Forgotten toys

there's also a picture of 2-year-old latebloomer with birthday cake all over his face and carrying his brand new little people toy helicopter

Anyone remember Sweet Secrets?

Yes! My sister and the neighbor girl were into these, sort of a charm bracelet version of Transformers. Neighbor had the house which was pretty cool. No one else remembers them though. It's funny how you kind of assume the toys you played with must have been the really popular ones of the era, even though it just ends up being what caught your dad's eye at Service Merchandise or whatever. But for a simple twist of fate you would reminisce about entirely different toys that occupied endless weeks of childhood.

For me, it was as much yard-sale Playmobil as could possibly be attained, populating a world of wooden blocks and miscellaneous plastic monsters et cetera. I was talking the other day with some people about this and discovered that to many, this kind of toy integration was considered some sort of sacrilege - to me it was just so natural!

I had a matchbox car version of that parking ramp thing, folded up into a little suitcase.

do kids still play with toy cars ? i assume they do, so have the toy cars come along in any advanced way like do they have any steering mechanism yet? i always hoped for some kind of pressure sensitive side doors that would control the front wheels.

I am too old for the toys in this thread, but the most badass toy I ever owned was probably Horrible Hamilton:

http://thegalleryofmonstertoys.com/60swing/hambug.jpg

http://static.flickr.com/53/165898461_80f6baa10d_o.jpg

one of these has passed through like 30 years worth of children in my family.

http://laughingsquid.com/wp-content/uploads/1965_catalog_daddysaddle-781x1024.jpg

ahahaha

Still available actually.

http://www.delivercenter.com/images/daddle_baby_shower_gift_idea.jpg

It's called the "Daddle" now.

I began to say that I rode my Dad bareback and thought better of it. :/

hahaha

Dyin' over here...

VG irl lol

So the first thing I thought of when I saw this thread was Creepy Crawlers (and the Creeple People, Fun Flowers etc. variants.) Evidently there's a version of these plastic-molding things still being made.

http://www.samstoybox.com/toypics/CreepyCrawlersBox2.jpg

http://www.dicemaestro.com/games-articles/retroactive-escape-from-colditz.asp

http://www.dicemaestro.com/graphics/ColditzMainImage.jpg

World’s last dedicated Meccano factory to close in France

Now the last dedicated Meccano factory in the world is being closed and dismantled. The Canadian company that owns Meccano has said the plant at Calais will close at the beginning of 2024, putting 51 people out of work. It blamed the soaring cost of raw materials and “a lack of competitiveness” for the closure.

Spin Master, which bought the brand in 2013, said Meccano toys would continue to be produced by its “network of partners in Europe, Asia and Latin America”.

“We have no other choice than to envisage the end of industrial activity at the Calais factory,” Spin Master said in a statement, adding that the factory had “never managed to break even” in spite of receiving €7m (£6.1m) in investment since 2014.

Jean-François Sandrass, who has worked at the Calais factory for almost 40 years, said the staff had not expected the shutdown. “We were stunned … some were even crying. We were expecting reduced working hours, but not the closure of the factory,” he said.

He said the company did not appear to be in financial trouble. “They’ve told us for the last two or three years that we were gradually getting back on track, and in 2021 we had a positive year. And suddenly the board says: ‘It’s been 10 years that money has been injected, and it hasn’t worked’. We are part of a major group that has made enormous profits.”