1970s toys Archives - Retro Reminiscing Video and Pictures

Flatsy Dolls: They Were Flat and That Was That!

Here’s one that really could only have come out of the late 1960s — Flatsy, the doll whose big selling point was that she was…flat!

But there was actually more thought put into these than I remembered. The dolls were made of soft vinyl with wire inside so you could bend and pose them, and some came mounted in decorative frames that could actually be hung on the wall. You could even wear some of the dolls on your clothes.

I found something interesting in a 1968 issue of Broadcasting magazine: Ideal was already planning network and major-market advertising for its new Flatsys beginning February 1, 1969. The line lasted until 1973 and grew well beyond the dolls in this commercial, with Fashion Flatsys, mini versions, Flatsyville, Candy Mountain and different playsets.

Even the company behind them has a great story. Ideal traced its beginnings to Morris and Rose Michtom, the couple associated with creating the original American Teddy bear after Theodore Roosevelt’s famous 1902 hunting incident.

And somehow that little jingle did its job — “Flatsys, Flatsys, they’re flat and that’s that” is still being remembered more than 50 years later.

Did you actually have a Flatsy, or is it the commercial and jingle you remember most?

Don’t Blow Your Top

Don’t Blow Your Top came out in 1972, and this is one of those wonderfully simple toy ideas that probably didn’t need much explaining to a kid. You spun the spinner, added the required number of marbles to the character’s hat, and watched the pressure build on a real balloon hidden underneath. Eventually — POP! — somebody literally blew his top

The game came from Marvin Glass & Associates, the legendary Chicago toy-design company connected with Mouse Trap, Operation, Rock ’Em Sock ’Em Robots, Lite-Brite and eventually Simon. They created and developed toy ideas, then licensed them to companies like Schaper to manufacture and sell

Schaper itself had quite a history. The company was founded by Minneapolis mailman Herb Schaper, whose homemade Cootie game became such a huge success that Schaper eventually promoted itself as “The Cootie Company,” just as we hear at the end of this commercial. The company also gave us familiar games like Ants in the Pants and Don’t Break the Ice

And I have to give them credit for the name. “Don’t blow your top” was already a familiar expression for losing your temper, so turning that into a game where the poor fellow actually blows his top was pretty clever

The game apparently had some staying power too, with advertising for it continuing several years after its 1972 introduction

Did anyone have Don’t Blow Your Top — and was waiting for that balloon to pop more fun than actually winning?

Carry-All Action Playsets

With four other brothers to keep busy, Mom and Dad scored big with all of us when they brought home the Carry-All Action Playsets by Marx. These kept us entertained, and probably more importantly, quiet for hours.

You had to be careful with the pivot joints and mounting points, but other than that, these playsets could take a lot of abuse. I had Fort Apache, and one of my younger brothers had the Fighting Knights set.

Surprisingly, my Marine sergeant dad did not get us the Army Men set, but it did not matter much. No matter which one you had, these Carry-All playsets brought hours and hours of fun.

Small Shots: Mattel’s Hot Wheels Dolls

Small Shots was one of those 1971 toy ideas that sounds strange now, but made sense once you see it. Mattel basically took the Hot Wheels idea and put little dolls on skates, wagons, carts, and other rolling stands that could run on Hot Wheels-style track.

The commercial is pure early ’70s toy advertising. Everything moves fast, the kids act amazed, and the announcer makes it sound like this was the next big thing. It was not just a doll, and it was not just a car. It was Mattel trying to mix both worlds together.

That was probably the real idea. Hot Wheels was huge with boys, while dolls were usually marketed to girls. Small Shots tried to pull both sides together — little fashion-style figures that could race, roll, and crash down a track. It was a clever idea, even if it also feels a little odd today.

Another interesting note: one of the early Small Shots commercials is listed among Jodie Foster’s early TV commercial work. She was still a child actor at the time, years before most people knew her name.

Small Shots did not last very long, but it is a great example of how toy companies in the 1970s were willing to try almost anything. Dolls on Hot Wheels track? Why not. In that era, if it rolled, launched, flipped, or crashed, somebody was going to put it in a commercial.

Big Jim’s Rescue Rig: Backyard Adventure in a Box

This is the Big Jim a lot of kids remember: not just the action figure, but Big Jim’s Rescue Rig from Mattel. The 1973 commercial had everything a kid needed for instant backyard drama — a rock slide, danger, a crane, a ladder, and Big Jim rushing in to save the day.

The Rescue Rig was basically a rolling rescue headquarters, with enough parts and gadgets to turn a pile of dirt or rocks into a full emergency scene. It was the kind of 1970s toy that did not need batteries, screens, or sound effects. You supplied all of that yourself.

For kids who had it, this was more than a truck. It was the whole adventure.

