That’d be like throwing paint on the Mona Lisa. And besides, I hoped to inherit it when he lost interest in Matchbox cars.
My fastest car was the Hairy Hustler (the red one). Won most of the races with it, and it’s one of the few cars I still have left.
Lawn darts were pretty fun back when they had the weighted steel tips. A few deaths and a few thousand injuries, and suddenly you can’t buy a deadly projectile kids’ toy anymore. Damned nanny state.
I also had a water powered rocket. I was so excited when I got it Chirstmas morning that I put it together, filled it up, threw on my boots and went outside. When it launched I got sprayed with the water exhaust. Not a smart thing to do when it was below zero in Chicago.
I loved my Merlin! I felt so hi-tech with this portable game. I had another hand-held game but I can’t remember what it was called. Maybe about 8 inches long, 3 inches wide. Had a liquid crystal display and you could swap out cartridges to play different games.
My parents were very anti-violence/anti-gun so I wasn’t allowed to have GI Joe. Instead I got Big Jim. He had this “metal” band that you put around his arm. When you bent his arm the bicep would bulge and “break” the band.
I had the old school Legos with the big people, not the little ones you see in every kit today. I even had the motor with the control box connected by a wire. When I was 10 I broke my knee and was in traction in the hospital. I made a little motorized platform so I could swap Mad magazines with the kid in the next bed.
I had lots of Estes model rockets. Sometimes I would be so eager to launch them that I wouldn’t even bother painting them. After a few launches there was always the inevitable parachute failure. Then I would send the rocket on its suicide launch. I’d put a baggy of nail polish remover inside and glue match sticks inside and out with model glue. The rocket would take off and when the ejection charge would go off instead of a nice parachute being released you’d have a huge fireball. I would also glue the rocket engines to model cars and planes. One time I made a rocket car that looked like the Blue Flame. It shot down the street, hit a rock and took off, barely missing an oncoming car.
Good times.
We always played chicken with them, tossing them as close to the other kids feet as possible. Had to stop after my friend Ralph developed a case of Jart-induced stigmata. Darn spoil-sport parents.
I actually have a set of lawn darts in ‘like new’ condition, and in the original box. Don’t have anyone to play with, though.
I won a set of Jarts around 7th grade when I was a paperboy right before they reached their mythical outlaw status. I never did impale anyone, which is nice.
Years later, I was at a 4th of July picnic and some people were playing beer Jarts – hit the can in the ring and you have to chug it. I don’t think anyone actually had to chug.
Many of my friends (40-60 age range) have sets that they cherish. And though we are all adults, we’ve had plenty of close calls.
Cool!
Space 1999 Eagle: this one
Oh, now that is
I have the model (AMT?) in my Big Box-O-Models.
The ones that really stand out:
Sonic Fazer. Had lots of space adventures with that one. It even had mass inversion!
Big Trak. It was a programmable tank that you programmed with instructions like forward 3, turn 3, fire, fire, backwards 2, etc.
Legos, a few genuine but a lot of off-brand too. The off-brand were somewhat flexible plastic and would better survive our game of building cars and crashing them into each other, if your car wouldn’t sit on it’s wheels without part of the car touching the floor you lost.
And just plain branches, rocks, and other outdoor stuff. We used to play a pretty good game of “bomb the leaves” from a high bank above the creek.
I acquired one of those recently.
I repaired the slider that selected the sound and soldered a new battery tab, where and adult had obviously smashed the sucker over an article of furniture, or perhaps a child’s head.
We had that one. It actually wasn’t that hard to set up to work correctly. I remember using it as a “burglar alarm” for my room by setting it up with a trigger so if the door was opened the balls were released. The final bucket they went into was metal and made a ringing sound when they hit it.
One of my favorite cool toys was the Micronauts
Also the GI Joe Space Capsule
I had a whirly-bird. It was a four-seat sort-of-a-merry-go-round. Each seat has a hand and foot pump so the kids can power the spin. It was the best thing EVAH!
What was on the record?
Probably the same set. I have the track and everything on the landing outside my apartment. Nobody would know it’s there or steal it, but I haven’t seen good prices for that stuff recently.
My neighbors had that. So jealous!
What was on the @#$% record?!?!?!?
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I used to have a box-o-models. They got tossed by my parents after I left for boot camp. 