Tudor’s brand new Super Bowl III No. 633 model in the 1969 Sears Christmas Book. ©Sears, Roebuck & Co. 1969

Electric football really hit the “Big Time” in 1969, when Tudor and Sears teamed up to recreate in miniature the Jets-Colts Super Bowl III game. The actual Super Bowl game, which the underdog Jets won 16-7, was perhaps the most monumental game in pro football history. It’s not an overstatement to say that Tudor’s new game was the electric football equivalent of Super Bowl III. (And we haven’t even mentioned Joe Namath…) Appearing on page 472 in the 1969 Sears Christmas Book, the game was an awe-inspiring vision to those of us who happened to be paging innocently through the catalog. It hit like a blitzing Dick Butkus. You just stared at the page — how could a toy get any better than that? (You knew electric football couldn’t.) And you kept coming back to the page. Man, you just had to have that game, you just had to…. All the motivation to “be good” until Christmas was on that page. Some of us were really, really lucky — we found a Tudor Super Bowl III electric football game under our tree. It was one of those life moments when all was truly well with the world. Even the box was inspiring — the game was a Lee Payne masterpiece. And a Christmas present that would never be forgotten.   Earl & Roddy