One for the over 50 crowd please

[Anonymous]

Back in the mid "50," the cereal companies packaged miniatures of navy frogmen,and a nautilus submarine,which had a small compartment where you would put in baking soda as a source of propulsion. the water would mix with the powder to form a gas that would propel the objects forward. your all wondering with this has to do with toy trains??? Didn't lionel mage a boat that worked on the same principle????? does anyone have one??? does anyone know what I'm talking about???? CTT always does articles on accesories,but I've never seen this one. Hey c'mon CTT do an article, will you???? Thanks Easter

[dbaker48]

Not only the boat, which was very attractive. But also part of the science series a Weather Station. I had two of them, and must have given them away or trashed them some 15-20 years ago. [D)]

[Blueberryhill RR]

I can remember having a submarine and the Lionel boat. I don't know
where they are now, but my Mom gave me some baking soda to
propel them. They did exist.
Chuck

[jonadel]

I clearly remember the submarine, great fun but I have no idea what became of it.

Jon

[Anonymous]

Don,what was the weather station??? Sounds like something A.C.Gilbert would come out with. Easter

[trigtrax]

Yes I had the frogmen, I also had a Captain Video ray gun which fired sneezing powder at people. Boy ,can you imagine the lawsuits with a toy like that today. [}:)]

[Roger Bielen]

I had both the sub and frogman. Taking a bath included a cup of baking soda on the side of the tub. Are we aging ourselves, or what?

[Anonymous]

I believe you had to mix the baking soda with vinegar to get a reaction.

[cnw1995]

They had sometihing like that in cereal boxes in the late 60s as well. Frogmen and submarines. Not Lionel branded of course.

[Anonymous]

Hey Roger,your in watkinsville ga.???? You got some nice train shops where you are don't you??? I'm in Tunnel Hill Ga. Nothing here but gun shops . Easter

[dbaker48]

Here are a couple of pics





Actually the pics are the front side and back side.

It was really pretty boring. The primary activity was maintaing weather data and plotting it on graph paper. There was also a thermometer, barometer, and a wind speed gauge.
Some of the paperwork gave descriptions about cloud types, explanation of the water cycle, and different weather conditions and what caused them. After going thru the package, you have to be a real nerd to sit down and spend any significant time with it.

The Gilbert Chemistry set or Erector set was lot better.

Spent lots of hours with the erector set, (Gilbert ! of course)

[Roger Bielen]

Easter - Memory Station is here in Watkinsville. He's a good sized Lionel dealer for this area. He also is a factory direct dealer and repair shop. If there's a problem he doesn't have and answer for he has the number for the direct line to a Lionel engineer's desk.

The next closest is Legacy Station over in Gwinett County, he carries a mixed bag leaning heavy toward MTH.

If you're going to be in town e-mail me via my profile.

[dwiemer]

Easter,
I think Roger is kinda lucky in the train store front. I am also in Georgia, but in these parts, the closest dealers are 3+ hours away. Also, we have NO Ogauge activity, just a local HO club. Like you, we do have plenty of gun dealers.
Dennis

[Anonymous]

All I remember is buying the "Sea Monkeys" from the backs of comic books.

[wrmcclellan]

I got the submarine via a cereal promotion. It wasn't free. Had to send a couple of boxtops and some money for mailing. The first one I got was broken and I was very disappointed we had to mail it back. Got another one in about 3 weeks. I remember waiting at the front door mail drop each morning and afternoon (we used to get mail twice a day) until it came. I do not remember how well it worked, but it did work. It was a diving and resurfacing submarine.

[IronHoarse]

Yep...had one of those subs myself...great fun.

[Warburton]

Hey Easter -- have I got great news for YOU! They still make them! Go to www.bettysattic.com and type in item 41002 (Mini Diving Sub) and 43053 (Frogman). Just like the originals --and cheap too! Glub, glub!

[Anonymous]

I remember that many of these were way smaller than they appeared on the backs of the cereal boxes. The frogmen were so small they didn't perform well in hard water. First they wouldn't sink, then when they finally did, the baking soda was too far gone to get them back to the surface! BTW, there was a Rocky and Bullwinkle episode about this, "The Boxtop Robbery".

[kblester]

Easter,
Both the submarine and the frog men may still be available. I just recently bought a new pack of three "U.S.NAVY FROGMEN" (2 different with knives yellow and green and the rare RED diver with the anti ship mine(frisbee). I think I paid less than $5.00. The submarine was $2.99. Both are made from original molds. the Frogmen are sold by Dimestore Dreams , the company that makes those 40's 50's *** TRACY looking cars sold in the train stores. The sub has a upc label of Toysmith Auburn WA 98001and package label of 4M Industrial Development Limited. Both toys have 2002 copyrights. OH NO !!SOMEBODY IS COPYCATTING AGAIN!!!! I bought both sets at TOY SAFARI on the Boardwalk in Ocean City NJ last summer. I hope this helps.

