Of toys and junk

Making toys from junk is a genuinely joy-prone activity, and though it may not classify as a sport or even a game, it is a junkly activity of the highest order - recycling fun if ever there was such a thing. The Mechanical Toys Page describes 15 different toys, each of which is crafted out of found materials (though some may be a little challenging to find), and each of which results in an action toy exhibiting some minor marvel of movement. Like, for example, the Water Rocket, which proves maybe not so easy to build, but the payoff is dramatic and crowd-pleasing.

For those of us seeking more immediate mechanical toy-induced spectacle, there's the match rocket. To build it, all you need is two wooden matches and some aluminum foil. Granted, you don't want young kids actually playing with matches. But what a rite of passage, so to speak.

The site hasn't been updated in a while (maybe 5 years), and the author's email as well as many of the links don't work. But it provides some excellent descriptions of junk-built joys, and is as powerful an invitation to play as it was when it was first launched.

Searching for similar, I came across this significantly similar page of Folk Toys as well as this significantly dissimilar page of images of simple, mechanical, art-like, toys. Though there's no instructions, the images are clear enough to inspire reinvention.