Toys and Games
Here are some home-made toys that children used to play with. Some have instructions on how to make them.
BUBBLE BLOWER
Get an old sewing-thread spool, take some soap, and make a lather in water. Dip one end of the spool in the lather and blow through the other end and make bubbles.
BUTTON ON A STRING
Thread a piece of thread 36 inches long through two holes of a button crossways and tie the ends together to form a loop with the button in the center. Move your thumbs in and start turning it round and round till it was wound up. Then start releasing the tension and make it whiz.
CORN GUNS
Another toy made with big spools. It had a big opening that would hold a grain of corn or a pea or a bean. Well, take a carpet tack and tack this rubber band around it. Have a plunger in back and this rubber band came around it. Have a little slot in the plunger so the band would hold in the slot. Put a pea or a grain of corn in there and flip it with that plunger and itd send it a pretty good ways..
CORNSTALK ANIMALS
Take one piece of a cornstalk for the body, then take another stalk and split strips off the outside for the legs and the neck. Then make the head and tail from other pieces. The head would be made from the hard outside of the cornstalk. The body, ears, and face would be made out of the stalk, too.
CROSSBOW
Hickory is the best wood for the bow, but white oak will work, too. Get a plank and saw it out like the stock of a gun, make a bow like for a plain bow, and mount the bow crosswise to the gun stock at the front. Then string the bow and make a trigger in the gun stock to hld the string back, set arrow in bow, and pull the string back ready to shoot the arrow. The trigger'd hold the string ready to shoot
till pulled, then it would shoot the arrow. Hew the arrows out
round and just leave the ends flat if going to practice. If hunting, take a .22 cartridge hull and drive a sharpened nail through its end from the inside and then mount that hull on the end of arrow.
DUMB BELL
Take a section of a hollow log and tack a peice of hide over one end. Then punch a small hole in the center of the hide. Then take a long string and tie a knot in one end and feed the string through the hole in the hide so that the knot catches against the outside of the hole and the string comes through the log and out the other end. Then wax the end of the string with beeswax. When you pull against the waxed part of the string it makes a sound just like a bull a'bellering.
RATTLETRAP
A white-oak split snapping against a handcarved cog wheel as the box spins around the handle causes the racket.
SLINGSHOTS
Mountain kids have played with sliingshots for years. Used them to kill birds and knock out windows of the schoolhouse. Used shoe tongues or leather to make the slings because they wouldnt break easily. Canvass or toubh cloth will make a pretty good one, too. You can throw a rock three times better with a slingshot than you can with your hand. Use old bicycle inner tubes for the rubber strips.
SQUIRT GUNS
Make them like pop guns. A hollow piece and a plunger. Pull the plunger back and suck water up in there and then push the plunger to squirt it out. Sometimes kids would fill their squirt guns with hog manure and squirt that mess all over each other.
STICK HORSES
Get a stick or a broomstick, tie a string on it for a bridle, and straddle it, and lope away.
SPLIT WHISTLES
Made whistles our of goose quills. Split the feather and blow against it. Or split an ivy stick and put your leaf down in there and trim it off and then blow on that.
Get your own
