This thread about the Electro-Shot Shooting Gallery began to drift into folks talking about other cool toys from their childhoods - to the apparent dismay of the OP, who seemed to want to stay on topic.
So I decided to open a new thread for anybody wanting to reminisce about all the awesome toys we enjoyed lo these many years ago.
I’ll start with the Strange Change Machine and the Creepy Crawlers Thing Maker, both of which provided hours of fun for me and my brothers, but would never fly today due to the very real potential of either to severely burn little hands.
The LEGO Technic 8865 Test Car. I saved my allowance for many weeks to buy this for myself when I was 10 or so. IIRC, it was somewhere around $100.
For years after I slowly modified it: I lowered it, added 4-wheel steering, made it a roadster, changed the gearbox order, added brakes, motorized it, and a few other things. It (and other Technic sets) served a crucial role in understanding mechanical objects and 3D visualization and design skills.
I had two Thingmakers and most of the available molds. I also had a Pretzel Jetzel and Incredible Edibles. Neither one worked very well. Neither did the Mr. Peanut peanut butter maker (the only old toy I still have) or the Sno-Cone machine. I’ve heard Kenner E-Z bake ovens also performed poorly.
For parents interested in a toy that makes edibles as it should, consider cotton candy machines. The small ones go for about thirty bucks, and they really work as they should!
We also had some monkey bars in the back yard and a merry-go-round for two people that worked by pumping the footrest/handle bars. These were awesome, but I am nine years younger than my three older siblings, so those two outside toys were ten years old before I was able to use them and didn’t last long for me.
I wanted a ‘picture maker’, i think instead i got a bunch of paper and colored pencils. Probably helped me to really sketch. But i was disappointed that year.
APBA baseball game that I received at age 10. It used dice and a card for each player to replicate his statistics (on average) for the past year.
Actually I guess I got it for the Christmas I was 11, but the cards were based on the 1959 season for when I was ten. That was fortunate as in 1959 the Yankees did not win the pennant for one of the only two times in my life until I was 16.
The sports talk reminds me of one. I never had it, but we had one at church. It was a basketball game in a regular board game sized box. There were two backboards which slotted into the ends, and there were holes in the box/court which had little spring loaded flipper levers with which to fling the ball at the goal. Half the holes aimed one way and half the other way. Anyone remember what this was called?
Nice. I had the 8855 Prop Plane, with fully functional stick and control surfaces. It’s still assembled, sitting on top of a cabinet at my parent’s house.
We had Hands Up Harry - You faced off with this cowboy, you had your six-shooter (actually it fired one suction-cup dart and you had to re-load after each shot :eek: ), you shot off his hat, making his armed arms fly up, you shot each gun out of his hands, then when he was disarmed and vulnerable, you shot his belt buckle and HIS PANTS FELL DOWN! revealing striped underwear. Katherine Ross was nowhere to be seen! It never got old. Wish I had one now.
Major Matt Mason (and his bazillion accessories) was an awesome space toy. The creators put a lot of thought and ingenuity into it. I still have one of the 4 D-cell powered tank-like vehicles. In the original box.
I would ride across town with that on my back so that I could play war with my friends like little boys used to do. Nobody blinked an eye, even with the black barrel, detachable magazine, gunsmoke generator, fairly realistic firing sounds, and light-simulated muzzle flashes.
Nowadays just having that visibly outside the house would get a dozen 911 calls and you shot by the police.
The Toot Sweet machine - Tootsie Rolls got inserted in the hole in the top, a mold was screwed down into place, the lever was pulled down and the Tootsie became different shapes that assembled into a working whistle or faces that you could attach to the whistle for some reason. Minutes later, down the hatch.
