Contributed by collector and Overstreet Advisor Art Cloos

In the early years of the 20th century Charles Raizen took a summer job with a manufacturer of embroidery patterns in Manhattan. Some years later, he found a method of transferring images using friction, and by 1915, the company was renamed the Friction Transfer Pattern Company.

It did not take long before they learned that children enjoyed playing with transferring the friction patterns, and as a result the company moved toward childrens products such as Art-Toy Transfer Pictures. In 1917 Raizen bought the company and renamed it Transogram using 1915 as the founding date in its company logo. Moving to 200 Fifth Avenue in Manhattan, the company developed the Toy Research Institute to test toys with input by a child psychologist, leading to the 1920s tagline that its toys were “Kid Tested.” The company also began licensing media properties, manufacturing the likes of a Little Orphan Annie set of clothes pins designed by Annie’s Harold Gray. Al Capp, the creator of “Li’l Abner,” was a graphic designer for Transogram.

In 1929, they produced their first game-like product, Orje, The Mystic Prophet, which one historian called “a solitaire fortune telling pastime.” After a previous incorporation in New York, Transogram incorporated in Pennsylvania on September 4, 1959. In May 1962, Transogram made an initial public offering of 196,000 shares of common stock from Charles Raizen’s private account, which sold for $10 a share. Raizen retained control with 61.4% of the outstanding stock. He died in 1967 and at that time the company’s fortunes were on the way down. But from the mid-1950s up to the mid-1960s it was considered one of the top toy companies in America.

In 1966, Transogram’s total sales were $18,665,631. However, in the first six months of 1967, the company posted a loss of $1,191,000 on sales of $4,713,000, down from $6,169,000 in sales during the same period the year before. The company was in trouble. For the first nine months of 1970, Transogram reported a loss of $2,328,000 on sales of $21,642,000, compared to a loss of $293,000 on sales of $17,938,000 during the same period in 1969. On February 26, 1971, after having been taken over by a holding company, Transogram finally declared Chapter 11 bankruptcy, listing liabilities of $12,067,307 and assets of $3,009,072. Trading on the American Stock Exchange had been suspended the week prior.

From the mid-1950s through the late 1960s it had a long list of licensed film and TV board games from Dragnet to Hogan’s Heroes to Snagglepuss Fun at the Picnic to The Monkees and Wyatt Earp. I remember seeing ads on TV for some of its toys and I remember that very distinctive logo on a couple of toys that I had as a kid.

When the TV Batmania craze hit in 1966-1967, Transogram got a license for both Batman and Superman, but only four Batman products were made by them. Of those, the carded set of Batman coins is a nice piece but a factory find years ago make it a relatively inexpensive to acquire. The Flying Batman is scarce loose or on the card but the sad truth is while it’s nice to look at it was too heavy to fly when shot into the air and a lot of them were destroyed when hitting the ground. The Batman figural bank is quite common, showing up all the time but to find one in nice shape with its label intact is not so easy.

The one that really stands out right up to today is their version of the Batmobile. It is large at around 20” long and made of plastic and it includes Batman and Robin in the cockpit. It’s not an easy piece to find loose and much harder to find in box. This is a top want for collectors who specialize in vintage Batmobiles. 

It’s interesting to note that the Khanis Toy Company of Argentina, one of the top toy companies in that country, had acquired a license from National Periodical Publications for both Batman and Superman toys in 1966. They produced the same kind of figural banks as Transogram along with toys unique to it. That is the basis for another column in the future.

If you are looking for a small but fun line of vintage 1960s era Batman toys, then you should consider checking this company out.