Toy research, early 60's
April 19, 2020 12:25 PM   Subscribe

I have a couple of grainy images of cool toys. How can I find out more about them?

I recently sent some slide archives out to get scanned. While looking through them I found a couple of poor quality shots of toys my brother and I had as kids. When I do google searches I don't come up with anything like these items.

Is there a forum or site where I can find out more about them? Here are a couple of images. Unfortunately really poor quality.

Toy 1 is a kind of moon rocket, bulbous in shape that had a crane that came out of it. Toy 2 is a kind of robot that had wheels and could make a squawking noise as it rolled along.

Nothing vitally important here, just idle curiosity about these things.
posted by diode to Sports, Hobbies, & Recreation (9 answers total) 1 user marked this as a favorite
 
Toy 1 I believe was called the "Astro Base", and I think it was circa 1960-62?

See wiki:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Astrobase
posted by AsYouKnow Bob at 12:51 PM on April 19, 2020


Astrobase on YouTube
posted by AsYouKnow Bob at 1:00 PM on April 19, 2020


Could the robot toy be the Mr. Machine Toy Robot?
posted by tipsyBumblebee at 1:06 PM on April 19, 2020


Yes, toy 2 is a Mr Machine. I'd recognise that cheeky nose and top hat anywhere. The Mr didn't really make a squawking noise, more like a geared noise as his wind-up wound down.
posted by Thella at 2:23 PM on April 19, 2020


https://www.reddit.com/r/whatisthisthing/

Is also really good at identifying things
posted by Jacen at 3:16 PM on April 19, 2020


Response by poster: That is so awesome. The Astrobase is quite a gizmo.

Long as we're at this, I've put a third toy image up there, a console kind of shooter gizmo. Thanks for the information and links.
posted by diode at 3:30 PM on April 19, 2020


From Timewarp toys, its a Fighter Jet by Ideal Toys. You may need to scroll down a bit to see it.
posted by tipsyBumblebee at 3:40 PM on April 19, 2020


Here's an ebay link.
posted by tipsyBumblebee at 3:43 PM on April 19, 2020


There is a subreddit called, I believe, what is this toy or ID this toy.
posted by KleenexMakesaVeryGoodHat at 7:10 PM on April 19, 2020


« Older Windows, why don't you like Bluetooth Audio?   |   Siblings 2 years apart - what are we in for? Newer »
This thread is closed to new comments.