These toys work with BAKING POWDER not SODA. Baking soda does not produce CO2.
The Submarine is marketed by KidzLabs brand. It is the smaller sub pictured in NJAL ' s posting. I think Mr Potato Head will sink no matter how much baking powder you stuff in him.
Best REgards, Ken Lester

[njalb1]

[njalb1]

Hi kblester,
I live about an hour from Ocean City NJ and visit there during the summer.
Sometimes, before high gas prices, I would go just for
Mack & Manco Pizza ![:D]

[kblester]

QUOTE: Originally posted by njal

Hi kblester,
I live about an hour from Ocean City NJ and visit there during the summer.
Sometimes, before high gas prices, I would go just for
Mack & Manco Pizza ![:D]

njal,
If you want to make some extra money BUY BUY BUY Mack & Manco Stock this week. We arrive Saturday with four families for this years vacation. My 20 year old son alone will eat two or three pizzas a day. they asked us to call ahead so they could order more pizza dough. Gas is cheaper across the Walt Whitman on the New Jersey side. AND they still pump it for you (STATE LAW). Now if they do away with the beach tag fees we can get a large coke with our pizza.
KEN

[Anonymous]

Hit 50 on the second of June but just had to include this link to my favorite childhood corporate premium... The Johnny Quest Decoder Ring offered with a new pair of P. F. Flyers sneakers:

http://www.classicjq.com/artifacts/misc/PFring.shtml

Johnny Quest was my favorite prime time show in the mid 60's and Race Bannon my hero. I needed that ring so I could be just like Johnny. Managed to talk my parents into a pair of the Flyers and was so proud of that ring I could'nt wait to show it off at my Cub Scout meeting the next day. Managed to loose the green and silver cardboard signal mirror during the meeting and was devestated. I felt like I had let Johnny and Race down. 40+ years later and I still think that was the coolest prize ever. Wish I had it still. No telling what happened to it. It looks like one sold on the Bay for $63.50 but I don't think I'll persue one. I love the memories of mine and am afraid my now 50 year old eyes will see it for what is just a bit of plastic and paste board. The ring I had was "special."

One thing I did for my now 11 year old son when he was a toddler was give him a "treasure box" to keep his treasures in. It has filled and grown over the years. Maybe when he is 50 he will find his "decoder ring" in it.

Thanks to all for reminding me of my ring.

Steve

[Anonymous]

We are going down next week. First stop---Mack & Manco. I don't know what it is about their pizza---maybe it's the salt air, ocean, whatever---it's the best.

[Anonymous]

Hey all,thanks for sharing all the memories. As we get older & our future gets shorter we can draw on the wealth of the past good memories to bring back the smilesSay "warburton" my wife gets those catologs all the time. I know she has a Betty's Attic somewhere,I'll check it out. There was a lot of good info on this tread. Thank you,Thank you.Ken I used to live in Asbury Park NJ. I remember good pizza. you can't get good pizza here in Tunnel Hill GA. I remember the convention center going up in flames every other year,so they could collect the insurance money & build a new one. Easter

[Anonymous]

"I waited three to six weeks for this???" My first thoughts after charging my long awaited submarine from the cerial offer. All it did was sink, then rise to the surface, then tip on it's side and the bubble would escape, then it would sink again until the baking powder was gone!
Baking POWDER reacts with water, Baking SODA reacts with vinegar, and much more violently I might add.(for the post above)
Amazing what a comic book add, or cereal box can get a kid to do.
I remember:
World Stamps for 10 cents!(got you on an approval list for lots of money)
Get rich by selling Cloverine Salve, the wonder healing agent of the decade!(nobody bought it except my mom who ended up paying for the whole thing)

[cnw1995]

Good memories. I remember ordering things from the back of comic books - got a gigantic set of teeny tiny plastic toy soldiers once I had to save up for seemingly forever.

[palallin]

QUOTE: Originally posted by cnw1995

Good memories. I remember ordering things from the back of comic books - got a gigantic set of teeny tiny plastic toy soldiers once I had to save up for seemingly forever.

I once ordered the "HUGE" set that had troops, aircraft, tanks, ships: over 100 pieces for just $1!!!!!!! Of course, they were all badly molded from a brittle plastic and only about 1/8" thick. Even the ships were Olive Drab, and I was very disappointed. I ran across a complete set on eBay last year, but, nostalgia notwithstanding, I managed to restrain my impulse to buy this time.

[palallin]

How many of you ordered the Charles Atlas body-building program?

[Jumijo]

I remember the ads for sea monkees and all those army men for a buck on the backs of comic books. I also remember seeing ads for some newspaper you could sell to make money - GRIT. I never bit for any of it. It was more fun to go to Woolworths with my mother. We'd have lunch at the counter, then she'd let me head over to the toy section and walk the isles while she shopped. It seemed like everything was 99 cents back then. I remember Matchbox cars were 49 cents, and I ended up accumulating quite a few. That particular store had a big black bird with a yellow beak named Midnight who's cage was right near the toy section. He'd talk too. Who ever thought of putting the pet products right next to the toys knew what they were doing. Midnight was a popular little fellow.

I did have the diving frogman way back then. He came in a pie (Table Talk brand) a local kiddie show host, Major Mudd promoted.

Getting back to the comic books. We'd usually only get them when we went on trips, like to the Cape or the mountains. We'd go down to the drug store the night before and buy a bunch of them so we'd have something to keep us quiet on the drive. My tastes leaned toward all the Walt Disney titles as a little guy. Casper the ghost, Little Lulu, Richie Rich, Archie, those were all good too. As I got older, Batman and Superman, then those fantasmagorical horror tales.

Life was so incredibly different back then. It's like living on an entirely different planet today.

Jim