Today's dangerous toys pale to those of past

Chicago Sun Times ^ | November 26, 2003 | MARK BROWN SUN

[boris]

There are still some about. I bought a friend's kids some toy helicopters. You pulled a trigger, which spun up the blades; releasing the trigger released the copter. One kid immediately pointed it HORIZONTALLY at her face, incorrectly assuming she would get a nice breeze.

Her mom and I both yelled "No!" and started across the room to prevent disaster. She let go of the trigger, launched the helicopter directly at her face. One of the blades cut her lip.

She hadn't had the toy more than one minute.

Over the years I've bought them unicycles (think of the injury potential), pogo sticks (a ticket to the emergency room) and sundry other toys that make it easy for kids to hurt themselves. In fact, the local joke is that I shop at "the Department of Dangerous Toys."

--Boris

[Orangedog]

Thats what I liked about NI3. Plenty of concussion, but no flames. Besides, if you're caught with it, the average middle school history teacher wouldn't have the slightest idea that some nasty looking purple goop in a jar could cause any mayhem....until it dries.

[Orangedog]

PLEASE share with the group! I'd like to know what this is, in the name of science, of course!

[Barnacle]

The Ronco “Iwo Jima”. That’s what I wanted.

[Fresh Wind]

An aerosol hair spray can and a Bic lighter were almost as good!

[Orangedog]

My hat is off to you, sir! And here I thought that surplus weather baloons were just for attaching lawn chairs to.

[dalereed]

"thought that surplus weather baloons were just for attaching lawn chairs to."

Never thought about attaching them to the neighbors lawn chairs filled with hydrogen and sending them to some unknown part of the city!

[Barnacle]

An aerosol hair spray can and a Bic lighter were almost as good!

Going to the store now.

[AnAmericanMother]

Yeah, but once that stuff dries if your cat tiptoes past the area it will go. Don't like that. Reminds me too much of red phosphorus and chlorate (ask the guy who wrote the "Militant's Formulary" how he lost all the fingers on his left hand. I met him once, his lab safety procedures left a lot to be desired.)

[NewRomeTacitus]

“The "Lawn Dart" was a great toy for the whole family. Jarts!”
Was seeing how high I could throw one. Little sister had to run by and “THUNK”. “Whaaah!” Stuck straight up out of her head, slightly to the right (thank God it didn’t hit where the plates join). Great fun not being able to sit down for a week.
“What? No toad interrogations?”

It was only one, I swear he didn’t feel a thing going off in a cloud of pink and green at 100 feet. I didn’t know he was related to James Carville.

Other tidbits: Little gray plastic submarine propelled by a mystery tablet.
Barbie got a Corvette and her owners all over America got over with boys for the first time in their lives because of it.
SST cars powered by a “Rip Cord”. (I had the Black Widow).
Clothespin + baseball card + bike spokes = Lots of noise.
Crystal radio sets.
The Visible Man & Woman (Update! Visible Democrat: no guts and you can see right through it.)
Plastic model kits from Aurora (scalpels, flammable fluids, tiny parts, risk of hallucinations: these babies covered a lot of ground).

Happy Holidays!

[jaime1959]

>> "I had the Johnny Seven," one protective father told me wistfully. "It was seven weapons of destruction in one. You could pull out the Lugar or convert it into a grenade launcher."


Take the Vac-U-Form from Mattel, which used a sizzling 110-volt hotplate to mold small toys from melted sheets of styrene plastic. The Vac-U-Form heating plate was also later used for Creepy Crawlers and Thingmaker molds.
<<

I had the Johnny Seven gun when I was little and the Creepy Crawler maker, plus a chemistry set. Surprised I'm still here with all my limbs, eyes, etc.

The Johnny Seven WAS really cool!!!

[forsnax5]

... and put a straight pin in the nose.

Well, yeah.

:)

We put kitchen matches in the nose, as well. They made a satisfying pop when they landed on tarmac, and a fine bit of smoke.

Placing small firecrackers inside with the fuse threaded out to the match head was another interesting concept, but it was rarely successful.

[Orangedog]

Then you obviously missed the 1997 Darwin Award honorable mention! Granted, he was using helium, but you get the idea.

http://www.aps.org/apsnews/0198/019814.html

[gitmo]

My brother and I used to grab onto the electric fence, grit our teeth, and wait for the neighbor girls to walk by. The trick was to look non-chalante as each jolt of electricity jerked through your body. A simple touch on the back of the neck, and boy would they wail.

In Cuba we used to kick over small cactuses, pick them up by the roots (gloves were helpful), swing them around and throw them at the opposing army of kids. Of course, they were doing the same to us.

[AnAmericanMother]

Gosh! My best friend's little brother used to mow down entire regiments of little plastic soldiers with Alberto VO-5 and a cigarette lighter . . .

[Vermonter]

Long time no see dale.

Seems some guys I knew would borrow a rope from someone's flag pole and then go wait at a bus stop. While someone asked the driver for directions, someone else might tie the metal litter basket to the back of the bus.

Sometimes this litter basket would follow the bus down the road ;-}

[Delta 21]

I was thinking (uh-oh!) about posting my own thread with a few digital pics of our downtown Christmas scene and throw in the tidbit about the candy cigs as a zinger just to see how many Freepers I could get fired up. I still might.

The plains of Kansas can certainly feel like 1958 at times. and I can use all of that I can get. TVLand had "The Munsters "marathon just the other day and my three daughters were glued to the tube.

[Fresh Wind]

An aerosol hair spray can and a Bic lighter were almost as good!

Going to the store now.

Just moments ago tried this with a can of Lysol. Works great!!

[dalereed]

"Then you obviously missed the 1997 Darwin Award honorable mention!"

That's hillareous! Don't know how I missed it in the news or for that matter from just talk since I lived there and am also a pilot.

[Orangedog]

Well, the faint of heart can always use the store bought straight ammonia cleaners from the grocery store. Takes a lot of the punch out of it, but if you just flick a bunch of it off a paint brush onto the kitchen floor, it makes good entertainment when someone walks across it. Not that I'd know anything about that either.