A replica of the Robby the Robot that appeared in the 1950s sci-fi film "Forbidden Planet" lights up as it speaks lines from the film. A poster of the film is displayed near it. | Dan Scanlan, Jacksonville Today
Published on July 21, 2024 at 6:00 pm
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A steel-jawed 1930s-era robot greets visitors to the Bilotta Collection in Sawgrass, Bakelite knobs surrounding a voltage meter in its chest.
The robot rumbles about electronically with one tubular leg rising over tiny battery-powered metal robots underfoot.
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The German film prop is just one of a multitude of robots and toys that Ozzie Bilotta has amassed over almost four decades, after the collecting bug bit him at an antique show in Fort Lauderdale.
“They were battery tin toys from the 1950s, and I was just drawn to the aesthetics, the mechanics of it — I just thought they were beautiful, and it started the passion right there on the spot, and it’s been going on ever since,” the 59-year-old New York native said. “It was a long journey. The passion remains, so we fused it together with vacations and trips — if we went to a different states, we would make sure to do antique stores. Then it morphed into trade shows.”
Today, the collection at 151 Sawgrass Corners Drive is valued at nearly $7 million, and it is open to the public for about $35 per person.
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Bilotta grew up in the 1960s as a child of immigrants who did not have much. He saved a lot of toys he had, and that instilled in him a spirit of preservation. He has continued that passion over the decades, progressively seeking out iconic items at toy shows, county fairs, auctions and model train events.
“It was also entertaining,” he said. “Little by little, we started acquiring. My wife started finding publications — toy magazines and different books, and it just grew from that point. It was like a slow burn really, and it just continued. It’s like peeling back the layers of an onion because you start with one thing and then you find something that you like even more.”
As he collected, he found other kinds of toys or science fiction memorabilia that interested him, then met collectors who helped fuel the hobby, he said.
He still remembers the piece that started it all in 1986 — a Smoking Grandpa tin toy, a jovial old man in a rocking chair puffing smoke as he held a glowing pipe, made in the 1950s by Marusan in Japan.
“I don’t have the original since I have upgraded since. My budget was a bit limited back then as a recent college grad,” he said. “(The smoke) has a very distinctive smell, and it’s a smell I have become very fond of because it is just so nostalgic now, and it reminded me of my Daddy.”
Other early purchases were battery-operated Horikawa toys like the Fighting Robot, and Attacking Martian of the late 1960s and early 1970s, leaving some friends “shocked and flabbergasted” that he paid $40 for them in his early collection days.
“At that time, that was considered a tremendous amount of money, and those robots were not that old back then, compared to what they are now,” he said. “I was always a fan of monsters and sci-fi. To me, the box art was another really huge attraction.”
Bilotta has lived in Florida for 20 years, half of that in the Miami area. He moved to Ponte Vedra Beach in 2019 with his wife, Kristine, and son Andrew. He worked in commercial real estate as he bought, traded and sold what blossomed into more than 2,000 items in his personal collection now.
The collection eventually got to the point where he needed to find more space. The result was that he bought the Corners at Sawgrass office complex, fronted by the tax collector’s office. He reserved one building for his collection.
“Probably 85% of it is here,” Bilotta said. “All the arcade pieces are here. Toy-wise, there are probably 400 or 500 pieces left, but the significant pieces are here.”
Original posters of Forbidden Planet, plus It Came from Outer Space and Invasion of the Saucer Men decorate the walls at the entrance. A walk through the many rooms shows varied interests, from rare arcade machines and 1950s sci-fi rocket rides that children can ride for a quarter, to lots of vintage toys.
Some tin toys date back 100 years, like toy ray guns and rocket ships, with a rare Buck Rogers in the 25th Century wind-up tin rocket toy and shelves of early Mickey Mouse collectibles, some with the Disney character’s original look. One favorite is his Popeye tin tank toy, one of only five in the world, with Olive Oyl popping out of the turret.
He bought it in the early 2000’s, then sold it, only to buy in back in 2022.
“Reacquiring the Popeye tank was just a good feeling,” he said.
In another gallery you’ll find more modern anime characters from Speed Racer and Astro Boy, which were shown on U.S. TV, as well as others that never left Japanese tubes. There is a whole display of Batman collectibles — toy cars, figures, even a tank toy. It is next to tin toys of kid’s TV shows like Supercar.
There’s early anime from Japan, like the 5-foot-tall blue and red Gigantor robot — a 1960s cartoon of a world-saving robot operated by a boy — in a gallery shared with full-size replicas of B-9, the robot from Lost in Space, Robby from Forbidden Planet and Gort from The Day the Earth Stood Still.
The dome-topped Robby, which blinks lights, twirls antenna and speaks, may be Bilotta’s favorite robot, he said.
Other rooms are dedicated to pinball machines, as well as early 1900s fortune teller machines, including one that is still able to spit out a “Grandmother’s Prophesies” card. And then there’s “Ask The Brain,” a creepy bald scientist robot who plays with a computer as he cackles. Lights blink and sound effects buzz before he prepares one’s fortune — for a dollar.
“Ah, what do we have here — a human seeking advice from The Brain?,” he says. “Well, let me ask you a question first — do you have any idea what it smells like in this booth after a corn dog, ha, ha, ha?”
Bilotta’s son, a history major from North Carolina State, helps curate the collection while his mother also helps manage it all.
Bilotta said they opened the 3,000-squre-foot collection about a year ago “to inspire the next generation of collectors, keep this culture alive, expose these artifacts to people that have never seen them before, offer something happy/nostalgic, and lastly, for the historic significance spanning two previous centuries.”
Bilotta admits that it is hard to say whether he has an overall favorite, “because I have so many.”
“I just think the collection in aggregate is my favorite. Do you go by value?” he said. “I think the stuff that is most endearing are the early things I collected because it got me in the hobby. But now there are so many other pieces in here, like original art, movie posters, kiddie rides and full-size robots.”
The collection isn’t done yet.
He recently purchased a trio of robot musicians created by Gebroeders Decap in 1963 in Belgium. The wall-sized creation features three figures. One plays drums, another a saxophone, and the third a skinny horn, all backed up by a pipe organ and flashing lights.
That might need some interior redesign to fit in Bilotta’s Sawgrass collection, but he says he’s ready.
