8 Dangerous Toys from the Past

[gun sane]

It's a wonder so many kids got through those thrilling days of yesteryear alive. Now we have safer things to play with....like guns.

 

http://www.thefederalistpapers.org/us/8-insanely-dangerous-toys-from-the-past-will-leave-you-speechless-photos

 

As one commenter says, "The gene pool was deeper."

[K191145]

I have a cousin in Savanah Ga. who has a glass eye because of a chemistry set when he was a kid. My toy was an H&R .410 when I was 12.  :)

[Omega]

They forgot a few I had like water rockets, lawn darts and the ever popular water wiggle.

[Ted S.]

Some of those seem like they make for an engaging childhood.

[Chucktshoes]

Folks used to have more kids back then because odds were you were going to lose a couple of the weaker specimens during the raising process.

This was not a bug, but a feature. Edited July 30, 2015 by Chucktshoes

[Trekbike]

I wonder if that's where Caster got his start by using #7 Kaster Kit Jr, lead casting kit?

Sent from my SCH-I545 using Tapatalk Edited July 30, 2015 by Trekbike

[Motasyco]

I had a glass blowing kit, a chemistry set, and a steam engine.  Three out of the eight and I livied.  Not to mention lawn darts, although I seem to recall them called Jarts, and several water rockets.  I also had a rocket that used vinegar and baking soda for propulsion.  Fun but messy.

[Dolomite_supafly]

Folks used to have more kids back then because odds were you were going to lose a couple of the weaker specimens during the raising process.

This was not a bug, but a feature.

 

Funny how most of us survived without safety helmets while riding (and doing crazy stuff) our bikes. Not to mention those really dangerous car windows that rolled ALL the way down. Or if you did get hurt you got treated with antiseptics that contained trace amounts of mercury.

 

Something else I did during my younger years was to tear down 22's and up the powder charge. Can't tell you how many times I went too high and ended up cleaning all the brass bits out of the gun. Heck even in my adulthood I did some pretty stupid things in my quest for knowledge. I can tell you with great certainty that Home Depot nail setting blanks will NOT launch 55 grain pills out of a 22, got the scar to prove that doesn't work. Or at least the #4 blanks do not work, maybe I need to try the #2 or #3 to be 100% certain.

[Dolomite_supafly]

I made some home made water rockets by filling 2 liter bottles 1/2 way up with water then pressurizing to 125+ psi before launching. Trust me when I say those can be lethal at the end of their trajectory. Only real problem is they will sometimes do a 180 and come right back at you making all onlookers scurry like cockroaches when the lights are turned on.

[CommsNBombs]

Im sure half the things I did when I was younger would be considered domestic terrorism now...

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[peejman]

Funny how most of us survived without safety helmets while riding (and doing crazy stuff) our bikes. Not to mention those really dangerous car windows that rolled ALL the way down. Or if you did get hurt you got treated with antiseptics that contained trace amounts of mercury.

 

Something else I did during my younger years was to tear down 22's and up the powder charge. Can't tell you how many times I went too high and ended up cleaning all the brass bits out of the gun. Heck even in my adulthood I did some pretty stupid things in my quest for knowledge. I can tell you with great certainty that Home Depot nail setting blanks will NOT launch 55 grain pills out of a 22, got the scar to prove that doesn't work. Or at least the #4 blanks do not work, maybe I need to try the #2 or #3 to be 100% certain.

 

 

Yes... the places I rode and the things I did on a bicycle wearing shorts, a t-shirt, and sneakers.  I'd get arrested if my kids did that now. 

 

 

Back seat car windows that don't go all the way down are a byproduct of side impact bars and car design of the time.  Cars got smaller so the rear axle moved closer to the rear doors.  That required the big cut-outs in the lower half of the rear doors to accommodate the wheel well body structure.  There wasn't enough room in the small rear doors for the window mechanism to allow the window to go all the way down with that big steel side impact bar running the full width of the door, and with the big cut-outs in the rear doors to clear the rear wheels.  The door would need to be much thicker to make room for the window, which would have reduced already tight rear seat space.  It was a physical design limitation that the marketing folks spun as a "feature".   Marketing 101.

Edited July 30, 2015 by peejman

[Tncobra]

Toys back then prepared us for war. 

[EssOne]

We used to set .22 LR rounds flat on a rock with the bases facing us and then try to detonate them by hitting the base with a BB out of our Daisy Red Ryder BB guns. Never got one to detonate, luckily. We also launched stick matches out of our BB guns to watch them go spiraling like crazy into a brick wall and light with a loud POP. We also used to hide in lemon orchards and chuck lemons at the freight trains when they went by. Luckily again, we never hit anybody. That was during the period of development when we were at the shallow end of the gene pool. :surrender:

Edited July 30, 2015 by EssOne

[toby1304]

Wow, I cannot believe they didn't list the General Lee Hot Wheels car.

