Born in ‘75. As a child, I enjoyed playing with a Mickey Mouse Talking Phone, and later on the Atari 2600 and Speak & Spell, but what I really wanted was to win a Donkey Kong arcade machine from a cereal contest. Hi-Tech toys at any price were never complicated to use back in the day compared to the world of 2024 where you (unintentionally) call out “Siri” by mistake. Thanks! 😊

The 1970s will forever be legendary

@katiemoyer8679

26 күн бұрын

🤩 I found that I was having the time of my life 🌟👏👌

@thelittlegreenball6813

25 күн бұрын

Absolutely agree!!

@RJDA.Dakota

25 күн бұрын

The mid 1970s were the beginning of very vastly different technologies, all miniaturized. We’ve come a very long way, indeed, in a very short time.

@starmnsixty1209

25 күн бұрын

You said it, pal ✔️✔️✔️

@jonfreeman9682

22 күн бұрын

It was the beginning of the semiconductor era. Digital watches, calculator, the first Apple computer all started in the hippy era of free love. 😘

I liked Electronic Battleship when it came out. No more dealing with your opponent lying about you missing your shots.

@Name-ps9fx

25 күн бұрын

You too?! Jeez that was so aggravating!!

@karenroot450

25 күн бұрын

Geez I remember my brothers and I playing the old game and moving their damn ships around!

@tonycollazorappo

24 күн бұрын

I enjoyed the older version 👍🏻

@MelvisVelour

24 күн бұрын

And you knew EXACTLY who was going to do that....

@f34dave

16 күн бұрын

I was a full on Battleship cheater.

I remember those early digital watches. Like most "advances" in technology, everybody seemed to want them. To this day, I still wear an ANALOG watch. Many young people now struggle to tell time looking at a device with minute and hour hands. These same folks also can't handwrite their own name legibly. Technology is helpful. But everyone should be able to function without a smart phone for every task!

@Ann-st8et

26 күн бұрын

I agree 100%. My two watches are analog. None of my grandchildren can read or write cursive! They could probably dismantle and re-assemble a computer, and give me lessons on how to use all the features on my cell phone. I'm the only one left in my very large family to still have a landline!

@rf159a

25 күн бұрын

Me too. I don't like digital watches!! I remember one job I was on that all the clocks in the classrooms had to be removed and replaced with digital ones because the kids did not how to tell time with the analog clocks!!

@Name-ps9fx

25 күн бұрын

I prefer the analog watch...and yes, a WATCH. (Even my cell phone uses an analogue clock on the home page!)

@analogidc1394

25 күн бұрын

@@rf159a The worst part was rather than teaching them how to tell time with an analog clock, the school opted to keep them ignorant and not teach.

@chrissakal532

25 күн бұрын

I remember when I was in the second grade and we were learning to tell time that our teacher told the class that she hoped she never saw us wearing digital watches. Now, over 30 years later, I like wearing watches and they're not digital.

When 2024 gets too much for me I go down Recollection Road and just window shop to ease my mind.

@JackTorrance333

26 күн бұрын

Member berries

@tinahodge6819

26 күн бұрын

Yes! I agree, wish I could go back in time😊

@tonycollazorappo

24 күн бұрын

You and me, buddy. Back to the days of simplicity 👍🏻

@festeradams3972

20 күн бұрын

Given what this country has become or can become soon, I re-visit that road about once a day...

@jacknjill3000

20 күн бұрын

Me too and listen to older music and buy vintage stuff off eBay to get my fix.

Bitter sweet memories in that fine days and people are no longer here. Thank you for the nice look back none the less.

The Mattel football game was a big hit with the boys in junior high. A few of them found out that cutting a specific connection on the inside allowed the game to play silently, so you'd see them hiding it under their desks in class.

@jonfreeman9682

22 күн бұрын

What Mattel 🏈 game. Was it a computer game or a handheld. I think the first computer game was in the 80s.

@Modellbaustammtisch

21 күн бұрын

​​@@jonfreeman9682 The Mattel Handheld @07:00 I had the version with the submarine, a friend of mine had the "Battle Star Galactica" game, way cool😊👍🏻

@nofaves

15 күн бұрын

@@jonfreeman9682 It was a handheld one, just like the one in the video. The first gen came out without a toggle for sound, so when you played it, it beeped.

