I've still got a few of the plastic models I put together as a kid, but that stuff isn't made to last for more than a few years. And, decades ago, when I priced a Buck Rogers Ray Gun to replace the one my mother decided I was too old for, it was $300.
Instead of throwing it away, she should have stored it carefully to pay for my college fund!
2
"Packaging counts."
You bought a piece of plastic inside a box printed with the trademarked logos and copyrighted imagery of a multi-billion-dollar franchise. What did you think you were paying for?
2
Well, it seems to me that the best toys are the ones that build with a child's imagination.
My daughter wanted to make things, so I got a few 2x4s, took them down the basement, and made her a set of blocks. We built roads and houses. We made wood roofs and cardboard roofs. We made . . ..
And, at bedtime, we discussed how things are made. Lipstick, and medicine, toys and coins. Why a nickel is larger than a penny.
Ideas are the real stuff of which things are made.
9
Yep, when I was a kid (50 years ago), blocks were the go-to toy for my brother and me. That, and refrigerator boxes.
3
Homage to EB White in this short essay.
2
I come from the era of Cabbage Patch Kids and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Don't try to tell me toys being expensive, pointless and over-commercialised is a uniquely modern phenomenon!
There are still good toys, fun toys and highly desirable toys (and an awful lot of really good boardgames) available. There's also the wonderful electronic toys that were mostly too late for me, though I begged for the little Simon set for Christmas one year and we played with it endlessly. Easy to do the "everything was better in my day" but I honestly don't think it was.
1
I had a Harry Potter wand when I was a kid many many decades ago.
It was a stick.
6
34.95 for Kit's American Girl shoes and you can't even see them. Metaphor for our times. Peacetime and playtime. How much to replace Trump when he breaks? Will they give us another one for free with a shrug?
5
It's all junk. My parents toy of preference for my brother and I was getting up in the summer, pointing at the door and telling us, don't get into trouble, but make sure you come home on time for dinner. Greatest toy ever.
13
Well thought out article about commercialism. But to really give your child the most long lasting and gratifying childhood experience, join Boy Scouts or Girl Scouts or 4-H and become a leader. The best gift for your child is the gift of your time and attention.
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Any toy that doesn't have a kid staring slack jawed at a screen. The best ones stir the imagination.
14
Our oceans are filling with plastic garbage, a good portion of that being packaging and toys.
The seafood you eat is likely contaminated with plastics. Avada Kedavra!
18
I’m 64 and I have a magic 8 ball which I consult weekly and a dozen plastic green army men which I set up and shoot down with rubber bands. I’ve got my top bar from my first two wheeler! My cobalt blue cyclone from Sears. It’s got the bell installed into it. Last but not least, I have my custom bottle cap from a Yoo-Hoo bottle! Filled with wax, it was used to play Skully. I don’t have my old Lionel train set. We gave it to one of our cousins who had just come to the States from the old country. I’d better stop here.
25
I've still got my Lionel trains; got the set from my brother several years ago. After reading that Times article about Trainworld last week, went there a few days ago and blew $65 on two new freight cars!
Plastic trash and hype, and gotta-have. Our values and now our kids.
5
Oh lighten up! For the kids that read the books it's a link to the stories. My kids all loved the books, but we lived overseas and were, thankfully, out of the loop when it came to visiting all these places. However, the two oldest dressed the youngest one up as Harry Potter for Halloween one year, complete with scar on the forehead. Everyone knew who he was!
16
It's all about personal and connected symbolic value. Varies a lot. Last year's Beanie Baby for $6.00 is now a collectible for $1000 ( or is the reverse?). What about the last Matchbox car I still have from childhood? A $2.00 ambulance. But my mother bought it for me and died the next year. It's priceless to me because it is imbued with memories. What is the value of anything? What someone will pay for it.
18
Indeed, Robert! The hallmarks of "classic" toys, according to Dr. Toy, include simplicity of use and the user's ability to have a creative/imaginative influence on the toy. And, of course, the sentimentality.
Plug for me, StafffordDolls.com, who do this beautifully, the antithesis to every tech toy. I have a patent on changing a doll's hair with anything you can imagine; at its simplest, yarn hair you can style and cut and easily replace.
Your comment buoyed me in my lonely quest, thank you!
2
You're so right Robert! One boy liked little cars, the other little airplanes. Their favorite was a rootbeer truck and a b-29 bomber. They were presents from my Dad the year he died. Are they worth anything? Ask the boys, who are now young men, one in the Army on his way to Korea.
5