Do you remember your childhood toys being chucked??
I don't. I imagine that it must have been a gradual process by my parents and not one huge binning. Presumably my toys were chucked as and when they thought I'd grown out of them, maybe every couple of years.
A large throwing-out may have taken place when we moved house in 1978 but I really don't recall anything like that. Besides, I was 17 by then and about to get my own flat. I had a few things with me there like the Aurora Witch built-up for example.
No. I think all my Project SWORD, SpaceX, Outer Space Men, Action Men, Little Big Men, Tommy Gun, JR21 toys and all the other stuff I had as a kid was thrown in the bin now and then. Maybe it happened with my consent. God, I hope not!
If only I could go back and stop it all being trashed. If only I could go back full stop for that matter!
Do you have any memories of your toys going readers?
The only toys I still have from my childhood survived because my Mum chose to keep them,I don't know why she picked them but I prize them greatly now. I don't remember my toys going but I do know that I was missing them by my late teens and early twenties.
ReplyDeleteIt is an invisible process Kevin, the slow dissapearance of those toys. I'm glad your Mum managed to keep some for you.
DeleteMy mother grew up with relatives, not her divorced parents, and had no toys of her own, just ones shared with cousins.
ReplyDeleteI was always under pressure to give away toys and books to 'children that had no toys'. As a result Dinky Toys and toy soldiers left at different times for other homes.
When it came to my Hornby Dublo electric train that my father and I played with and I left for the US to get married, I made it clear to my mother that if she ever gave the train away I would never speak to her again.
24 years later when my parents downsized homes I took the trainset to the US where 20 years later I still play with it.
Amdazing Terran. That train layout has not only travelled through time, its moved continents! How did you get it over?
DeleteExcess bagage on several trips. With security at Heathrow Airport it was always fun to watch them x-ray my over weight luggage. It looked like a travelling salesmans samples!
DeleteHi again Paul, like you, I'd very much like to go back and do the 60's decade over and over like Groundhog Day, or perhaps Groundhog Decade!!! - Most of my beloved toys essentially got loved and played with literally to bits.
ReplyDeleteAs I got older, I recycled the surviving bits into my own kit-bashed models, and eventually they ended up in the bin. I still have my original Thunderbirds 1, 2 & 3 although they are in a pretty damaged/repaired state, but sadly Zero-X or Thunderbird 5 didn't survive or indeed the Johnny Astro. Fortunately, I did manage to keep most of my diecasts, although few could be displayed.
Of course, the famous trashing took place on November 5th 1970, when pretty much my whole back collection of comics [including TV21, TV Comic and Buster & Giggle] were put on the Guy Falk’s Night bonfire. To be fair, they were cluttering up our downstairs airing cupboard and we didn't have much space in my Grandmother’s home. Clearly, that was a mistake... However, with hindsight we can all be smug and smart. I think the truth is; these decisions are made given the circumstances and information at the time, and with the best of intentions. Just as well we made more space in the cupboard, because it soon got filled up the Countdown, TV Action, Look & Learn and Lookin.
Now, thanks to the internet, and wonderful Blogs like this, we've all been put in touch with people and resources where we can recover many of those iconic artefacts. I've even been able to find books which I didn't know even existed. You see, years ago, I used to have a reoccurring dream about a Thunderbirds Annual which preceded the original 1967 publication. For many years I thought it was just one of those tricks our minds play on us when we sleep. However, thanks to this blog, and the hyperlinks from it, I discovered that there was such a book! My brother managed to obtain a copy for me as a birthday present a couple of years ago.
And of course, I'm a lot more mindful of how and where I store stuff, and precisely what gets trashed.
A bonfire of TV21's. Now thats a phrase you don't often hear. A powerful symbol of growing up for sure. I'm glad you've been reunited with them and many more sixties treasures Bill.
DeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteMy mother was a kindergarten teacher. I still have nightmare today thinking at all my childhood toys she gave away at her school, sigh! :-D
ReplyDeleteOh no, Space Toyer I do sympathise. Those pesky kindergarten kids! We can get attached to our toys!
DeleteWhen I was about 15 I happily gave away most of my toys to the kids of one of my dad's visiting work colleagues. It was a time when I felt the adventure of adult life calling. I wanted to breakway from childhood and grow up, Woodsy. Having boarded the bus for Grownupsville, I look through the window and thoroughly accept the ride wasn't really for me. I'd like to go back to where I started and get a refund! By way of an apologetic appeasement to the inner child who tavelled with me, I still make a point of getting vintage replacements of some of the original childhood toys that I wrongly thought I'd outgrown :)
ReplyDeleteAnd you volunteered your toys Tony! Its gets worse. Teachers. Colleagues. Keeping hold of those treasures was not easy in a world of kindness and adolescence! Just gimme mi toys back! Yep, a sabbatical back to then would be something but not just one day like in AI. That would be too sad.
DeleteMy parents always asked before trashing anything. The reasonable argument - it's broken, it goes in the bin was used. However, the loft is insulated by a lot of stuff from my childhood. I did sell some, as I got older, to buy records and beer - but I can live with that.
ReplyDeleteRecords and beer! A fine combination Brian and the true symbols of growing up!
Delete