Born in 61... I do remember most of these things. Thanks for the vid; it brought back memories of a better time.

@tonycollazorappo

24 күн бұрын

I was born in 1961, but remember these things. Some were great and some were not.

The C.B. radio was the 1970s #1 gadget that everyone wanted to have. To have that huge antenna on your car's trunk was a status symbol. The bigger the antenna the more impressive you looked. Everyone wanted to be Smokey and the Bandit.

@nelliemayo9886

25 күн бұрын

Oh yes! I remember that now!

@fritz1990

23 күн бұрын

Yep, and I still run a CB in my car. And I have two pocket fisherman sets.

@readytogo6569

22 күн бұрын

I graduated in 1980. The C.B. Radio was a huge part of my H.S. years. Thanks to Smokey, Snowman, and The Rubberduck❣️

@fritz1990

22 күн бұрын

@@readytogo6569 wish I could give you a bunch of likes.

@cailean59

21 күн бұрын

Friends and I had C.B. radios mounted to our bikes with a lead acid battery on the luggage rack. At the time you needed a license which of course as school kids we never had. Got exciting when we heard the Government Radio Inspector was coming to town. Was a great way to keep in touch.

Born in 67. I had all that stuff!!! So cool to see it again!

@joeheid2776

25 күн бұрын

I'm a 67 baby too!!! I too had most of this stuff.

@jamesdefrancesco7765

25 күн бұрын

Ditto. How qbout the Mattel Intellivision and head to head football?

@tonycollazorappo

24 күн бұрын

Right!? I know, lol. I was born in 1961.

I can’t believe I was excited about having a Calculator as a kid.

In 1979 I was studying for my FAA certification as an A&P (Airframe and Powerplant) license. The FAA requires you to have a TI-30 or equivalent calculator because when people are at 30,000 ft. they don't want you guessing. Service Merchandise had a TI-30 for $75 and I got one. Still have it and it works just fine.

Good memories. Crazy how expensive stuff was back then.

@spang9782

23 күн бұрын

I remember my first calculator in the 70's. I think it was a Sharp or Canon? It did the 4 basic functions plus percentage and square root only. It was about 4" x 6" and 3/4" thick, and took 4 AA batteries to power with an AC adapter included. Cost around $100!! That was BIG money back in the day!

@jonfreeman9682

22 күн бұрын

Yeah back then an HP scientific calculator was selling for I think $150 which is about $500 in today's dollars. Price started coming down once Texas instruments then Casio and Sharp got into the game then a bunch of no name brand calculators came out which drove price down so cheap every kid could have one.

@JudeTavonFenwick

20 күн бұрын

It is? Where I’m from, things were much more affordable in the 1970’s

@spang9782

20 күн бұрын

@@JudeTavonFenwick Yup, that's true of most everything EXCEPT technology. I purchased our first flat screen TV from COSTCO a few years ago; a 40" TV for $1000. Today, you can get the same size for $300 or less on sale.

Ah, the 8-track! My grandparents had one in the 80s! 😂

@Mick_Ts_Chick

19 күн бұрын

They were nice because it wasn't convenient to have a record player in the car, lol. I sure was glad when cassette tapes came on the scene though! I hated the way 8 tracks split songs in two. So annoying! 😅

@johnrodriguez6676

10 күн бұрын

Anybody remember the removable 8 track player for the car? I had the pocket fishermen but never caught a fish😕

The Kodak 110 camera was an amazing camera that was easy to use for kids, also don’t forget about the Kodak instant cameras that were like Polaroids, the pictures came out instantly which didn’t need to be developed! The Mattel handheld electronic game was much the predecessor to the Nintendo Game and Watch. You also forgot to mention RadioShack’s TRS 80 computers in the 1970s which was much like the Commodore PET!

My favorite 70's portable game console was Merlin. I thought the games, buttons, lights, and sounds were just magical. I literally wore it out!

I loved growing up in the 1970's😃When things were made here in The United States of America and NOT from China😁Great times back then for sure😊Thank you Recollection Road for ALL you do🙏🏻Have a great weekendROCK ON!!!!!!!🤘🏻🤙🏻✌🏻

@Name-ps9fx

25 күн бұрын

I remember a lot of "made in Japan" toys, mainly Hot Wheels type cars...the ones without a bottom, and thin black tires. They'd eventually fill up with dirt because there was no chassis underneath!

