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Kevin Rader/Eyewitness News
Noblesville - At this time of year we are all looking for a great toy store where you can pick up something special for someone special. Randy's Toy Shop in Noblesville certainly fills that bill and more. It's a place where everything old is new again.
It is hard to get into the Christmas spirit when it is raining instead of snowing but if you wander about a block off the square in Noblesville, it could help you. That is where you will find Randy Ibey. He is to old toys what Santa is to the new. It all started over thirty years ago.
"I really could not afford mint toys so I would buy broken and beat up toys and take them home and fix them up myself," he said.
Now he has help.
"She's got a Shirley Temple doll made in the 30's and redoing the wig on it. She's also working on a toy box which is one thing we do that is unique here. We restore the actual boxes the toys came in because they are as valuable as the toys," Ibey said, explaining the work one of his employees was doing Thursday.
"All of this will have to be repainted as well as the rest of the box," said Linsey Davidson.
Ibey keeps busy on the phone fielding international orders which now constitutes about 20 percent of his business, but make no mistake. They are all important.
"We pretty much treat all the toys the same - if it's worth $5,000 or $5. If it means something to those people to send it all the way to us then we take that kind of pride in repairing it," Ibey said.
Whether it's Popeye and Olive Oyl, Charlie Brown and the Peanuts gang or Disney, it's all here.
"What you are looking at here is Officer 666. What we did to this was replace the arms and billy club which are usually missing. Match all the colors and the aging. What you see is a completed toy getting ready to leave our shop," Ibey said, holding up a doll.
He's not alone. Now sporting a new hairdo, Shirley Temple is ready to go as well - just in time for Christmas.
Ibey says there are only two others in the country who do the type of work he does and a couple more overseas. He says an average job will take three to six weeks, while custom work takes three to six months.
