Most of my favorite childhood toys date back to the early sixties- some of them would be considered totally insane but today's enlightened parents. A couple of these have been mentioned earlier.
Jarts (or Lawn Darts) Two teams on each end of your yard, a small circle made of tubing for a target by each team and you threw these giant darts with metal spiked tips toward each other. Yes, you had a dart flying right toward you, but you moved out of the way- we were not complete morons.
Thinkmaker. My best friend and I have most of the molds between us- the real challenge was to make perfect multicolored 'things' with the plastigoop. IMO the Eye was the hardest.
Chemistry Set. Real chemicals, glass test tubes, alcohol burner. Felt no need to swallow any of that stuff or shove broken glass into my eyes- that chemistry set had almost every hot button parents now worry about.
Estes/Century Solid Fuel Rockets. At the time the kits had no preworked parts- you just got a tube, balsa nose cone and fins. The real fun was just getting a bunch of parts and designing your own. They still make these rockets but they are expensive now and a lot of plastic...
Erector Set. Metal girders, plates, axles and a multi-drive motor and a lot of tiny ,machine screws and nuts. I built all sorts of things with it, from oscillating fans to a fairly good robot. I still have some of those pieces- they came in very handy when mounting car stereos.
Air Rifle. You primed it with a slide stock and when it fired it sounded real cool. I also figured out if I shoved the end into some dirt I could fire a plug about 12 feet. My parents never found out about that one.
Cap Rockets and Cap Guns. A little roll of caps just cost pennies but made a great bang. You threw the rockets which looked like little bombs, the guns were fantastic to play with. I had a couple of pistols and a machine gun looking thing which could fire a bunch in a row.
Original 12" G.I Joe - never got the big toys like the Jeep which was made to his scale, but I did make some out of cardboard. His weapon sets had wonderfully detailed guns and knives
Zoids Robots. About 7 inches tall, motorized and articulated. They moved on tank treads and had spring operated hands/claws. Realistic control panels and clear parts so you could see stuff inside them. Each one was unique, one super cool one had the ability to power accessories. Parts of them still exists as donor parts in a couple of scratch builds.
There a couple toys I forget the names of which were quite fun-
A tethered helicopter ( you held a flashlight type batter and motor with a cord attached to the helicopter a couple of feet away. You could control the speed of the blades and by tilting the handle get it to fly and navigate around the room
Metal airplanes about four inches long, I believe by Mattel. They had a metal wire clip you would put on top, string a cord through it and attached the far end to a control tower, your end had a resonator and platform for them to sit on. When you tilted them off they would make a roaring sound as the slid down the cord, by adjusting the tension you could guide them in for a good landing on their retractable wheels. Each plane looked wild, kinda like Hot Wheels cars.
A combat set which featured a helmet with drop down tinted visor and wind up mechanical bug-aliens you would hunt. Never got the whole set but while everyone else in my neighborhood was walking around with Danial Boone Coonskin caps and flintlocks, I was in my spacey looking helmet and with my air rifle.
