National Toy Hall of Fame

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Let's get personal for a second. Peyton, let's do it.
Do you have a favorite toy? Did you have a
favorite toy growing up? Was there a toy that you
were like, whenever you think about your childhood, there's like
that toy that you just had that it's like Linus
is blanky. You know, everybody kind of has that one toy,

(00:22):
the red rid bb gun, like in a Christmas story.
Was there something like a toy that you just remember
unequivocally as something that was part of your identity when
you were a young kid.

Speaker 2 (00:39):
I wouldn't call it traditionally a toy. I'll tell you
this is a toy or not. I had a list here, okay, okay,
but this this is my childhood right here. So we
had a plastic six foot tall basketball hoop. Okay, and
you're like, okay, well in the house, Well that's the thing. Okay.
So during the summer, be outside and we'd use one

(01:01):
of those small like you know basketballs, kids basketballs. But
then inside during the winter months, we had an inflatable
basketball and we'd play all the time, all the time.
Love that all the time. I would say, nerf hoop. Yeah,
And it's basically what it was.

Speaker 1 (01:19):
Yeah, yeah, nerf hoop for me, I had a basketball
hoop outside that couldn't be brought inside, but I had
a basketball hoop in my bedroom. I had a basketball
hoop in the living room that I could shoot on.
I mean, my my parents lay let me have at it.

Speaker 2 (01:34):
I would.

Speaker 1 (01:35):
This was VHS time, back in the nineties, before DVDs
were prevalent. But my mom got me like all these
basketball DVDs, like or VHS is like Michael Jordan's playground
they had, you know, when the Bulls won the championship.
We'd get like the championship tapes. Larry Bird, a basketball legend,

(01:56):
got to watch a bunch of Larry Bird stuff, and
I would just throw that stuff on. If there wasn't
about ssketball game to watch, I would just throw one
of those vhss in and I'd play on my nerf hoop.
I'd also play football in the house too. I like
to play football. While football was going on, I'd just
run in the living room and act like I was
getting tackled by imaginary people. So that's certainly like my

(02:19):
That would be my number one too. I would say
a nerf hoop is absolutely a toy when.

Speaker 2 (02:24):
I was younger, to give maybe a better answer, when
I was a little bit younger, I did go through
a pretty strong hot wheels era, and I had the
semi trucks where you could put the hot wheels in
the side of it and it looked like it was
carrying them. That was always pretty fun. But I grew
out of that.

Speaker 1 (02:41):
Yeah, well, I mean, we grow out of a lot
of this stuff, right, But it's the nostalgia that keeps
us bringing back.

Speaker 2 (02:46):
Now.

Speaker 1 (02:46):
I don't see NERF Hoop as a toy here on
my list, but Nerf is Nerf just the brand, and
there are a lot of knockoffs that had you know,
basketball hoops and stuff on the inside. My list, by
the way, is all of the toys that have either
been inducted or have been a finalist for the National

(03:07):
Toy Hall of Fame, which just inducted its class of
twenty twenty five. By the way, Nerf inducted into the
Toy Hall of Fame in twenty twenty three. Now I
got the list here. Who do you think got inducted
in twenty twenty five? These are toys company or games.

(03:29):
Toys are games that haven't already been inducted.

Speaker 2 (03:31):
Correct. Oh, so that's kind of like, uh, it's a
tough guessing game, it is.

Speaker 1 (03:37):
I'll tell I'll just tell you who was inducted and
who are the other finalists, and then we can kind
of go through and we can talk about some of
the toys, our memories, and in the second in the
three o'clock hour, we'll open the phones and have people
share their memories with us. The toy one of the
three three toys technically Slime.

Speaker 2 (03:56):
Oh that's a good I maybe could have guessed that one.
But is that the line homemade or manufactured? Either of them? All?

Speaker 1 (04:04):
Slime officially inducted into the Toy Hall of Fame. Did
you ever have some of that? I just remember in
the nineties when I was a kid. Yes, you would
see people on Nickelodeon get slimed. It was like their
big thing.

Speaker 2 (04:17):
It was peak.

Speaker 1 (04:20):
Kid television, Nickelodeon in like the mid to late nineties.
This is prime I mean boom, Yeah, I mean the
two thousands. There were still some good stuff there that
I would watch, you know, but it wasn't the same. Man,
it never was the same after that. But Slime, not
that Slime didn't have any other connotation. But whenever you
say slime and you show like green slime, or you

(04:40):
would read about how to make your own slime for home,
you just think about getting slimmed on Nickelodeon, and how
you know as a kid, you just wanted to get slimed.
You wanted to go to Orlando, you wanted to be
where they would film some of the TV shows and
you'd get slimed.