@jamesdefrancesco7765

25 күн бұрын

"Made in Tawain" meant it was a piece of crap product but it was cheap.

@Mick_Ts_Chick

19 күн бұрын

​@@Name-ps9fxMy best friend's mom called it "Japanese junk." 😂 Funny how later on the better stuff was made in Japan, and the stuff from China was the junk.

Don't forget portable cassette players, they allowed you to take your music anywhere.🎶

@tonycollazorappo

24 күн бұрын

Every time an Elvis movie was on I would tape the music from it, lol.

@johnalexander7490

24 күн бұрын

Even as a kid I hated the quality of Cassette Tapes. I was introduced to a Wollensak Reel-to-Reel machine when I was 4 and loved that machine for years. :) I still have it - it's broken in the attic but I can't seem to make myself get rid of it. :)

The memories this video brought up was so needed, thank you!!!!!

I still have that Matel Football game and it still works. I remember playing it under my covers. Its best played in the dark.

I was the remote control for the tv. Also I was the rabbit ears too!!

@Iggythemovieman

20 күн бұрын

Remember holding on to the rabbit ears to be the amplifier. so our dads can watch the news.

1970’s ‘high tech’ electronic products were usually overly simple and underwhelming - but our imaginations filled in the blanks! If you were lucky enough, to own ANY of this stuff, you absolutely cherished it!

You missed the Polaroid camera. My father was an influencer born in the wrong century! He always had that Polaroid and took tens of thousands of photos that were every where in our home growing up!!

@edwardzarnowski5558

24 күн бұрын

How have the Polaroid photos held up after all these years? Some pictures we have have turned almost a sepia color. These are regularly developed photos from the drugstore. Just wondering.

@jacklittle1624

24 күн бұрын

@@edwardzarnowski5558 They held up pretty well! Regrettably I didn’t keep them all, but the ones I have still look pretty good.

@Allan_aka_RocKITEman

22 күн бұрын

​@@edwardzarnowski5558>>> I have numerous Polaroid photos -- the the ones that did not require the cover being peeled off -- that still look quite good.

In the 70s, all the high school dorks kept their calculators in their soft case on their belt. The cases came with belt loops.

@misterwhipple2870

22 күн бұрын

I had one! Texas Instruments SR-51A! I still have it 48 years later and it still works! But I stuffed the whole bulging thing, foam case and all, into my pocket. I never used the belt loop. I worked all summer to save up the money for it, and one month after I bought it, they cut the price in half!!!!! August 1976. Boy, was I pi$$ed! I was even madder when Jimmy Carter won the election.

I wasn’t born in the seventies, but it would have been cool seeing the technology of that decade.

@sonyafox3271

25 күн бұрын

Well, you wouldn’t have necessarily have been born in the 70s, me and, my brother were born in the mid 60s and, began to grow up in the 70s! But, there’s so, much that came with 70s other than the technology or rather the technology we didn’t have yet because, we really didn’t need it so, much because, we got off of our butts up doing things other than playing, we were doing chores.There were things to do when,we were home in the summer and, on the weekends, we kept busy and, the whole family got involved. We didn’t sit idol and watch tv hrs on end! If you had to do homework that came first! When, I got in the 3rd grade, I would come home with pages and pages of math homework to the point, I never got it all done! The president actually signed into law that the schools and, teachers had to start putting limits on homework! I then, was free and, didn’t have much homework. Because, not only had, I had math homework in those days, I had other homework on top of it, I couldn’t get done. It was the same thing with Language Arts, we would be assigned to do so, many pages we couldn’t get it completed! 10:13

@johnalexander7490

24 күн бұрын

Living through it was something words can't really touch. And the early 80's too.

A neighbor of ours got a Pong game in the mid-‘70s. We played it for hours! Our family got the Atari (2600) in about 1978. We got a Radio Shack TRS-80 - referred to as the Trash-80 - at the end of 1979. We upgraded to a TI home computer by 1981, and got an Apple 2+ by 1983. It all felt so futuristic! We had one of those wired cable channel-changers by the end of the ‘70s. My mother would yell at us if we clicked through all, what, 36 channels over and over. "You have 30 channels to watch. Pick something and just watch it!" We did think the 30 or so channels were more channels than anyone could dream of - including HBO! HBO only showed two movies a day back then, though, alternating between the two all day long. I must’ve watched movies like ‘9 to 5’ and ‘The Incredible Shrinking Woman’ a hundred times each on HBO back then.

