I took a picture of the green biker just before Christmas last year on a rare trip to my home town. There was nothing significant about the trip, just as there's nothing especially significant about the green biker. It just happened to be on the shelf, never dusted, and I happened to take a photo of it, along with many other photos of my childhood bedroom.
The green biker, I remember, is made up of two solid pieces of plastic and two metal rollers hidden underneath. The wheels of the motorcycle do not move, they are part of the mold. I have fiddly finger syndrome or some such, so over the years I've occasionally just played with the rollers; call it a fidget roller if you must.
After I dug up the photo as something to post that I haven't posted anywhere else, I got a bit hung up on origins of the green biker. I know it wasn't my toy, since – as I remember it – it was just... there. However, my memory has never been great, accurate or truthful, so I can not rely on it. Besides, I got a Biker Mice from Mars toy where you could push the antennae into the biker's head (so you could put the helmet on), so that would cloud any memory of a motorcycle toy lesser in stature and fewer in delightful antennae.
My options are: a) it was my own toy; b) it was my sister's or brother's; c) it was something we got from our father's childhood home.
This gives us a generous, rounded time frame of this being produced anywhere between the years 1970-2000.
Another thing to look at is the characteristics of the motorcycle. The entire model is raised to hover above the rollers, which gives me the impression that it was meant for a miniature track with raised edges. You'd put the green, and maybe the red and the yellow bikers on the track and see which one won the race. I think this is very likely, as by itself it makes for a sub-par toy (with excellent rollers!). I've also considered the possibility of it being a surprise egg or a happy meal toy, but the heavy metal rollers make this unlikely.
I have done a couple of basic searches to see if I can locate a similar model. First I did some basic image googling with terms like “tiny motorcycle toy”, which gave me a lot, and “small green plastic biker on a motorcycle with metal rollers”, which gave me pretty much nothing.
I got: a) actual motorcycles; b) children on bikes which are tiny compared to real motorcycles, but not at all tiny to children; c) finger bikes, which technically fit the category but are distinctly not what I'm looking for; d) tiny motorcycle toys(!).
Looking at these results, I figured that adding 'vintage' to the terms wouldn't hurt, and it did clear up a lot of noise. I found some toys that were, in principle, similar to the goal. These toys, all on eBay, were made of cast tin painted over with details, they had immovable motorcycle wheels, but they rolled on wheels in the middle. Some were wind-up, some didn't appear to be. My green biker, however, was nowhere to be seen.
My next stop is a local auction site. This time I went with the conservative term 'motorcycle' and just went through every item, five pages in total. On the first page already I saw the familiar tin toys, no ancient plastic ones though, and you won't be surprised but there were none on the later pages either.
Here's a biased, non-representative sample of stuff I did find:
1) A model motorcycle that comes with a magazine. Which magazine? Who knows! The pictures of this unopened model include: a) an open model; b) the actual motorcycle it was based on; c) no magazine. In conclusion though, this is certainly someone offloading merchandise and not their own junk. I was very disappointed.
2) A really old photo of a motorcycle race, poor quality, condition: old. There are a few of these, but appreciating them would require some research into the events. Last year I worked with an older gentleman who said they were writing a book on a racer from this era of motorcycling, so I think I'll hold off until that's published.
3) A cast iron Harley motorcycle with a passenger sitting way back on the far end of the wheel behind the biker. They are both wearing black uniforms, sunglasses and black caps with golden stars on the front. They get four and a half stars from me.
4) There are a variety of professional photos. Some of these are of undressed women posing with a motorcycle (they were really pushing artistic limits of the concept here, since all of the poses were distinct and the states of undress varied), some are locals having their photo taken (such delights as: two women on a motorcycle, or two men on a motorcycle). My favourite one has a biker feed a deer.
5) Old licences, manuals etc. Personally I have no interest in these, but the fact that they are even listed makes them interesting. What a
6) And of course, stamps. I used to collect stamps, for about two weeks when I was around 10. I had an album and all. I had all but forgotten about it, but even that seems to somehow live on, somewhere in there. Strange how these things work.