Speaker 2 (04:54):
And never happened for me, unfortunately.

Speaker 1 (04:58):
Two board games are the other two Battleship and Trivial Pursuit.
A couple of classics there. I'm surprised it took this one.
The National Toy Hall of Fame, by the way, has
been inducting toys since back in nineteen ninety nine. Ninety
nine was the first class. So it's been over twenty
five years now that we've been inducting toys.

Speaker 2 (05:18):
And those are the three that got here.

Speaker 1 (05:19):
We'll talk about the finalists and if there are toys
from your childhood you're curious about whether or not they
have made the National Toy Hall of Fame, or you
wanted to share your memories with us. It's a Friday,
We're gonna have some fun with this we were talking about
toys and our favorite toys and what toys we remember
growing up, and I got the entire list of the

(05:42):
National Toy Hall of Fame here from the beginning of
this Hall of Fame in nineteen ninety nine to yesterday
when they officially inducted Slime Battleship, the board game, and
Trivial Pursuit the Board Game into the Hall of Fame.
What I think makes this Hall of Fame pretty interesting
is they tried to limit what gets in on a
year to year basis. The first year, for instance, the

(06:07):
toys that were the initial inductees, the inaugural inductees to
the National Toy Hall of Fame, what would you think?
There were seventeen of them, so they wanted to get
it off to a good start. What toys do you
think we're on this seventeen toy list?

Speaker 2 (06:25):
Was this is kind of a weird guess, But what
about Tonka ooh Tonka, Because you know how they make
some like really heavy duty toys that I could see
have been manufactured.

Speaker 1 (06:37):
Tonka toys were inducted in two thousand and one. That's close, Yeah,
it's close.

Speaker 2 (06:41):
They were.

Speaker 1 (06:42):
They had just missed being on the cutoff of the
original list, and the third year of this thing, they
were added in two thousand and one.

Speaker 2 (06:51):
Tonka trucks. Hmm, it's pretty good. And that's still before
they were still inducted before I was around. So all right,
I'm tough. That was a great pool. What about.

Speaker 1 (07:10):
Don't overthink this? These are these ya, I mean, stuff
that you wouldn't even think to be a toy I
think would probably be would probably be on this list.
I'll give you one.

Speaker 2 (07:18):
Barbie.

Speaker 1 (07:20):
Barbie was one of the first seventeen toys inducted into
the Hall of Fame.

Speaker 2 (07:26):
Does that mean American Girl Dolls are on there somewhere?
You know? That's an interesting point. Could you somewhere bit different?
Could you?

Speaker 1 (07:34):
American Girl Dolls were a finalist in twenty fourteen, they
were finalists in twenty fifteen, they were finalists in twenty eighteen,
and finally made it in in twenty twenty one. Wow, yeah, okay,
so yeah, could you buy your way? That's a good question.
Could you buy your way into being in the Hall
of Fame? I was going to ask, is there any criteria?

(07:55):
You know, how like a professional athlete retires? Okay, you
got five years and then you can be qualified. You
can qualify. I wonder what the qualifications are. Maybe it's
just popularity, Yeah, I mean it. Criteria is icon status.
The toy is widely recognized, respected and remembered. Longevity more
than a passing fad, discovery, Foster's learning, creativity, or discovery

(08:20):
and innovation, profoundly changed play or toy design. The National
Toy Hall of Fame was originally housed in Salem, Oregon,
but now is in the Strong National Museum of Play
now known as the Strong in Rochester.

Speaker 2 (08:37):
New York. So there you go.

Speaker 1 (08:41):
You can actually visit this place. Here's another one of
the originals, the ogs. The crayola crayon.

Speaker 2 (08:50):
A toy. It's That's what I'm saying. Some of this
stuff on here. You would think, is that really a toy?
You could say that you probably play with it.

Speaker 1 (09:00):
Coloring and a coloring book or drawing or dudling as
a kid with crayolas. Is that the Does that count
as a toy? You're definitely playing, right. The erector set,
you don't know what? Do I know what that is?
You don't know what an erector set is? You ever

(09:21):
watched The Sandlot? Yes, you know that the contraptions that
he builds to get the to try to get the
catapult thing to pick up the baseball and fire it.

Speaker 2 (09:32):
That's an entire erector set. Okay, yes, yeah, that's a
good that's a good pull. So I my mom didn't let.

Speaker 1 (09:39):
Me get the metal erector sets, so I had to
get the plastic erector sets.

Speaker 2 (09:43):
But you could like build whatever you want.