I bought an HP 65 and an HP25 from Ebay a few years ago. They still work perfectly. Back then, when these calculators were made, America had great quality products. These calculators were made 100% in the USA. HP designed the chips.

@user-ph3rb1in6e

25 күн бұрын

I had a TI SR-10 back in the 70s.

@garysheppard4028

24 күн бұрын

I loved my HP25 back in the day. Unfortunately leaky batteries killed it.

@leonardshand7845

22 күн бұрын

I was devastated when my gen1 HP48G calculator/computer died three years ago. I really battle with a 1+1 type calculator compared to the ease of RPN calculations.

@jonfreeman9682

22 күн бұрын

An HP calculator was every engineer and geek dream Xmas gift. They were expensive back in the day but it was the future. Calculators were prevalent until maybe late 2000s and I think by the time iPhone came out it was a relic of a bygone era.

@jimdennis2451

19 күн бұрын

RPN!

I still have a working Mattel Football game. I still break it out and play it. Great little handheld game!

On the Kodak camera I liked when you had to manually rotate the button to get the camera ready for the next picture, satisfying sound, weird I know.

I had Hot wheels, the plastic tracks for them & a bunch of electric Hot wheels they called Sizzlers.

@misterwhipple2870

22 күн бұрын

I had Hot Wheels in 1969, and like most kids, managed to break them all very quickly. That's why they're so damned hard to find now. The problem with toys is that kids play with them.

I always wanted a Little Professor calculator as a child in the 70s, which featured cool games to teach basic math.

Some things that stick out is Pong, my nifty mini cassette player and my Texas instrument calculator.

@Mark.G475

26 күн бұрын

Yes, yes and yes! And my Daisy BB gun, Skateboard with polyurethane wheels, Mego Batman, Batman Ben Cooper playsuit, Schwinn 10 speed...

@markharrington7843

25 күн бұрын

@@Mark.G475 Still ride the Schwinn 10 speed!

@jonfreeman9682

22 күн бұрын

Pong is friggin legendary. I had so much fun with two bars and a dot moving on a CRT TV screen. Kids these days don't know what they're missing. 😂

@carlsaganlives4036

17 күн бұрын

@@jonfreeman9682 My entire gaming 'career' began and ended with Pong...except for occasional Golden Tee or electronic darts while enjoying an adult beverage here and there...no shit.

loved this, i had a texas instrument calculator and since i was interested in electronics and was always either blowing something up or taking something apart, i chose the latter. i was able to design my own based on their circuit board and kids at school were amazed at what it could do. also had a Mattel football game, took that apart just to see what was inside, that one had a problem, follow a certain pattern and in the end my score was like a hundred to nothing, i do remember the sonic remote control for the tv, took that apart too but was disappointed at what i found, it never did work right when i put it back together. i remember we got a channel changer for the tv, it sat by dads recliner and he had the final say in what we watched. my job was to get up and run the antenna tuner, it had two buttons and it changed the direction the antenna pointed. my best time was when a friend got an atari, we cut so many classes just to sit around at his place and play whatever all afternoon before the bus taxi drove us home. the seventies, they were a warmup to the 80's but some of the best times ever - til i discovered girls, it was over after that lol

Thank you for this fantastic episode!! ☮️

My Dad had that Pulsar watch, that he gave to me when he upgraded to the new model. I wore it for years and I still have it. It doesn't work anymore but I still have it. I had the pocket fisherman and that exact Mattel football game. But the Atari was really something else. I played Adventure so many times I could almost play it in my sleep. I didn't get a computer until 92 or 93, but I did have a word processor. Anybody remember them?

When my brother or 2 got those electronic football games for Christmas, I (the youngest child) was the last one to try it out. But, that game is the ONLY reason I know anything about football. Lol. The samples you provided of tv remotes were such a blast from the past! The 70s ruled! Thanks.

The 110 Instamatic saw us through an entire summer of driving through Europe in 79. A magazine of photography also claimed it had the most precise focal plan resolution of any camera at it's time. Even though it was just a point and shoot.

