This Quiz is Child's Play!... UK Toys and Games

Answer: Dolls

The development of celluloid, a compound of nitrocellulose and camphor, is generally considered to be the point at which the plastics industry came into being. Originally named Parkesine, this material rapidly found its way into many children's toys as it was cheap to produce and easy to mould into complex shapes. Until this point, many dolls heads had been made using china, bisque or papier mâché, all delicate materials subject to breakage if played with too roughly.

Although celluloid appeared to be a new dream material for the manufacturers, unfortunately it was also highly flammable! Representations were made to ban the use of celluloid in children's toys as early as 1949 by the Association of British Fire Services and 1961 the British Standards Institute restricted the use of the material in toys. Things changed again in 1966 when celluloid and toxic lead paints were banned completely, forcing toy manufacturers from that date onwards to use safer plastics and lead free paints that were then becoming more widely available.

Answer: Clackers

Click, clack, click, clack, clackclackclack! After some practice, you could get really good at playing with clackers and could perform all manner of tricks with them. This was great fun right up until the moment that you became over-enthusiastic and caused the two hard plastic balls to smash together so fast that they shattered showering you, and any of your friends close by, with a multitude of fast moving pieces of coloured shrapnel! I can clearly recall a young girl in my class at school going off to hospital after morning playtime to have pieces of clacker removed from her face. Surprisingly, clackers were not banned fully until 1985; more than a decade after the craze had finally subsided... I never realised that. Maybe it was just me being all grown up?

Answer: British Bulldog

Bulldog, or British Bulldog, was a fabulous fun game involving lots of running around, a bit of wrestling, a bit of weightlifting and, on occasion, a few punches being thrown! In the version of British Bulldog played at my school in the 1960s, as many boys as could be mustered (it was rarely played by the girls) would line up at one end of the playground facing an individual. On the word 'Go!' everyone would rush forward and try to avoid being tagged by the single player before reaching the other side of the playground. Anyone tagged would then join the single player in the centre and the process would then start again. Once the team in the centre had reached four individuals they then had to catch and lift the player clear of the ground to get them into their team. Once numbers between teams became more even, that was when the trouble would start, the occasional punch or kick would go in and the teachers on duty would have to step in an put an end to it...

Aye, they were great days!

Answer: Spirograph

Spirograph first hit the shops in 1965 and was something of a sensation at the time. I received my first Spirograph set for Christmas in 1966 and was in deep trouble by Boxing Day the same year because of it. The toy basically comprised of a number of clear toothed plastic rings and toothed plastic discs of varying size each pierced by a series of holes at different points.

The idea was that you fixed a sheet of paper to the large cardboard sheet and in turn fixed a clear ring to both using the long pins provided. Taking a smaller disc you inserted a pen or pencil through any one of the holes and proceeded to roll the disc around the inside (difficult) or the outside (impossible) of the ring thus drawing geometric shapes and patterns. Provided your pen didn't spring a leak and you actually managed to complete the twenty or thirty rotations required without your small disc slipping, you could produce some quite interesting smudge free patterns (rare!).

The reason I was in trouble? My kid sisters had used and ruined my cardboard sheet in one of their games and so I had pinned my paper directly to the top surface of my grandmother's best antique dining table... Ouch! Ah yes, the discs and rings were also advertised as being shatterproof...

This was a lie as well.

Answer: Conkers

Who hasn't played conkers at some time in their life? If not, you don't know what you've missed. The great thing about conkers was that it involved a bit of naughtiness, a bit of danger, the appliance of science and hours and hours of great fun! The naughtiness invariably involved trespassing on someone else property in order to collect your conkers... At this juncture I should add that 'conkers' are the shiny brown fruit of the Horse Chestnut tree. The dangerous bit was getting caught which would invariably mean being dragged home by the land/tree owner and being punished by mum or dad; my dad always said that I was not being punished for the act of trespassing but for the stupidity of being caught. To prepare your conkers for competition involved the appliance of (pseudo)science. They were baked, soaked in vinegar and all manner of fluids, some pleasant others not so, before being pierced and attached to pieces of string knotted at the bottom. The aim was to hit your opponent's conker with yours and hopefully smash his to pieces. Great fun until your own over-excitement led to your conker flying around in a wide arc and connecting with your own knuckles! We were bred a bit tougher back then...

