I got a Fanner 50, also got a muzzleloading rifle toy. Looked like a Kentucky rifle, you stuck a cork ball down the bore, rammed it home with the ramrod, no patch. Then you cocked the hammer and put a greenie stickup cap on the place where the hammer hit. When you fired, the force of the cap going off would fire the cork ball and it went about 40 feet.
Well I had been studying up on Davy Crockett, I was about 11 years old, I realized what we needed was gunpowder. I got 6 black cat firecrackers and cut them up and got the powder out. Very fine silvery powder. Poured it down the bore. Then I found a marble that fit the bore pretty well, rammed that ball home, no patch. Then I put in the greenie stickup cap. Somehow, in my little 11 year old brain, I knew this was dangerous. I wedged the rifle in a bush, and got a 50 foot kite string that I tied to the trigger. Aimed it at the neighbor's block wall basement, 20 feet away, and fired!
The thing went BOOM. Big cloud of gunsmoke. The rifle did not blow up. I went over to the neighbor's basement, there was a 1/2 inch hole in the concrete block.
toy soldiers and rubber band guns for indoors and BB guns for outdoors toy tractors and other farm equipment (used in the garden dirt - sand was worthless) toy guns for playing soldier or cowboys as appropriate for the weapon as for electrified: American Flyer train Strombecker slot cars (later Aurora slot cars) Tudor Electric Football
Not a real member - just an ordinary guy who appreciates being able to hang around and say something once in awhile.
Happily Trapped In the Past (Thanks, Joe)
Not only a less than minimally educated person, but stupid and out of touch as well.
I got a Fanner 50, also got a muzzleloading rifle toy. Looked like a Kentucky rifle, you stuck a cork ball down the bore, rammed it home with the ramrod, no patch. Then you cocked the hammer and put a greenie stickup cap on the place where the hammer hit. When you fired, the force of the cap going off would fire the cork ball and it went about 40 feet.
Well I had been studying up on Davy Crockett, I was about 11 years old, I realized what we needed was gunpowder. I got 6 black cat firecrackers and cut them up and got the powder out. Very fine silvery powder. Poured it down the bore. Then I found a marble that fit the bore pretty well, rammed that ball home, no patch. Then I put in the greenie stickup cap. Somehow, in my little 11 year old brain, I knew this was dangerous. I wedged the rifle in a bush, and got a 50 foot kite string that I tied to the trigger. Aimed it at the neighbor's block wall basement, 20 feet away, and fired!
The thing went BOOM. Big cloud of gunsmoke. The rifle did not blow up. I went over to the neighbor's basement, there was a 1/2 inch hole in the concrete block.
Had the same thing in both musket and pistol.
IME the ramrod for the rifle wasn't long enough to really seat the ball down tight so velocity was disappointing. However, the pistol ramrod was long enough to fully seat that cork ball. Not having any firecrackers around I used 6 Greenie Stick'em caps on the nipple. That gave the ball enough force to remove a patch of skin from whoever it hit within about 10-15 feet and leave a red welt for another 10 feet beyond that. I appreciated that since it negated any arguments about "I got you! No you didn't!" The scream of pain was proof positive that I got'em.
Mostly had toy guns and plastic "army men" as a kid then moved to model airplanes, ships and such later on. I'd unbend a paper clip, heat one end red hot on the stove and customize the model airplanes with bullet holes. I understand you can't buy the glue anymore and models are all snap together, too bad.
Gunnery, gunnery, gunnery. Hit the target, all else is twaddle!
My brother and I got these for Christmas one year and back yard and in the woods wars were never ending....
I got one of those for Christmas one year too... my older Sister gave it to me. Lost all of the rockets and grenades and such pretty quick... don't know what happened to it.
My Parents were going to move to an assisted living facility and were going to have an auction to sell most of their things. We spent 5 weeks going through stuff getting ready and I was in the attic which was stacked waist deep with boxes and such when I spotted a lugged tire and wheel behind a stack. I cleared a way over to it and found my plastic toy cannon that I had forgot about. I got it one Christmas too and it even had the spring loaded cartridge. It's about 3' long and says Deluxe-Reading U.S.A. on the tires. Pretty neat to find.
My Dad gave me a homemade wood and tin toy truck that his Dad made for him... my Dad was born in 1920 so the toy is probably 1930 give or take a couple of years and is in surprisingly good condition... looks kind of like a Model T and is a dumptruck.
Every kid in the neighborhood had toy guns of some type, usually cowboy guns, revolvers or lever action rifles although some would have WWII type Tommy guns or something. On Saturday afternoon we'd get all fired up watching some John Wayne move on TV and then go have epic gun battles around the neighborhood. We knew every good ambush spot in the shrubbery of houses for two blocks in any direction, private property rights were an alien concept. But most homeowners didn't seem to mind going out and finding a machine gun nest in the geraniums manned by two 9 year olds. After a good gun battle little bodies littered the yards depending on whether rules of the day were "dead is dead" or "two touches and you're alive", i.e. if two of your teammates could reach you and touch you without getting shot you were okay and could rejoin the battle.
We'd have SWAT teams after us and be sent to psychiatrists today...
Gunnery, gunnery, gunnery. Hit the target, all else is twaddle!
Every kid in the neighborhood had toy guns of some type, usually cowboy guns, revolvers or lever action rifles although some would have WWII type Tommy guns or something. On Saturday afternoon we'd get all fired up watching some John Wayne move on TV and then go have epic gun battles around the neighborhood. We knew every good ambush spot in the shrubbery of houses for two blocks in any direction, private property rights were an alien concept. But most homeowners didn't seem to mind going out and finding a machine gun nest in the geraniums manned by two 9 year olds. After a good gun battle little bodies littered the yards depending on whether rules of the day were "dead is dead" or "two touches and you're alive", i.e. if two of your teammates could reach you and touch you without getting shot you were okay and could rejoin the battle.
We'd have SWAT teams after us and be sent to psychiatrists today...
And I'll bet that the crazies that shoot things up for real today didn't do this kind of thing when they were kids to learn the difference between play and reality.
Not a real member - just an ordinary guy who appreciates being able to hang around and say something once in awhile.
Happily Trapped In the Past (Thanks, Joe)
Not only a less than minimally educated person, but stupid and out of touch as well.
My Lionel train set. It was my fathers set that he had as a child., circa 1937.
This Christmas we bought our 7 year old his own Lionel set, and sent mine back to Lionel for a tune up. Lionel said they'll have mine all tuned up and running, and it'll run on the current track set up.
I got a Joe Palooka punching bag one year and dad and some of his friends tore it up during a little light drinking episode. Tops and a yo-yo. We used to make a pistol using a short length of 1/2 or 3/8" pipe with a cap on one end and a small hole drilled in it strapped to a piece of 1x4 shaped like a pistol. A couple of Black Cat firecrackers with the fuses twisted and stuck through the hole would send a rock with some authority in the direction of any of the neighborhood cats if it had good packing. Spent most of my time terrorizing the local fauna with my BB gun or fishing.
The Johnny Seven OMA was one of my favorites. There was a Helmet Walkie Talkie that went with it. I had that too.
Earlier, I had the Remco Bazooka and the Remco Mortar.
Mattel had a Tommy Gun and a Shot-n-Shell Lever gun and a cap boobytrap. I loved all of them. The latter was the only toy I managed to get banned by popular acclaim by my friends. We'd all be playing Army in between the houses and I'd set the time-pencil option and then duck around the corner. The boobytrap would go off and scare the piss out of my friends. My Dad got mad at me for setting tripwires around the house and tore it to shreds one day. He felt guilty and bought me another one.
Did y'all have the Mattel M16? John Wayne carried one in the Green Berets.
I also had the Wild Wild West belt pistol, and the Secret Agent Zero 7 radio gun and camera gun.
