As a kid in the 90s I had this pirate playset that I loved and played with all the time. Sadly I had never really seen it online, an it took me years to finally find some information about it. You can often find loose pieces online mislabeled as either Playmobil or Little People. Heck sometimes I’ve seen them called K’Nex figures, Megablocks and even LEGO. The Playsets instead are called either Tiny Town or Tot Town and they had different themes from Cowboys, to construction workers. Now that I have this new found wisdom it’s my responsability to cement this online so others can find the information on these particular little toys and remember a nostalgic piece of their childhood from a company called Manley.
Finding any information at all was really hard to come by, reverse google image search didn’t work. Asking other people also seemed to only get them to remember but not much else. Finally finding some listings online did I get to see that they were called Tiny Town and Tot Town, not the best names to make a brand name that people will remember but I guess that wasn’t their intention. Upon further research these offbrand toys came from a company called Manley, that’s how I was able to finally find more information on these little guys.
Manley seemed to be a company that just made cheap toys for either supermarkets or small mom and pop stores that needed some type of cheap toys to keep kids entertained. I remember the Pirate set I got I only ever saw it in a small toy store in an amusement park called Silver Dollar City. Looking at what Manley did they also had other toys but none of them seem to be as intersting or detailed as these, but some do appear higher quality as well. The Tot Town figures could either have plastic hands modled or grip hand handles to hold stuff, depending on the set. Some sets include little accesories like shovels, batons, pickaxe,
Like Playmobile they came in their playsets and everything you needed to play as in their respective themes. As far as different playset themes, they had Police, Roman, Pirate, Cowboy & Indians western set, Gladiator, medieval soldiers, Paramedic, Fireman, Miner, Race Car Driver, construction worker. In fact if you got enough of the sets you could make the Village People.
The figures are made of good hard plastic and work with a lot of the other lines mentioned here, which is why most people don’t know how where these seemingly offbrand figures came from. The playsets seem very elaborate as well, including plenty of stuff to really enjoy the theme. I can’t tell you all the adventures the pirates had with the islands, treasure troves, Ship and boats it included. The play value these had was great, looking at other playsets they seem similar in terms of content and accesories .
I hope this article brings light to these figures to other people searching for these online. If there’s another website or place that has more information on these I’d also love to hear. I could only uncover so much, if someone has found more information I’d love to find out about it. In the meantime this is my little tribute to these little toys in the 90s.