[crossfire]

Chances are if you had a "dangerous toy", your Dad bought it for you and the only time you got to play with it is when he was done playing with it. :wave:

[Spots]

I'm not as old as some of you are, but dangerous stuff still happens. When I was in automotive school at 17 we would fill two liters half full of gasoline. Drill a hole in the cap, pop in a valve stem from a tire and pressurize the bottle to 100 psi. Sprinkle gas on it, draw a trail and light it. It makes a big pop and huge fireball.

Sent from the backwoods

[Omega]

We used to set .22 LR rounds flat on a rock with the bases facing us and then try to detonate them by hitting the base with a BB out of our Daisy Red Ryder BB guns. Never got one to detonate, luckily. We also launched stick matches out of our BB guns to watch them go spiraling like crazy into a brick wall and light with a loud POP. We also used to hide in lemon orchards and chuck lemons at the freight trains when they went by. Luckily again, we never hit anybody. That was during the period of development when we were at the shallow end of the gene pool. :surrender:

Ha, we used to wedge .22s in a tree and detonate them with our bb guns.  The we just used real .22 rifles and cut out the middle man.

[Ugly]

My favorite was the Evil Knevil motorcycle toy. It had a ripcord and would fly along the ground like a rocket with so much torque it would right itself after the certain crash.

My sisters didn't like the bruised ankles and of course it became one of those toys that mysteriously came up missing.

[Ray Z]

Y'all forgot my favorite, jarts.

[K191145]

We need a contest about who did the dumbest things when they were kids.

 I'll go first. How many of us shot practice arrows straight up with a kids bow, watched them 180 after stalling and trying to figure which way to run?

[Raoul]

All I know is that back in the day, if you had a chemistry set and an encyclopedia, you could figure out how to blow $#i+ up.

[gun sane]

We need a contest about who did the dumbest things when they were kids.

 I'll go first. How many of us shot practice arrows straight up with a kids bow, watched them 180 after stalling and trying to figure which way to run?

 

How many of us engaged in BB gun wars?  I had several until the rich kid on the block bought a pellet rifle.  Instant armistice!

[seez52]

one of my favorites was a carbide can. Take a quart paint can, put a small hole in the base, throw in several rocks of calcium carbide. Spit on the carbide slap the lid on quickly, lay it on it's side and put your foot on it then hold a lit match to the hole. It would make sound like a cannon and the lid would go flying. Grab the lid and do it again. Eventually the can was so bloated and overworked the can could explode at any point. Never did though. Our ears would ring for days I'm sure.

 

I remember buying the carbide at the local army navy store.

[CommsNBombs]

Took a extra large cardboard tube like you get from a large sheet of mapping or butcher paper. Melted a bunch of crayons to plug the bottom and then emptied almost 100+ Blockbuster M80s into it and kept packing it tight (not knowing the dangers of HSF to Ordnance, low order explosive safeties...blah blah eod blah).

Then we cut a bunch of long firework fuses with box cutters and extend it and shoved it down in there and MELTED (stupid me) more crayons on it to seal it

Wrapped it in ductape and set it on a chain link fence in the Hunts Point area of NYC...

Blew out every damn car and building window and car windshield around....oops

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[2.ooohhh]

We need a contest about who did the dumbest things when they were kids.

 I'll go first. How many of us shot practice arrows straight up with a kids bow, watched them 180 after stalling and trying to figure which way to run?

When I was 16 we were using a bulldozer/front loader on a friends farm in franklin/triune to build a motocross course. Of course we hit a huge piece of limestone right where we wanted a mudpit, rather than alter the course layout we decided to move the rock. Off to the barn we went in search of chains and shovels but instead all we could find were sticks of dynamite. The friend had helped his dad blast rock to build the stables so he set it up ran the wires and we all took cover behind the equipment as instructed. Only problem is that he was apparently way off in both placement of the charge and in the amount of explosive to use. The rock moved all right, large chunks of stone and dirt rained down from the sky for what seemed like an eternity, somehow only one of us was hit by any and it only caused a gash on his arm. We didn't think much of it and went back to work on the course until it was close to dark at which point we put away the tools and loaded up to head out, as we approached the front gate we were surprised to find a deputy sitting at the locked front gate. He hassled us and lectured but we stood our ground that we had no clue what that loud noise was(it was a several hundred acre property and we were FAR from any roads or other properties where the track was being built) and somehow got away with it all, at least until his dad found the explosives inventory low a few weeks later.  :rant: