I was recently going through some old belongings which included my old computer games from the mid 90′s (stuff like SimCity 2000, SimTower, Widget Workshop, WarCraft 1). At the same time, I came across an old piece of Maxis merchandise which I can honestly say I have never seen anywhere else: a “beanie” propeller hat given out by Maxis at Macworld Expo San Francisco (MWSF) in 1996!
Back in the mid 90′s I was still a little kid and my parents had gone to Macworld Expo a couple times. At that time, I didn’t really know the significance other than that they would see a lot of cool computer stuff. Okay, that and they’d probably return with some really cool swag! 
Anyway I got this hat from my parents after they returned from Macworld Expo San Francisco in 1996.
Check it out:
Isn’t that awesome? These hats were given out by Maxis at their booth at MWSF ’96. I don’t know what game(s) they exhibited that year, though. They could have been showing SimPark, The Crystal Skull, or Full Tilt Pinball, as far as I can tell (based on the release dates of those games).
Prior to that I was already a big fan of Maxis thanks to their games I had been playing for years starting with the original SimCity, and continuing with most of their big classics like SimEarth, SimAnt, SimCity 2000, as well as lesser-known ones like Widget Workshop, SimLife and SimTower.
Here are a couple other shots of the hat. First is a closeup of the Maxis logo:
And here’s a shot of the tag in the hat, showing which company made the hat:
Looks like Maxis just did a bulk order of propeller beanies from J Hats and had their logo slapped on. Probably a typical process for trade show merch.
So, here’s one thing that makes this hat pretty unique today: I can’t find a single piece of information about it anywhere. No one has mentioned it online that I can find, including Usenet posts. I guess this blog post is now the first and only piece of info on the net about this hat. 
If you have one of these hats, let me know! I’d be curious to hear anything else about it – what game was Maxis showing at their booth, and were they giving out any other items?
You might notice I put watermarks on the photos. I don’t usually do that, but I did this time to try and prevent people from putting up scam eBay auctions, knowing that die-hard Maxis fans would probably want this hat. Oh and no, I’m not selling mine, unless you have an extremely good offer.
BTW if you want a real trip down memory lane, I found this old article about MWSF ’95.
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Tags: games, mac, maxis, rare stuff, retro, retro gaming