Old toys that you thought were really cool

[Mountaintown Creek Ranch]

You ever notice how all the really cool toys that you loved as a kid have been deemed "dangerous".

For example yard darts I thought they were a blast now evidently they're a killer.
Not sure what's wrong with throwing sharp weighted metal pointy arrows at each other .

I guess kids are just getting soft

 

[greybeard]

'You'll put your eye out kid"

 

[coachg]

BB guns , every boy had one . My dad told my brother and I we could shoot every bird in the yard except bluebirds .

 

[Ouachita]

My 24yo daughter found a full set of those lawn darts at a yard sale a few weeks ago. She waltzed in and said "hey, why didn't we have these when we were kids?". I told I thought they were outlawed by then, and reminded her they had lots of other cool stuff.

My favorite as a small child was a pedal firetruck, all metal, until mom backed over it with her Ford Maverick and punched her gas tank.

Tinker Toys and Lincoln Logs for rainy days. BB and pellet guns, followed by archery and real firearms for outside (except for that one time).

The old metal Tonka trucks were cool too. I still have a couple of them, and my first tricycle.

We got an Atari when I was about 12yo, but I never got in to it much. We still had a old black and white TV and the wiring to hook it up was a nightmare. The Atari sound never worked.

Beyond toys, it was building forts and tree houses from scraps; mostly old pallets that granddad brought home from his trash route. Playing war with mud clods, rocks, and sometimes we'd sneak in a BB gun until dad thrashed our behind.

Does anyone else remember the Big Wheels, and the commercial where they used a snippet from Merle Haggard's "Movin' On". I could pedal and sing like Merle.

 

[greybeard]

, and my first tricycle.

Current pic or it didn't happen...

 

[greybeard]

Playing war with mud clods,

No rocks where I grew up (unless you count chunks of concrete), but man we had dirt clod fights ever week, with all the neighbor kids picking sides and we'd range 1/4 mile of properties. Learned to use a 3' long flexible willow limb to stab a chunk of damp clay on and hurl em way farther than we could throw with our arm. 4th of July and before New years, we'd add a firecracker to the clay ball, have someone 'on your side' lite it and send the exploding ball of clay toward your enemy.

 

[Ouachita]

Current pic or it didn't happen...

I'll try to remember when I get home this evening

 

[GoWyo]

I made a sling for throwing rocks. A piece of leather and two strings. That was fun. Also made a bow out of greasewood and my own arrows, but didn't have fletching on the arrows, so wasn't very accurate. Had a Daisy BB gun to shoot sparrows and blackbirds out of the chicken scratch pen and feed the cats. Big set of Legos. An old beater bicycle until got an old beater motorcycle. We irrigated using motorcycles. They were the old trail type, not motocross frames so the suspension wasn't all that great. Had ponies and horses too -- sometimes they got used to play cowboys and Indians.

 

[Ouachita]

Sling shots and pea shooters; Mom's old bras were often repurposed for such things. I wasn't the only kid in the neighborhood with a double barrel sling shot

 

[SBMF 2015]

You ever notice how all the really cool toys that you loved as a kid have been deemed "dangerous".

For example yard darts I thought they were a blast now evidently they're a killer.
Not sure what's wrong with throwing sharp weighted metal pointy arrows at each other .

I guess kids are just getting soft

View attachment 35180

I use to throw them from my fast pedaling bicycle.

 

[GoWyo]

Sling shots and pea shooters; Mom's old bras were often repurposed for such things. I wasn't the only kid in the neighborhood with a double barrel sling shot

I tried to make an atlatl, but couldn't figure out how to make a decent spear to start with and never got that project off the ground.

 

[GoWyo]

We never got lawn darts. Wanted some, but my parents were cheap and probably figured we had enough old junk materials to amuse ourselves trying to make stuff we wished we could buy.

 

[Silver]

When I was a kid my dad gave me his Mechano set he had grown up with. Best part was the steam engine that came with it.

 

[TexasJerseyMilker]

I got a chemistry set for Christmas. Used up all the sulfer in 2 days making stink bombs. I never went for dolls and girly toys, too boring.

 

[Travlr]

My parents never gave me anything I asked for, so I ended up buying everything myself.

I never did get a Tonka truck, which is one of the things I always wanted, but I did buy my own Schwinn Stingray and my own 22.

They never bought the horse I was promised but they did give me my first cow. And in the end my little Hereford was a much better gift than a horse would have been. I rode plenty of horses without owning one. My Hereford paid for a lot of things.

 

[Ouachita]

My parents never gave me anything I asked for, so I ended up buying everything myself.

I never did get a Tonka truck, which is one of the things I always wanted, but I did buy my own Schwinn Stingray and my own 22.

They never bought the horse I was promised but they did give me my first cow. And in the end my little Hereford was a much better gift than a horse would have been. I rode plenty of horses without owning one. My Hereford paid for a lot of things.

I know most of our toys, at least the outside type toys, were brought home by my granddad from his trash route. He had the first rural trash service in the area. Even then, people threw away things that just needed a little work.

 

[GoWyo]

I know most of our toys, at least the outside type toys, were brought home by my granddad from his trash route. He had the first rural trash service in the area. Even then, people threw away things that just needed a little work.

Now that I think about it, my bicycle and a few other things were salvaged from the dump by one of Dad's friends.

 

[Travlr]

I know most of our toys, at least the outside type toys, were brought home by my granddad from his trash route. He had the first rural trash service in the area. Even then, people threw away things that just needed a little work.

I still like going to the dump to find things...

 

[SmokinM]

Always wanted a "too dispensive dighole tractor" (backhoe) but never got one as a kid. Own and have owned/ rented a lot of Caterpillar equipment since I "grew up" so in the end I showed them! I love my job, I get paid to play in the dirt.

As a kid we bought our own toys other than birthday or Christmas with money we earned cleaning house, fencelines and splitting/stacking firewood. Our bike path ran thru a half acre patch of solid poison ivy, we laughed in the face of danger!

 

[Mountaintown Creek Ranch]

I can't remember how I got it, but I got a wrist rocket slingshot when I was young it was taken away after 2 days