Toys of your youth

[oldwheels]

We also during and just after the war have real revolvers which we played with but fortunately no ammo. Naturally adults were never informed of this. They were smuggled back as souvenirs by big brothers who served in the army.
In those days also every schoolboy had a penknife in his pocket. Never heard of anyone getting stabbed.

 

[Oldhippy]

I've carried a pocket knife since I was about 7. Upgraded to a Leatherman in the last 15 years or so.

 

[Darius_Jedburgh]

In those days also every schoolboy had a penknife in his pocket. Never heard of anyone getting stabbed.

And they all had one of those things for getting boy scouts out of horses hooves.

 

[Darius_Jedburgh]

Talking of adventure playgrounds.....
What are they? We never had anything like that. We went off down into the fields and woods. Went for hours at a time. Damming streams, making swings from old rope, walking across water pipelines far too high off the gound for safety. We knew what time lunch was, and we knew what time tea (or dinner for southern softies) was. 12 noon and 5.30PM. So we were home then. No watches so we just learned how to know when to go home.
Cuts and grazes were commonplace. A bad cut got a slap from mother for making a mess.
Did we ever feel in danger? Not once.

 

[Jody]

@JtB Here's one my uncle made for me when I was a toddler. He made two identical but mine never got the fire box to complete it

 

[Jody]

This was my favourite until I got banned from it.

Bonus on this picture as it has the game loaded that got me banned

 

[Randomnerd]

<<Hovis soundtrack playing int he background throughout this thread>>


Spirograph. Bring out your biros. Let's get creative. Not.

The Thomas Salter Adventure Kit.

Aged eight maybe, I had this bad boy strapped to me the whole summer. Knew where I was headed, what time it was, and how I could get back in the dark once I had looked at things from afar and blown my whistle to alert others and taken some snaps of things. Nicely plasticky, and quite a lot of the components broke quite soon after purchase. The second summer I recall feeling far less adventurous, and had to make do with staying in our road.

Etch-a-sketch? Yes.

Spud gun? Deffo.

Cap gun? what? cant hear you. Cap went off right by my ear.

A bow and arrows with suckers on the end, to fire at the garage door. Splonk. Splonk. Splonk.......Splonk

Six Million Dollar Man. Bionic arm and eye and that little plastic engine he could lift. Wow.

('Its raining. We all going round yours?) Connect Four! Kerplunk! Buckaroo! Burning holes in the nylon bedroom carpet with the chemistry set

Klackers? No.

I wanted but never got: pogo stick; roller skates; space hopper; chopper. Plenty in the road had them, and sharing was often okay if you had something to swap.

One last one I really liked" Matchbox Superfast with the double loop track.
Here it is look!

 

[Andy in Germany]

<<Hovis soundtrack playing int he background throughout this thread>>


Spirograph. Bring out your biros. Let's get creative. Not.

View attachment 590501



The Thomas Salter Adventure Kit.
View attachment 590497
Aged eight maybe, I had this bad boy strapped to me the whole summer. Knew where I was headed, what time it was, and how I could get back in the dark once I had looked at things from afar and blown my whistle to alert others and taken some snaps of things. Nicely plasticky, and quite a lot of the components broke quite soon after purchase. The second summer I recall feeling far less adventurous, and had to make do with staying in our road.

Etch-a-sketch? Yes.

Spud gun? Deffo.

Cap gun? what? cant hear you. Cap went off right by my ear.

A bow and arrows with suckers on the end, to fire at the garage door. Splonk. Splonk. Splonk.......Splonk

Six Million Dollar Man. Bionic arm and eye and that little plastic engine he could lift. Wow.

('Its raining. We all going round yours?) Connect Four! Kerplunk! Buckaroo! Burning holes in the nylon bedroom carpet with the chemistry set

Klackers? No.

I wanted but never got: pogo stick; roller skates; space hopper; chopper. Plenty in the road had them, and sharing was often okay if you had something to swap.

One last one I really liked" Matchbox Superfast with the double loop track.
Here it is look!
View attachment 590516

Oooh. I had one of those, sans curves. It came with a Matchbox "Vantastic" model, which invariably hurtled down the ramp, rocketed to the apex of the loop and dropped straight down like a cartoon character realising it had run over a cliff...

 

[newts]

@JtB Here's one my uncle made for me when I was a toddler. He made two identical but mine never got the fire box to complete it

View attachment 590514

That's a 'Wells schools' engine, Kenneth Wells plans from his Step by Step metalwork books.
Many were never finished as students had often left school long before finishing.
Completed examples are very collectable.

 

[Jody]

That's a 'Wells schools' engine, Kenneth Wells plans from his Step by Step metalwork books.
Many were never finished as students had often left school long before finishing.
Completed examples are very collectable.

Interesting. I'll ask him about that when I see him next. This was made to keep me entertained until the actual traction engine was complete. That took him 18 years

EDIT - Wow. I've just had a look on Google. Thanks for that info!

 

[lazybloke]

View: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=_7Dlgkcj1u0

Reminds me of the time my brother unpacked a violet wand aka erotic electrostimulator in front of 3, possibly 4, generations of my family.
He'd bought it because the glassware looked "cool", almost steampunk. I was the family expert with electrics, so he wanted my opinion of what it did, and whether it was safe.

To be fair, no one had any idea what it was. It took me several minutes on Google before I had the slightest inkling.
We've not seen it since!

 

[markemark]

I’d recommend a visit to the wonderful V & A Museum of Childhood in Hackney.

 

[Drago]

Reminds me of the time my brother unpacked a violet wand aka erotic electrostimulator in front of 3, possibly 4, generations of my family.
He'd bought it because the glassware looked "cool", almost steampunk. I was the family expert with electrics, so he wanted my opinion of what it did, and whether it was safe.

To be fair, no one had any idea what it was. It took me several minutes on Google before I had the slightest inkling.
We've not seen it since!

We used to steal the batteries from my mates mums vibrator for our Walkman's, safe in the knowledge she was never going to ask us about it.

 

[Oldhippy]

I seem to remember having a den in the woods as well at some point.

 

[Milkfloat]

These were some of mine:

And one that still gets pulled out at Christmas, that nobody else other than my family seem to know about.