nice things that the person bought right there. Showing off their stuff. I haven't bought very much, but I did meet somebody who is important to me. James DeSimone, a very important name in G.I. Joe fandom. This is someone who was around at the infancy of the G.I. Joe fan community and had a lot to do with this formation. So I'm hoping to talk with James DeSimone and maybe pick up a few cool items. So let's go check out inside. What better advertisement can there be than that? I wanted to get this stuff. I wanted to make sure that we could get these. That's really good. I mean, if you want anything back here, you can make sure that's the same. Well, let's see. I want to get a fair way of presentation. What the fuck is that? Hello G.I. Joe fans, HCC788 here, and I am in Kentucky at G.I. Joe Winterfest, and I'm here with James DeSimone. Mr. DeSimone has been a G.I. Joe fan for quite some time and was instrumental in the formation in the early years of the G.I. Joe fan community, which as you know is something very important to me. So Mr. DeSimone, thank you very much for talking with us here. You're welcome. Glad to be here. I'm glad to see you. I was actually really thrilled to see that you made it to the show because of your connection with history and a history that I care very much about. If you don't mind, let's start at the beginning. What was your first encounter with G.I. Joe? My first encounter was I collected cars. I was looking for a car magazine. Some guy had an ad in there, looking for G.I. Joe's. So I called him up and I asked him, I said, well, what's the deal with this? Yeah, I collected G.I. Joe's and I go to bar, sale, swap, lease, whatever. And I hung up with the guy and that was it. And then all of a sudden within a week I had this crazy idea of wanting to get a G.I. Joe. And I did. Thousands of them. Yeah. My understanding is that your collection grew large and fast. Yes, it did. Yeah. Is that when you really started collecting in earnest, or did it take a minute? No, once I started collecting, I bought everything that I could find. Yes. And do you remember when that was? What that would have been like in the 12 inch era? 82, 82, something like that. Cool. So what was your first interest? Were you first interested in the 12 inch or did you get interested? I only had interest in what I had when I was a kid. Yeah. There was no internet, no vaults, nothing, no documentation whatsoever on anything. And so I was just haplessly, apathetically, whatever that word is. Just buying, consuming everything I wanted. I knew the G.I. Joe. But I did have a specific thing in mind and I wanted to collect only what I had when I was a kid. And that was the very early basics, four figures, a couple of vehicles. And I was able to get those immediately. And it just snowballed from there into everything else. It always does snowball. Yes, it does. So that's where we all start, and then it gets bigger. Yes. But when, so you had an interest, or you played the G.I. Joe. Right. Yeah. 12 inch action figure. Right. What did you think of G.I. Joe when it became the small Joe? What was your first impression? I didn't even know. I didn't even know somebody else that asked me if you'd collect the small Joe's. And I didn't know they were small Joe's. And they said, oh yeah, they sell them at the toy store. So I went to the toy store, throw up Toys R Us. And I was shocked. He, these guys wouldn't lie to me. G.I. Joe was now like this big. But I had no care. No interest in them whatsoever. They would just name G.I. Joe. I only wanted the old vintage stuff that was no longer real. At some point you actually walked into some court. So we'll get to that in a minute. Okay. At what point, at some point you were involved in toy shows and G.I. Joe's shows. How did that turn out? Well, in 1991, I lost my job. And I had a newborn son and I wasn't hurting for money. But I wanted to make sure that I was having on me. And I had tens of thousands of pieces of G.I. Joe's stuff that I wanted to sell. And I knew the best way to do that was to have a lot of people to buy it. Because again, you couldn't go on the internet and say, hey, I got stuff to sell. No eBay, nothing like that. So I decided to have a show and invite people. Because people knew me at the time and they knew I had a lot of stuff. So I decided to have a show right where I lived in California. And what made me different than what made me successful was that there had been a few other shows specifically for G.I. Joe. But I was the one that caught Hasbro's attention. Prior to that, Hasbro wouldn't respond to the collective community whatsoever. But I happened to be at the right time at the right place when Hasbro, a year before, was actually going to reintroduce to G.I. Joe. So they seized the moment of coming and participating in the mall show as a form of advertising the brand, which was good for them. And I wanted to ask you about that because you're kind of leading into the G.I. Joe convention that's, by a lot of people, considered the first G.I. Joe convention in 1994. Yeah, that's absolutely the stupidest concept of a lie that anybody can come up with. And I don't want to ask you that. Did I say that right? Yeah. We talked about this a little bit before, that 1994 show on the USS Enterprise, again, is often cited as the first G.I. Joe convention. What is your recollection of that and how that came about? Okay, well, prior to that particular event, I had produced at least three other shows. And in 1993, I guess, I advertised that I was going to have another big, really huge event with Hasbro sponsorship in an undisclosed location in New York City. In the meantime, I knew where it was going to be. I was already in the signed contract, but Hasbro had different plans. And Hasbro stole that show from me and gave it to the other two guys that wind up producing the show. And that's what became of that. I still have the original contract. It's a well-known documented fact other than terrible shitty rumors out there that it didn't happen. That's not my point. And I don't care. I've always been curious about that because I have seen some snippets here and there that I knew that you had shows