@TheAMBULOCETUS

25 күн бұрын

@ivanleterror9158 I remember the 110 instamatic camera. Back then, my dad’s old Kodak camera with the C 126 film cartridges was a good camera. You had to buy the flash cubes for it separately. I used to borrow that camera all the time, still have old photos that look sharp and clear.

@ivanleterror9158

24 күн бұрын

@@TheAMBULOCETUS Maybe simpler was better.

@ivanleterror9158

24 күн бұрын

@@TheAMBULOCETUS A couple of times quizzes on here have used a flash cube as one of the objects to ID.

Great trip down memory lane. I was a middle schooler in the 70s, and remember all this great old tech. Many children and young adult today could still benefit from a Speak and Spell as education has eroded significantly and even parents.

I bought a PET as my first computer, 47 years later I am retiring as a software engineer. Commodore was great, they had this guy called Jim Butterfield (RIP) who was an evangelist that would reply by mail If you wrote him a coding question.

@Mick_Ts_Chick

19 күн бұрын

We got the Commodore 64 first at my house. Pretty cool then, lol.

@twwc960

12 күн бұрын

Yeah. I met Jim Butterfield a couple of times when I was a kid and it felt like meeting a rock star. That's how much of a nerd I was. My dad was a teacher and he used to bring PETs home from school during holidays and sometimes weekends, so I remember them fondly. (I'll never forget my excitement the first time he brought home a floppy disk drive and I dumped several cassettes worth of games onto a single floppy. And unlike the C-64 floppy drives, the PET drives were fast! It was an awesome time to be a kid!)

@charlesbaldo

12 күн бұрын

@@twwc960 were you living in the Toronto area? I live in western NY, many shows and events all along towns and cities around Lake Ontario

Here's nostalgia for ya... Back when you PAID for cable and satellite TV to get popular movies and shows... WITHOUT ADS! Now Cable and sat TV are mostly ads. And yes, I was the TV remote back then, (For all four channels. 3, 8, 10 and 12) as well as the antenna rotator. We kept a pipe-wrench on the windowsill near the antenna pole. I remember the words shouted across the living room, through the bedroom, and out of the window, "Stop! Go back.. THERE!" That, and the heavy "Clunk" of the rotary VHF TV tuner.

Scientific calculators in school. Taking geometry as a HS junior in 1973-74, the teacher allowed those who could afford scientific calculators to use them. That gave a few students who could afford them a huge advantage. I wasn’t going to get a $300+ (over $2,000 in today’s money), but by some miracle my father got at a trade show a more basic calculator that still had sine, cosine, tangent functions. I used it for a good part of the year-until it began to fall apart in May. It finally stopped working the day of our final exam and I had to go back to making all my calculations by hand. Ugh! Wasn’t fair!

@misterwhipple2870

22 күн бұрын

I remember in those days it was always a battle between teachers who allowed them and those that banned them. I had a teacher who would only let you use a slide-rule! He was a G*d-D*mned WIZARD with a slide-rule! Still, he was very popular and almost everybody loved him.

@Nicksonian

22 күн бұрын

@@misterwhipple2870 Although I had slide rule lessons in junior high school, I never got the hang of it. I held onto my slide rule as a relic of the past for decades…until my ex threw out boxes of my childhood stuff and photos just to spite me.

@Nicksonian

22 күн бұрын

@@misterwhipple2870 Mister Whipple!!! I just noticed that. Hilarious!

@misterwhipple2870

22 күн бұрын

@@Nicksonian Sixty-five and STILL Squeezing the Charmin! Procter and Gamble fired me and hired a family of bears, but MY legacy lingers on!

My step dad is 66 and he still pack's his on his motorcycle. No matter where he goes he takes that thing everywhere. We have actually talked about it thinking about how many miles is on that fishing pole. Thing still work's just like it did new.

In college, I used an HP-21 calculator. It was a really good design, despite the dim led screen and the time it took to do complex calculations. It got me through 4 years of engineering school, but once I graduated, it saw less and less use.

@jimdennis2451

19 күн бұрын

I have my HP-11C on my desk next to me. I have used it almost daily for 40 years.

