Classic Space - 1978 or 1979?

[Spidrax]

I often see 1978 listed as the start of Classic Space. There are even several Lego printed elements that say "In space since 1978".

However, I have yet to see catalogs from 1978 that show Classic Space sets. They all appear in 1979.

Even the instructions for sets supposedly from 1978 have 1979 copyright notices.

Does anyone know of a reference to Classic Space in print that is definitely from 1978?

[rriggs]

I would agree that no classic space sets appear in catalogues before 1979

However, in 1978 the catalogue for 1979 would have been available, people would have been aware of the space sets in the pipeline and no doubt some would have sneaked into shops and into people’s hands at some point so maybe that’s where the disparity comes from?

[deraven]

You are correct - the earliest "Classic Space" sets were available in 1979.  It was a well-developed range and obviously had extensive development during the year or two prior, and there was some promotion and probably some early availability in 1978 as rriggs said, but the actual release and general availability was 1978.  Of course, Lego made space sets as early as 1964 or '65 I believe (a moon rocket, lunar lander, etc., made from standard System bricks of the time) so I don't think saying "in space since 1978" is disingenuous, but it is odd that there is so much reference out there to 1978.  Perhaps 1979 was later than they had intended to launch - but around the 10-year anniversary of the moon landing would make sense from a marketing perspective - or maybe there was a wider but less promoted release in Europe or elsewhere in 1978 from some of the distributors.

[Aanchir]

According to an interview with Classic Space designer and minifigure inventor Jens Nygaard Knudsen in BrickJournal Issue 6, the release of Classic Space was supposed to be in 1979. The LEGO Castle and Town sets were effectively rushed to shelves in 1978 in order to debut the LEGO minifigure before any competitors had a chance to develop their own counterpart. But since the Space sets were much more groundbreaking compared to earlier LEGO products and were expected to generate more excitement, LEGO decided to delay their release by a year so that it could make its official debut at the 1979 Nuremberg Toy Fair and become that year's "star attraction".

Those plans changed when a LEGO designer who had worked on the Space theme ended up leaving LEGO and taking a job at competing building toy company TENTE, which then began working on their own Space theme. So in order to ensure that the LEGO Space theme appeared on shelves before its TENTE counterpart, LEGO ended up releasing three Space sets in the United States in 1978, more than six months ahead of schedule. It's possible that the lack of printed LEGO Space material with a 1978 copyright date is because this was such an abrupt change of plans.

Note that back in the 70s and 80s, the development schedule for new LEGO sets and themes had a lot more "lead time" than it typically would today. LEGO had actually finished developing the initial wave of Space sets back in 1976, before they had finished development on either the Town theme OR the Castle theme. So LEGO didn't actually need to rush the development process of those three sets to release them ahead of schedule.

[Spidrax]

Some good info here, thanks to all who replied. I've been trying to collect some of the earliest mentions of Classic Space sets in print, and this is helpful.

That bit about the Lego designer defecting to TENTE is particularly interesting. Their old space sets are really great, and I had no idea there was a connection to Lego. One bad thing about TENTE though - the edges are so sharp!

[deraven]

On 1/22/2021 at 1:57 PM, Aanchir said:

According to an interview with Classic Space designer and minifigure inventor Jens Nygaard Knudsen in BrickJournal Issue 6

I went back and re-read that issue.  Really interesting!  Thanks for adding that great old story into the discussion.  

[AmperZand]

I was going to say there was a limited release of CS in the US in ‘78, but @Aanchir beat me to it 

I was living in Europe in ‘78 and ‘79 and don’t remember seeing any CS on toy store/department shelves or in marketing collateral such as catalogues until ‘79.