This great, fun game was reported in the British press as being dangerous and once the health and safety fanatics latched onto it, it seemed that the game was doomed... Nah!

Answer: Magnetic Fishing Game

I remember this game with some fondness as a nipper, a fondness which led to me being a keen fisherman my entire life. The magnetic game was great fun but for those that needed more of a challenge it could be purchased with little wooden fish that had small rings screwed into their noses.

This required a higher level of hand and eye co-ordination than the magnetic version; anyone can blindly thrash away with their rod in the hope of attracting a fish! Invariably, you'd end up losing interest in the game, especially when you'd lost your fish as kids tend to do over time.

Answer: Tiny Tears

The groundbreaking feature of 'Tiny Tears' was that she could actually cry just like a real baby could, or would, especially since it was necessary to give the dolls abdomen a good hard squeeze to force the water from its reservoir out through her tear ducts! The British version of this doll was introduced in 1965 by the Palitoy Company and remained in production until 1968 when the company was bought out by the American Mills Company; during the intervening years this little doll won the Toy of the Year award on three occasions. Later versions of Tiny Tears also had the ability to wet her nappy again this was quite lifelike as this also required a good, hard push down on her abdomen. Considering the cruelty that had to be inflicted on this poor little doll to get her to perform her functions this doll is, surprisingly, still on sale in the 21st century.

As a youngster I always enjoyed propping up my sisters Tiny Tears against the lounge wall to shoot at her with my 'Britain's 18" heavy howitzer' model... Just a few years later the toy gun would be replaced with a BSA air rifle! Poor Tiny Tears...

Answer: Johnny Seven

All things considered, I think that this was the best toy I ever had. Christmas 1967 and my mum had saved up all year to get this for me; after returning to school after the holiday, my Johnny Seven was the envy of my classmates. This toy was huge and took its name from the fact that this one gun could be broken down to perform seven different functions.

The pistol grip could be detached and be used as a cap-firing pistol, it had a spring loaded grenade launcher on top, could fire weighted red plastic grenades and bunker busting missiles, made a noise like a real machine gun and even had a twelve shot reloadable magazine that contained plastic bullets! The Johhny Seven (O.M.A) was manufactured by Topper Toys, a subsidiary of the New Jersey based company, Deluxe Reading who also manufactured a range of separately available replacement components should you lose any of the originals. Now, how many companies will do that these days?

Answer: Tonka

These must have been some of the biggest, toughest toys ever made; they were so massive that you could almost ride along on them. I never owned a Tonka Toy as I wasn't that interested in vehicles back then, at least not trucks and cars... Tanks, yes - dumper trucks, not really.

The regular Tonka trucks were 1:18 scale which in some cases made them seem as large as your Dad's car. During the 1970s there were a number of impressive television adverts that demonstrated just how tough these toys were. Two that spring to mind are the toy truck being used to support the flat front wheel of a Volkswagen Beetle enabling the car to be driven and the second with a truck being stood upon by a fully grown Asian elephant with no effect whatsoever on the toy. Sadly Tonka toys are now manufactured in the Far East and predominately from plastic...

Although still tough by modern standards, it is unlikely that modern Tonka's will be the inheritance toys that they once were.

Answer: Sindy

First released in September 1963 by Pedigree Toys Limited, the ten and three quarter inch tall Sindy doll was to become Britain's biggest selling fashion doll. On her release, Sindy was a fortunate young lady being provided with a wardrobe packed full with all the latest 1960s fashions; clothes being worn by the supermodels of the day such as Twiggy and Jean Shrimpton.

These included a range of themed dolls and outfits which included the charmingly named 'Dream Date', Country Walk', 'Pony Girl' and 'Undie-World'.

In the 1970s and 1980s Sindy had herself a lovely boyfriend called Paul; girlfriends called Vicki, Mitzi, Poppet and Betsy and she had even brought herself a scooter! During her fifty year life as fashions and lifestyles have come and gone, Sindy has been there to reflect them and has become something of a record of styles and attitudes over the last five decades and unlike the unrealistic and overtly glamorous Barbie doll, the British Sindy was more realistic... Can you ever imagine Barbie coming with her own iron, ironing board, washing line and clothes pegs? Sindy did!