Digital watches and clocks were so cool! I used to play Pong all the time 😂

I remember mowing yards all summer so I could buy myself an Atari 2600. I wanted one so bad, one of my friends had one and he was a bit stingy with play time when I was over. I had it about a week before someone broke in our house and it got stolen! I never quite got over that. A couple of years ago I was helping clean out a hoarder house of someone's mother that had passed. Found in a box hidden in cabinet, an Atari 2600, complete with all the accessories, games and manuals in near perfect condition. She let me have it at the end of the cleanout and once again I had it in my hands! Huge moment of nostalgia there! My gaming started playing the black and white Space Invaders table game they had at Pizza Hut and I never stopped. I never dreamed I'd still be gaming all these decades later and how amazing it would all become.

The very first image in this vid was a Texas Instruments TI-99/4A. I still have the one I was given as a high schooler for Christmas, though it's been stashed in a box for a long time. I also had one of their early LED watches which required you to push a button to get the time. Quite a lot of those Pong-style videogames ran on the same chip, the General Instrument AY-3-8500. Those first Mattel handheld games were quite revolutionary for their time; the Nintendo Gameboy was the spiritual descendant. My grandmother had one of those Zenith TV's with the clicker remote; it's the reason why many of us still call a remote control a 'clicker' even if it's silent.

@Mick_Ts_Chick

19 күн бұрын

I had the TI-55 in high school. My cousin worked for Texas Instruments. He got us digital watches very cheap when they first came out. Mine had the white plastic band. I loved it!

In the late seventies, I received an HP programmable calculator as a graduation gift ahead of starting college engineering studies in the fall. I thought this was the coolest gadget I had ever seen and it was my most treasured possession back then.

👍👍👍 Recollection Road.

Lots of stuff here... I remember getting the SynchroQuartz watch for Christmas 1976. It was my first digital watch and it had an LCD display. Christmas 1978 we got the Atari 2600. It was early 1980s when I worked on the PET computers we had at school. Also in the late 70s was the TRS-80 computer. I wanted one so bad but they were expensive relative to my meager paper route money.

Preserving past forever is to show new gen kids to know what we had on that generation amazing gadgets.

I loved playing Pong. It was before it went out to the masses and you had to play it in the mall.

@misterwhipple2870

22 күн бұрын

When I was in college we had a table Space Invaders game upstairs in the Student Union building. It was stuck on, and you did not have to put money in it to play it. We kept our mouths shut and played it for two years and never spent a dime!

When my older brother bought his first new car (an Oldsmobile Starfire), he got an Odyssey game system from the dealer who was giving them away as a perk with purchase. We were extremely envied, being the first of our friends to have it.

Like Always, Just Fabulous!!

I had one of those little flat 110 cameras from 1972 on, and took hundreds of photos as a kid. Unfortunately, that process film fades over the decades unlike my mother's 35 mm camera's photos from that era.

Great Video. Thank You!

I was very fortunate growing up in that period as my mother worked at TI. As such, they had employee sales and I ended up with just about every cool gadget they put out, including the full TI994/A computer system. I remember having the first calculator watch at school. Calculators were the spawn of the devil in school at that time according to your teachers. I got in so much trouble taking that to school. My teacher said to me "What would you do if you were adding up your groceries in the store and the battery died?" Without missing a beat, I said "I'm in the store, I'll buy some more batteries!" Got sent to the principles office for that one and got detention! LOL I thought it was pretty clever (and accurate).

OMG that remote when we first got cable TV in the 70s😊😊😊😊😊

From childhood to this very day I want that electronic game called "Simon". It's the round one with four coloured lights/pannels, it flashes a pattern which you have to remember and push the coloured pannels in the same sequence. Fun for the whole family and I need it in my life.