Speaker 1 (09:45):
You had a bunch of different tools and different toys
and you could really just fiddle around and do whatever
you want. It had stuff that you could build and
you could follow along, but you also could just build
whatever you want. It's kind of like Legos, which, by
the way, also we're an original toy and to the
Hall of Fame. Also the Etches Sketch. A lot of

(10:05):
people like Ketches Sketch. Did you like the Etches Sketch?

Speaker 2 (10:08):
My grandma has one inner basement. Even to this day,
sometimes I'll go over there and fiddle on it a
little bit. Yeah, it's fun, but short term, yeah, people
really can do some crazy things on that thing, and
I just can. Never I could make straight lines and
that was it. And then you shake it and you know,
like you ruin it and you can start over. I

(10:29):
don't know, like everybody had one. I just couldn't really
understand what the appeal was. Uh, Frisbee.

Speaker 1 (10:37):
Is a toy, yes, yes, Hula hoop in the same
vein Lincoln logs, yes, good one. Yeah, build whatever you
want with the Lincoln logs. If you put legos in,
you better put Lincoln logs in. Marbles never shoot marbles
or you know. Nowadays they're really popular. Have those like
marble runs where you build like a big old thing
and just like send the marbles down.

Speaker 2 (10:58):
It's like a race. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (11:00):
Yeah, Monopoly, it's the first game inducted, like the first
board game inducted.

Speaker 2 (11:07):
Play dough. That's a good one. I was thinking about
that one.

Speaker 1 (11:10):
Radio flyer wagon. Yeah, kids had it. I have one
of those.

Speaker 2 (11:16):
So it's a small one, mainly used to pull humans
but small children.

Speaker 1 (11:20):
Yeah, roller skates, Teddy Bear, they all had a Teddy Bear.
Come on, Tinker toy? Do you ever have Tinger toy?
That's that's kind of like a primitive erector set type
of thing. And then the view master you have you
probably especially wouldn't have had one. I don't know if

(11:42):
they still even make a few masters, but It was
kind of like you you put the thing up to
your face and then you pressed like the button and
it showed you different pictures from different places.

Speaker 2 (11:51):
I did have one of those, okay, and then the
dunk and yo, yo, you know, I have no issues
so far. I mean, these are all greats. How can
you those are that? That was the entire list of
the first of the first induction. Yeah, that's really good.
Now I have the final list. We mentioned that Slime
Battleship in Trivial Pursuit were the three toys that were
inducted into the Hall of Fame. And I have the

(12:12):
list of the National Toy Hall of Fame in front
of me after their new inductees of Slime Battleship and
Trivial Pursuit. And we're here to talk about it.

Speaker 1 (12:21):
Your toys of your childhood, toys that you remember, toys
that you're curious as with whether or not they're inducted
into the Hall of Fame, and we're here to chat
with you about it today. So let's get to the
phones of four h two eight eleven ten. Joe was
on the line, Joe, what's on your mind?

Speaker 3 (12:36):
Well, one of the toys I had or two of
the toys I had was a Lionel train, oh yeah,
and a rocking horse.

Speaker 2 (12:46):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (12:46):
So a rocking horse that definitely Linel trains, by the way,
inducted in the Hall of Fame in two thousand and six,
so it made it those guys. Yeah, and then the
rocking horse was a two thousand and four inductile. So
how about that rock and horse? You know what, Joe,
Now that you mentioned that it wasn't, I can't say
in good conscience. It was my favorite, but my dad

(13:08):
made me and I have very vague memories of what
this horse looked like, but my dad and I'm guessing
a couple of my uncles helped make me a rocking
horse when I was a baby, and it was in
our house growing up. I mean, it was really like
the first toy that I had. It was like and
my dad made it so it had a lot of
real sentimental value. And and with a rocking horse, it

(13:32):
really can be whatever you want it to be. It
can be, you know, it can look however you want.
It's it's a great toy. Really appreciate you calling in everybody.

Speaker 3 (13:40):
Everybody wanted to name it.

Speaker 2 (13:42):
Did you have a name? For yours was Poncho.

Speaker 1 (13:49):
I gotta ride poncho. You know, it's like playing on
the basketball hoop. I was watching Michael Jordan. You would
sit on the rocking horse and watch John Wayne. You know,
it's like good Joe, appreciate calling in man, Thanks so
much for listening.

Speaker 2 (14:02):
That's a good one. Both of those are good ones.

Speaker 1 (14:04):
Lionel trains, Uh, I mean gosh, you talk about losing
hours with these train sets. Jason on our phone line
four oh two, five five, eight eleven ten, Jason, welcome
into our show today.

Speaker 2 (14:17):
What's on your mind?