before that. But there seems to have been some kind of transition that I was naturally curious about. That does help kind of clear that up. Yeah, right. Now, in spite of that, I still went on to produce what people know as the best shows outfit. I did the second intrepid show. I did the poor puppet Rhode Island show. I did the Kentucky show. I did the Annapolis Maryland show. And, you know, I had to, even though there were other shows happening at the same time, I had a large following. And that following and the blessing, by the way, to be successful in a time where I didn't have a license. I didn't have Asbro's blessing or whatever the case is. And still, in spite of that, I tried. And I'm grateful. I'm grateful. Around this time, maybe a little before then, you had some volts produced, like some guides. Sure, yes. In 1993, there was a collector's guide to completing G.I.'s actual years of accessories, if I remember the title correctly. Yeah, something like that, yes. How did that come about? What gave you that idea and what completely did you do that? I had this book prior to that. Okay, yes. I've seen that. And this book encompasses the twelve of things. Yeah. I was the only person in the world known at the time to have everything. And it's all documented here. There was, the hobby of three and three quarter room stuff was up and coming. And I was the only person in the world to know to have all of that, too. For a blues and a boss, just like I did with all of this stuff. And I seized that opportunity right away with the blessing and licensing from Hasbro to do a book like what I did for the large guys for the little guys. That's still a book of all time. Collectively. Of any other toy books, nothing collectively. I've outsold every other book. Something I try to point out to people is that at the time that was made, there wasn't a resource. You couldn't just go online and find these things. No, no. This is how you were able to figure out what accessories were. Right. You gotta understand, I laid the groundwork for every other book that plagiarized my work that came out. And I'll put that later. I did all the legwork, all the research, everything. And everybody else after me just came along and did it. Said, okay, I'm going to do it better than he did. And so those were those figures from your collection? Absolutely. Yeah, yeah. I owned every figure loose and every carbon figure. Now, you know, I can't believe the pettiness of some of these. Okay, they would say, oh no. The color on that rifle is wrong. Oh no, that rifle goes with this set. Well, the fact of the matter is Hasbro authenticated everything. The fact of the matter is that probably if you find ten figures on a car, three of them are going to look different than that. Because the colors, the variations, whatever. So nobody can say that the hobby or the figure or the line was a finite thing. It is what it was and you got what you get. I don't know. I think very many people were like variation hunting at that time. Some of that stuff is documented now, but somebody seems to be still on the pegs at the time. Okay, well let me tell you something. Again, Hasbro themselves personally told me this. In my questioning to them, why are you making variations? Because, and they had found out that collectors drive on those stupid little variations. I still do. And Hasbro's exact words were to me, if that's what they want, that's what we're going to give them. And they proceeded to go ahead and make fun of with different things just to drive up the markets and people would blind more of it and Hasbro would sell more of it. As I've always suspected. No, no. You're hearing it from me. So you continued to do some show. Actually, I want to backtrack a little bit. So that 1994 show in the Intrepid, that was a bit of a watershed. They announced kind of the end of Real American Hero in the beginning of this new Sargent Savage. Do you have any recollection of that? No, I had no interest whatsoever. Anything new that was being produced? It didn't seem to go over. Well, okay, so that was the other thing. Hasbro and I actually had arguments over this. If you're going to make it for the collector, make it right. And they proceeded to make it work. Simple as that. Don LaBean came out with the first thing that was right. He made an exact replica of the original 1962. The problem with that, it was way overpriced. Chidamated said it was five bucks, instead of 55 bucks. Alright, so what's the question? You did some shows after that 1994 show. How long did you continue to do your hero friends? Ten years? More? I don't know. You can ask somebody else now though. Do you still have connections with those? There's a show in California that people for years wanted me to come back and do it. And then finally, after relentless people asking me, I need one of my friends. I said, okay, well, I need it to be easy for one. And sure enough, they got the promoter of another show, gave me a space, a separate room where I had my own little thing, got my own dealers. And that's successful. That still goes on to this day. But it's on a small scale. I don't promote it. I don't produce it or anything like that. I just participate in it. And that's because I've got too many other things that I want to do. I travel all over the world. I love my life. I've got great lives. I don't want to work with it. You know what I mean? Do you still collect? No. However, I got on this kit of wanting to get these particular figures of all kinds of genres that could fly. They made one for James Bond, they made one for Captain Hatchens, and they made half a dozen each in the idea. And at this show, I came here deliberately, intentionally to find that. Right. And I was fortunate enough to buy everything I needed at this show. Awesome. And I didn't realize that, you know, I didn't squabble over price or anything. I would always say, hey, what's your best cash prize? But the point is, everybody, individual, had one of the pieces that I needed and I just paid all the people I needed. And I don't have to look for them anymore. And that was my philosophy in collecting back then. I would see so many people squabble over even a dollar