Oh, the 1970s! What a time to be a kid. I remember vividly the gadgets I wished I had back then, even if my desires were a bit... unconventional. Firstly, there was the Jetpack 3000. Now, mind you, this wasn't an actual product, but in my head, it was the pinnacle of 70s technology. I had this wild fantasy of zooming to school above the traffic, waving down at my friends stuck on the school bus. Of course, the jetpack had a built-in disco ball, because what's the point of flying without some groovy tunes and flashing lights? Then there was the Teleportation Telephone. I imagined it looked like a regular rotary phone, but with one significant upgrade: it could teleport me to my friend's house instantly. One minute I'm at home doing chores, the next I'm in my buddy's living room, ready to play Atari. The idea was so vivid, I actually tried dialing random numbers in hopes of a spontaneous teleportation event. Spoiler alert: it never worked, but I did accidentally order a few pizzas. Speaking of Atari, how could I forget the Giant Inflatable Pong Arena? Picture this: a massive, bouncy castle-like structure where you and your friends are the paddles, bouncing giant inflatable balls back and forth. I wrote to Santa about this one every year, but I guess the elves couldn't quite figure out the logistics. Now, for the list of slightly more realistic (yet still absurd) gadgets I wished for: 1. **The Mood Ring Translator**: A mood ring that didn't just change colors but actually spoke to you, explaining your emotions in detail. "You're feeling blue because you forgot your homework... again." 2. **X-Ray Specs (Real Ones)**: I was convinced that these would let me see through walls, desks, and of course, the mysteries of the locked cookie jar. Reality, however, was a cruel teacher. 3. **Hover Skateboard**: Not like the ones in Back to the Future (which came later), but a skateboard that hovered just a few inches off the ground. Perfect for gliding over the cracks in the sidewalk that always tripped me up. 4. **Voice-Activated Simon Game**: Instead of pressing buttons, you would just shout the colors. This would've been a game-changer at family game nights, especially with my competitive sibling who always pressed the wrong button. 5. **Pet Rock Trainer Kit**: This kit came with a tiny treadmill, miniature dumbbells, and a motivational cassette tape to get your pet rock in shape. Because, you know, even rocks need a good workout routine. Ah, those were the days. If only I could go back in time and hand myself a reality check... or maybe just some batteries for my actual toys.

@tonycollazorappo

24 күн бұрын

I rode my banana seat bike all over with my friends. I was born in 1961.

Popeil! Now there's a name I haven't heard in eons.

@Mick_Ts_Chick

19 күн бұрын

I think those commercials are burned in my brain permanently. 😅

I got a red radio one year that attached to my bicycle. I felt like I was King of the neighborhood! I still wonder what happened to that thing.

Thank you.

Me and my brother had Odyssey !! We loved it !! We also had the gun that you had to buy separately.

The instamatic 20's problem was the flash (the silver box you got 4 uses out of then discarded, not the electric one)... Not that it didn't work, quite the opposite, the flash was so bright you couldn't see anything for a few seconds, just long enough for you to briefly wonder if your blindness was going to be permanent before you could see again...

Great video and now I better understand why I spend much of my time trying to buy much of this vintage stuff I wanted when i was a kid.

@jacknjill3000

20 күн бұрын

I had a pocket fisherman, but o never used it or tried using it one. Lol! I ended up buying a fishing pole and a reel.

@jacknjill3000

20 күн бұрын

We had that tv that you connected the phone to and when you got a call, the tv would mute and I think you could talk through the tv. The reason why I say i think is bc we never hook it up to the phone and just used as a tv. I forget if it was Zenith or RCA, but it wasn’t a Japanese TV. They did run a commercial and was pushing sales on that tv.

Thank you

Kodak camera take them pictures then drop them off at Photomat for developing ❤😂😂😊

Thanks, brought back lot a memories.

@slim-oneslim8014

23 күн бұрын

That it did for sure!

The first digital watch was the Synchronar 2000, and I had one! When new, the cost was thousands of 1970s dollars. I did see someone wearing one while on vacation in Acapulco, thanks to the man who was kind enough to show his to me! I got mine for only $175 in 1981. It was more than just a digital watch--it was charged by solar cells and hermetically sealed in an ABS plastic case that was tested to survive being run over by a train. The "buttons" were tiny reed switches activated by moving small magnets in the case. And it displayed the date, good past the year 2000, hence the name.

We had that zenith clicker. It was strike a four different bars inside depending on what button you pressed which made a high pitched tone the TV would pick up. I still have that 110 camera.

I had that handheld football game as a kid... it was a lot of fun!

I don't even like football, but the electronic game was fun.

Ron Popiel was an amazing inventor. Good ‘ol Ronco! Also, I was my Dad’s remote control… no matter how far away I was.😆

My father was a Pulsar watch dealer in the ‘70s. I still have 3 working models, including the model used in the James Bond film.

7:54 Wow I remember something like that uses as a cable box in the mid to late 80s

I remember both the Mattel & Coleco hand held games when I worked in the Toy Department at Sears. I had to unlock & lock the display cabinets so many times. 🤣

My mother scrimped and saved to buy my dad that Pulsar watch. My dad was mad cause he knew it was expensive but she told him she saved the money on her own. If I remember correctly, we ate a lot of liver for a year!! My father loved liver and I hated it!!