Speaker 4 (14:19):
Yeah?

Speaker 3 (14:19):
I remember the rocking horse. I remember the plastic ones
with a spring, the springs. I had one of those
when I was like two years old. I used to
bounce on that thing all the time. I rocket That
was a lot of And then when I was remember
the old thumb wrestler toys that you put them on
your thumbs. There were rubber men that had a little
spot for your thumbs to go.

Speaker 2 (14:35):
In yes wrestle with yeso.

Speaker 3 (14:38):
And then the metal Tanka tank truck. I had a
tanker truck.

Speaker 1 (14:42):
Nice Yeah, those uh, those Tonka trucks. I had variations.
I definitely had some that were Tonka. They had the
Tonka logo on it and stuff. But I had also
I don't know if it was Tonka, but I had
like a little like car that you could drive. Did
Tonka make those two?

Speaker 2 (14:59):
You know?

Speaker 1 (14:59):
I know that they're like Barbie cars that you can,
like little kids can sit in and drive. But those
were those were a lot of fun too growing up.
I appreciate the call, Jason.

Speaker 3 (15:08):
Yeah, that you pushed them.

Speaker 4 (15:10):
With your feet.

Speaker 1 (15:11):
Yeah, you could do that too, like Flintstone right with
a little petals on the bottom.

Speaker 4 (15:17):
Like.

Speaker 1 (15:17):
Uh, I can't remember who makes those. Maybe it was
Fisher Price. Maybe that's what I'm thinking of that that
made those little ones, but yeah, it's uh, those are
good ones too. Appreciate the call, Jason. You have a
great day. Yeah, let's go to John on the phone
line here, John, appreciate you for being on the show today.

Speaker 2 (15:32):
What's on your mind?

Speaker 4 (15:34):
Hey, I I agree with that guy about the h
on the bucking horse thing. It went to both my
boys and some nephews and niece's. Uh it lasted a
long time. But did they say anything about transformers?

Speaker 2 (15:49):
Transformers?

Speaker 4 (15:51):
Yes, okay, that's my boys went.

Speaker 1 (15:55):
Now, see, like those were awesome toys, and I had
a couple of those because you could, I mean just
to like roll them around like a car and then
all of a sudden, boom, there they are giant robot Transformers.
Let's see here, twenty twenty four class of twenty twenty
four Transformers action figures officially inducted into the National Toy

(16:16):
Hall of Fame.

Speaker 2 (16:16):
There they are cool to catch.

Speaker 4 (16:20):
Some originals worth a lot.

Speaker 2 (16:24):
Now.

Speaker 1 (16:24):
See that's the other thing too, right, It's just I
was talking about this earlier today with someone and they
told me that they had a couple like original tickle
mielmos still in the packaging. Now, I don't know what
a tickle Mielmo would go for in the packaging, but
it's kind of like a lot of toys are collectible.
They still are because they there either is or is

(16:44):
it a lot of them that are still very prevalent.
If you had like an old, you know, nineteen nineties
or even nineteen eighties version of something like the Transformers
and you have the original packaging, I've had to have
been a pretty uh, pretty pricey item.

Speaker 2 (16:59):
I would imagine back in.

Speaker 4 (17:00):
The day, I'm telling you and thinking what the head
guy then the semi drive. The semi truck was ultimates
Tom exactly. Yeah, that that replayed several times in our house.
But anyway, if you have an original Barbies in a box,
oh yeah, allegedly because now I've got so many different Barbies.

(17:26):
But anyway, yeah, that was all fun. But you have
the bucking Horse pay that was living for years.

Speaker 2 (17:35):
That's awesome. John.

Speaker 1 (17:35):
Appreciate the call today, man, thanks for listening to our show. Thanks, man,
appreciate that. Steve's on our phone line of four oh two, five, five, eight,
eleven ten. Welcome in, Steve, you're on eleven ten KFA, B.

Speaker 4 (17:48):
Bye. I'm going to date myself.

Speaker 5 (17:50):
But cap guns and caps MM and army men.

Speaker 1 (17:58):
All right, so the cap gun was a finalist in
two thousand but has not been inducted yet. And what
was the second one you mentioned? Oh, army men, Yeah,
army men, there we go. It was a finalist in
twenty twelve, a finalist in twenty thirteen, and officially inducted

(18:19):
in twenty fourteen, The Green Army Men. There you go, Steve. Now,
and again I love that. Have you seen Toy Story
the movie?

Speaker 5 (18:30):
Yeah?