“Shoop Shoop Hula Hoop”

I remember my mom calling it the “Shoop Shoop Hula Hoop,” and for years I wondered where that came from. Now I know she wasn’t just making up a funny name — that was actually part of Wham-O’s marketing.

The original Hula Hoop craze took off in 1958, but like most fads, it cooled down. Wham-O later tried to bring it back by adding a new twist: sound. They put small ball bearings inside the hollow plastic hoop so that when you spun it around your waist, it made a swishing, “shoop shoop” kind of noise. TIME described the 1967 version as the New Shoop Shoop Hula Hoop, with bright colors and ball bearings inside to give it that “whirry” sound.

That explains why the name stuck with so many parents. It wasn’t just a hula hoop anymore — it was the one that made noise. Toy collectors and nostalgia sites still point to the Shoop Shoop version as Wham-O’s attempt to freshen up the craze, and later versions from the 1970s kept the name alive.

It’s funny how those advertising names became part of everyday family language. A kid might have just called it a hula hoop, but Mom remembered the commercial name: Shoop Shoop Hula Hoop. And once you hear that, you can almost hear the sound of it spinning again.

Slinky

The Slinky was just a coil of metal, but once you put it at the top of the stairs, it became magic. It could walk, stretch, flop, twist, and occasionally tangle itself into something no child on earth could ever fully fix.

Invented by accident in the 1940s, the Slinky became one of those toys almost every kid knew. You did not need batteries, a screen, or instructions. You just needed stairs, patience, and maybe a little luck.

And who can forget the jingle? “It’s Slinky, it’s Slinky…” Once that got in your head, it stayed there.

Did you have a Slinky? And did yours actually make it all the way down the stairs?

Did you have Shark Pack?

I felt that changing the discs to make it do different maneuvers meant you might as well have pushed it by hand. Was I wrong?

Shark Pack was a 1970s toy boat line from Ideal, and the big feature was its interchangeable program discs. Instead of radio control, you put in a disc, set the boat loose, and it would follow a preset pattern, turning or circling depending on which disc you used.

For the time, that was a pretty clever idea. It gave kids a way to “program” the boat before home computers and remote-control toys became common. The commercial made it look exciting, with the boats cutting through the water and changing direction on command.

Like a lot of toys from that era, the real fun probably depended on where you used it and what you expected from it. If you had a pool, pond, or enough room to let it run, Shark Pack may have been a lot of fun. If you were expecting total control, the disc-changing part may have felt a little less magical.

That’s why I’m curious. Did Shark Pack really live up to the ad, or was it one of those toys that looked better on TV?

Whenever I saw the Barbie Cut ’n Curl commercial as a kid, I always wondered if it really worked as smoothly as it looked on TV.

The idea was great: give Barbie a haircut, style her hair, curl it, and somehow keep the fun going without ruining the doll forever. Of course, commercials always made these toys look effortless. At home, I’m guessing it depended on patience, steady hands, and whether Barbie’s hair ended up looking salon-ready or like she had just lost a fight with a brush.

But here’s what I really want to know: Did you have Barbie Cut ’n Curl? Did it actually work the way the commercial showed?

And even better, did any of you start by cutting and styling Barbie’s hair and later end up becoming a hair stylist, barber, or working in cosmetology? Sometimes those childhood toys really did point us toward what we’d do later in life.

Probably no toy gave me more joy than Hot Wheels.

It was great the first day you got the track, but the fun didn’t stop there. A new car didn’t cost all that much, even for a kid, and suddenly the whole race changed. One new car meant new matchups, new winners, new arguments, and another reason to reset the track and try again.

Hot Wheels were introduced by Mattel in 1968, created to compete with Matchbox, but they had a completely different attitude. Matchbox cars looked more like regular cars you’d see on the road. Hot Wheels looked like something a kid dreamed up: wild colors, big wheels, racing stripes, spoilers, flames, and hot rod styling. The first line is remembered as the “Original 16” or “Sweet 16.”

And they were fast. That was the magic. Mattel built them with low-friction wheels and axles, wider hard-plastic tires, and a suspension design that helped them fly down those orange plastic tracks smoother than other little cars of the time. The Strong National Museum of Play notes that Mattel engineers wanted them to “zoom,” using thick plastic mag wheels, minimal-friction axles, and torsion-bar suspension.

Then came the tracks. If you got a new setup, like the one with the Super Charger, it worked with the track you already had. That was the genius of it. You didn’t have to start over. You just added on. A curve here, a loop there, a launcher, a jump, and suddenly your living room floor became Daytona, Indy, and a demolition derby all at once.

Looking back, Hot Wheels were a great value because every piece made the whole thing better. One car could change the race. One track set could change the whole afternoon. And for a kid, that little orange track and one fast car were enough to make the whole room feel like a speedway.