That pulsar is still a beautiful watch…my first digital watch was a Texas Instruments when I was ten and I still have it although unsure if it would work.

FWIW: As best as I can recall, the first time I saw a red L.E.D. wristwatch was the one Rodger Moore wore in 1973's *LIVE AND LET DIE.*

I was 10 in 1970, all I remember was starving trying to find my next meal, being homeless, always looking for a way to shower, to get clothes & shoes, and trying to find shelter from the weather. It was a tough time to live.

HP always had the best calculators. I still have mine from college back in the 80s. No one ever borrowed it since it used Reverse Polish Notation.

I didn’t too many gadgets. I had a poleroid land camera that I used to document the construction of our new house, a compact transistor am/fm radio, and that was it. Dad had a TI calculator. Our new house sported four, yes four touch tone phones. I thought we moved to nasa’s Mission Control.

The Mattel Electronic Football game didn’t just launch electronic games for sports fans, it also was preceded by Auto Race which was the 1st handheld electronic game. Handheld electronic games existed before and well after Mattel’s hugely successful electronic Football.

I still have a pocket fisherman and carry it on my ATV just in case I find a nice little stream or pond when riding.

I remember when the first Atari came out. My earliest memories are from when I was five, maybe four. I had a winde-up police car with a big light on top. I think that was 1976.

I turned 13 in 1979, turned 33 in 1999. No kids until 34. Great time to be alive.

Wow, the Commodore Pet. I vividly recall Mr. Stern (our Math lab teacher) coming to our 3rd grade classroom and asking for a few students to help with a project. Turns out the project was disconnecting the old Commodore pets and helping him setup up the new Apple ][ e's. That one moment sparked a career in IT. The killer app for us was LOGO.

I had a Star Wars digital watch (Christmas 78) and Kodak 110 Instamatic with the flip flash. I used that camera to take a picture of my Atari. 😆 I’m glad I grew up then. I do still have my Mattel basketball game and it still works.

7:50 we used to have a pylon on the roof of the house attached with cables to,keep it up with a motor to turn it in the right direction to have a better reception

The digital watch is back in style for people that are into watches. Casio makes a handful and Bulova has a Computron watch that looks like it fell straight out of the 1970's. 🤖

The Tandy (Radio Shack) TRS 80 was a very competent competitor to the Apple. I purchased one and had some business programs running on it, saved a lot of time and was a great entry system

I had a Mattel basketball electronic game sometime around 77.

I remember the magnetic football men that vibrated across a steel plate. And the electronic race cars that could switch lanes! But I never owned one, and when my friend got one for Christmas, I remember how the cars would always fall off the track in a turn while switching lanes. 🥺

The Pulsar is beautiful and cool. Hamilton has a pretty much identical model.

I forgot all about the pocket fisherman. Some of my fondest memories are the times we would go fishing. I got my first scientific calculator in 1984. It sure didn't cost $800.00!

@lylecoglianese1645

25 күн бұрын

@pslm23, scientific calculators were not the new 'hot' items in 1984, 1974 yes. Things have always cost more when first introduced. Prices go down when more items are purchased, quite normal. 🤔

Anyone from the UK remember the Sinclair Black Watch? It was the first digital watch that came within the average kids' birthday or Christmas gift range and was the ultimate status symbol at my school in the mid 70s. It had a LED display, so you had to press a button to display the time, or twice for the date. Mega cool!

My Dad bought the Odyssey in 1974 or 75 I was only born in 71 so I didn't play it much. I have it now. But have never hooked it up to my TV. I did put a white frame up on my 40" 4k TV had my kids hold up some of the overlays a d used my high quality Canon mirrorless and took some high quality images of the overlays.

The pocket fisherman saved my life. I was driving in the middle of nowhere. My car broke down. I opened my glove compartment. I use the pocket fisherman to catch a fish so I didn’t starve to death. True story.

"Speak&Spell? Isn't it a Depeche Mode album, or something like this?" Some groundbreaking stuff there, nice overview.

I do wonder if we’ll ever see such a decade again & I can’t even imagine what it would look like .. even flying cars in every garage .. maybe teleportation ..