or a few hundred dollars looking for something, spending so much time and effort looking for that that they didn't realize, you know, it was like my wife. She would jump around from store to store and say, five cents on potatoes. Really, thank you very much. I eat a price. It's only a few dollars more and you'll save all that time, effort, aggravation, whatever, looking for it. So that's what I did. I was fortunate to be in a position at this show to find everything I wanted. He got it. Was there a time... He's a tie. He's like that. Was there a time when you when you stepped away from collecting and was there a reason if you did step away from collecting? I passed away, actually. I died 12 years ago. Flatline died on an operating table. Took them 10 minutes to revive me. So I was flatlined dead 10 minutes. When I came back, I was revived. I had half a heart that I was living on. But I realized two things. I didn't say no light. No tunnel. Tell everybody neither the Lord or the Devil wanted me. They both sent me back. Here I am. And I didn't take a damn thing with me. You know what I mean? And plus, my health was in such poor condition that I realized the less stuff I had in life, the better all problems would have been. So I started liquidating my collecting and stopped doing sales. Had a couple of the state sales. And yeah, I sold just about everything that I wanted to sell. I still have a lot of stuff that I tell them that I'm going to die with. Let my kids sell for about an hour or so. Make a few dollars for that. Although my kids are smart enough to know that what I got is what I want. So there's two things about what I got and what I want. Half of it could be worth money. Half of it ain't worth a dime. Half of it ain't worth a dime. But it's what I want. Does that make sense? Yeah. And it's more happy for me always in my collecting life to have what I want as opposed to the monetary value. And I never bought a single thing with the idea of, you know, I'm not going to get my money out. That was so insignificant in my collecting values that to this day I don't care what I get for it because I want it. Anyway, that's encouraging to hear because that's kind of in my approach. Yeah. So it's very encouraging to hear that. Yeah, thank you. Well, thank you for taking the time to sit down with me. You're welcome. I really appreciate the window into the history that I care a lot about it. And I hope that we can see you around again in the future. Thank you. Thank you. Well, like I said, I travel a lot. So whether or not I get here, I don't want to commit now because right now, July, is that when the show is, is open for me, but I don't want it to be. I want to be able to, I want to have that block, that space blocked in for some other adventure in my life. But, you know, I just came back from the Philippines on Monday, and I may be here today. Nice. You know what I mean? So I'm like, you know, I could squeeze a weekend in. All right. Well, thank you for squeezing this week. Thank you for taking the time. I really do appreciate it. James DeSimone. Thanks everyone. Thank you. Thank you. I'm here outside of Winterfest as I wrap things up. I just wanted to try to find a quiet place, although it's not too quiet because that's the freeway back there, but a somewhat quiet place to wrap this up and say thanks to everyone who said hello. In fact, I just saw somebody in the elevator who said hello, and it's really nice to meet everybody. Thanks to everyone who was so kind. Everyone has been really a gem at this show. Thank you to Mike from What's On Joe Mind. Thank you to Jason from Order of Battle Podcast. Thanks to the guys from the podcast from The Pit and Anything Joe's. And thanks to Roma Collectibles, GI Jason. Thank you to James DeSimone who was very kind to do an interview. What a treat to talk to someone who has been a part of GI Joe history. That was special. But for now, I think I'm going to wrap it up. I will put together this video as quickly as I can. Hopefully it'll be up tomorrow. But there's just enough time. For me to go back in, say bye to everyone. And then that will be it. So thanks again to GI Joe, KY, Winterfest and hope to see everyone again soon. We're back in the hotel room and I just wanted to show you guys what I got. I didn't get a lot. I didn't really get anything that filled any gaps in the collection. I kind of focused on weird stuff. Weird and fun stuff. It's not all weird. Some of it's kind of weird. But mostly fun stuff more than getting things for the collection. I started with this 2D pressed plastic cut out of hooded Cobra Commander. I thought that was appropriate. So that was fun. When I met James DeSimone I had him sign and I think he signed it inside somewhere. He signed his books somewhere inside. So I got this signed by James DeSimone and I also met this gentleman from Alpha One Creative and he was really cool. And I got a patch that I shall add to my patch and pin shirt. This is the last thing I got. It is what it says it is. This is a fun school police jeep obviously modeled off of the vamp. I was curious about it. I've seen these around. Never had one. Thought I'd give it a shot. Give it a try. But the I think the most important and the most cuddly thing I got was a plush Cobra Commander here. He wants to take over the world but that doesn't mean he's not soft and squishy. It doesn't mean he doesn't want hugs. Even even world dictators need hugs sometimes. So that's it. That's really basically the entire haul. Again, not really focused on adding vintage items to the collection but this book is pretty cool. I will get some use out of that and I'll put this up somewhere to annoy the neighbors. So, beautiful stuff. Thanks to everyone who came up and said hi. Some folks who got some pictures with me and somebody who had me sign something. And thanks to Mike who is looming over my shoulder right now. Yeah, did you see that looming? Anyway, but thanks. I tried to thank everyone in my last clip that I saw if I missed anyone. I apologize but sincerely, thanks everyone and I guess next stop will be Joe Fest in Augusta, Georgia. That's the next show on my calendar for this year so I will see you then.