Even as an adult I learned that the company who made these never meant for kids to get a free sucker if you turn this in.
Yet when I was a kid our local convince store did honor this. If you got the Native American with the star I could turn it in for a free one.
I didn’t learn that it was something the store were doing until saw it on Reddit in my late 30’s. It true even then no one had an explanation for that.