Speaker 1 (18:30):
Yeah, so like I love that they incorporated some of
those simpler toys too, because obviously they have like woody
and buzzlight. You're in like fancy toys. But then they
also have a bunch of green army men that you know,
they have to work with when they do their operations
in the house, which I love, you know, and they're
like talking to them on walkie talkies. It's great stuff.
I appreciate the call, Steve. Thanks for listening to us today.

(18:53):
All right, we will continue to take phone calls here
if you want to call in four h two, five, five,
eight eleven. Ten had some emails coming in about people's
favorite toys. Had Rick say, my favorite toy grown up
was stretch Armstrong.

Speaker 2 (19:07):
Have you uh? He says.

Speaker 1 (19:08):
We would get three dudes on each side and pull
to see if we can destroy the thing. Have you
heard of stretch Armstrong?

Speaker 2 (19:15):
I haven't. I've played with it, Okay, so you you
you're strong?

Speaker 1 (19:18):
You you know you know Stretch Armstrong not ever even
a finalist in the Toy Hall of Fame for whatever
it was worth, but I think everybody had one right now.
This would be my thing is if you think about it,
what was the appeal you get to you get to
pull them apart.

Speaker 2 (19:39):
Stretch it right, I mean, yeah, I don't think it's
there's a lot of throw him.

Speaker 1 (19:44):
Yeah, Terry's on the phone at four oh two, five, five,
eight eleven ten.

Speaker 2 (19:48):
Welcome in, Terry.

Speaker 4 (19:51):
Hey.

Speaker 5 (19:51):
Of course, my favorite toy has been Legos. But at
the lift there. I don't know if you guys are
old enough to know anything about Stomper. Those were like
a little battery powered toy that could crawl over your fingers.
And it was kind of like a small little toy
goes anywhere jeep, but battery powered.

Speaker 1 (20:10):
Oh nice, Yeah, I now see. I maybe that's what
I had when I was a little kid, because I
think what I had was battery power too. It was
just kind of like a small, like I don't know,
it's a.

Speaker 5 (20:24):
Small four wheel drive vehicles back during the time when
really four wheel drive vehicles where everybody was getting them. Yeah,
but it was like a little toy car. And like
I said, you could even let it run over your fingers.
But then they had Stomper tracks that you could use.
They were kind of like a wild hot wheels track,
but it had bumps and all kinds of stuff and
you get them to go just about anywhere, so you

(20:44):
could even have the things run through water too.

Speaker 2 (20:46):
You know, I would have spent a lot of time
I had.

Speaker 1 (20:49):
I had like those high wheels tracks that the cars like,
they had the wheels on them in the track that
would like shoot the car forward, and you know, I'd
of course set up in a lot of ways so
they'd run into each other and there'd be big collisions.
But I just loved that stuff, so yeah, I would
set up these. I would have loved that little four
wheel drive guys able to climb over stuff.

Speaker 2 (21:11):
That's great stuff. Terry, appreciate you calling in today.

Speaker 5 (21:14):
What about the tractor though? Did they actually include track
the toy tractor? Is that strictly a Midwest thing?

Speaker 2 (21:21):
Yeah? I don't know.

Speaker 1 (21:22):
I don't see anything tractor related on the list here,
so I you know, maybe like small little cars, if
I had the right name or the right brand, that
maybe that would be something that I could like. I
may be able to find if I dig in a
little further, but I'm not seeing anything tractor related.

Speaker 5 (21:42):
And then if they can include Kreon, they should include
boxes because I had so much fun with big boxes,
making tanks and sleeping outside in a box.

Speaker 1 (21:53):
Now see Cardboard Box Class of two thousand and five.
It was they did, yep, the inducted it and it
wasn't even nominated. They just said it's overdue. A box
is a toy, We're putting it in the Hall of Fame.
So in two thousand and five, the cardboard Box officially
inducted into the National Toy Hall of Fame.

Speaker 5 (22:12):
There you go, that's.

Speaker 2 (22:14):
Great, Terry Ay.

Speaker 1 (22:15):
And you know what on his to his point about
the cardboard box, who didn't play in a cardboard box
or use a cardboard box for something, whatever it was.

Speaker 2 (22:25):
I love the TV box. It was just something different,
in different shape, whatever it was, you know.

Speaker 1 (22:28):
And there's a Rugrats episode, yeah that you go back,
it's classic. And Stu Pickles the dad of the main character,
Tommy Pickles. He is an inventor, which is a funny
job for somebody in the nineties to have, but he
realizes that no matter how hard he is trying to
make these crazy elaborate toys, his kids always are grabbing

(22:51):
and playing with the box and making all these different
toys with the cardboard box, and he eventually just gives
in and makes like this whole playground of cardboard boxes.

Speaker 2 (23:01):
It's pretty cool stuff.