An Old Toy You May Have From Your Childhood Could Be Worth A Lot Of Money

Sometimes, getting rid of your childhood junk is simple. Dolls missing heads and puzzles missing pieces can all be parted with faster than you can say "garage sale." But other childhood toys take on a more nostalgic glow; in the case of classic Lite-Brite toys, quite literally. Original Lite-Brites allowed artists the power of "makin' things with light." Kids would punch colorful translucent pegs through a sheet of black paper over a light box burning with the power of a thousand suns to create pretty pictures from patterns ranging from sailboats to the Super Friends.

Some vintage toys are hunted for pristine conditions (like certain valuable old Barbies) or were built to be collected (like these super valuable Pokémon cards), but classic Lite-Brites tend to be sought by lovers of an ineffable sense of wonder, like seeing downtown lights twinkling in the night sky for the first time, or in the charmingly pixelated shapes of performing seals and clowns.

These rainbow-pegged light boxes have been fascinating kids of all ages since 1967, when Hasbro first released Lite-Brite. In fact, Lite-Brites are still made today, using LED lights in place of the old-fashioned potential burn-unit bulbs grownups may associate with their own childhood models. So, take a deep breath of the nostalgic scent of lightly burning black construction paper, as we dig deep into our metaphorical toy box to shine a little light on which old Lite-Brite models might prove valuable beyond their years.

A team from Chicago toy design and engineering firm Marvin Glass and Associates brightened up the world with Lite-Brite in 1966. As the story goes, a few members of the design team were in New York for the 1966 Toy Fair, and were dazzled by the beauty of the city at night. One Fifth Avenue building in particular used a display full of hundreds of colorful twinkling lights, causing the team to wonder: What if that same light and magic could be condensed into a children's toy? They returned to Chicago, created Lite-Brite, and licensed the product to Hasbro in 1967.

Lite-Brite hit stores in 1968. The toy enjoyed popularity throughout the '70s and '80s, plus some pretty catchy commercial jingles. Even ads for the '90s version of the product urged children to "turn on the magic of shining light," but with even more licensed character pattern template sheets. Along with freestyling their own beautiful light art, kids could punch their Lego-hard pegs into patterned sheets for licensed designs like Disney's "Beauty and the Beast" or "The Little Mermaid."

In 2002, the Lite-Brite Cube was released, allowing groups of kids to design on Lite-Brite at the same time — as if they were joining together to hack a mainframe. Throughout the 1990s and early 2000s, additional variations were released, including Super Bright HD, Lite-Brite Touch, and mini models. Lite-Brite was inducted into the National Toy Hall of Fame in 2022, and new (and new "retro," like Lite-Brite Classic) models are still being released today.

So which Lite-Brite items are valuable today when it comes to collector dollars and cents? As of this writing, a gently used but complete 1967 Lite-Brite set is listed on eBay for $275, or best offer. While older sets don't always sell for their asking price, a brand-new 1990s set did sell for ~ $100 on eBay, while a used (but boxed) 1980s edition sold for $70. Not bad for items that might otherwise gather dust, instead of twinkle with light.

The real collector potential for Lite-Brites may lie in peg resale (like for an artist who hunted eBay for enough pegs to make a Lite-Brite Elvis), tie-in refill sheets, and Lite-Brite adjacent products. A set of already punched Fraggle Rock refill sheets, for example, recently sold on eBay for around $54, while an '80s-eras set of Mr. T sheets is listed for ~$45. We pity the fool who misses that bid. A 1969 Hasbro Astrolite, which is a sort of Lite-Brite but along the lines of a 3D Jetsons-style light-up city rather than Lite-Brite's pixelated clowns, recently sold for ~$50.

In 2022, Lite-Brite made an appearance in a key scene from Season 4 of the hit family horror show "Stranger Things." The characters use the Lite-Brite to make the ultimate thing with light — contact across dimensions. This scene spurred a "Stranger Things" Lite-Brite line that may one day prove as nostalgic — and valuable — to tomorrow's grownups, as yesterday's Lite-Brites are to grownups of today.