Comments on: MERRY-GO-ROUND DRIVEN BY HAND

By: ATHENA

ATHENA — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 19:56:55 +0000

BTW, mine also had a protective dome-like cover in the middle to hide the moving parts. Someone could sit in the middle, but they wouldn’t be able to stay there for very long! LOL
Athena

By: ATHENA

ATHENA — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 19:52:30 +0000

I had one of these in the seventies. It was already pretty old back then. Someone gave it to my dad, he fixed it up and it worked great! It had 4 seats and was hand AND foot powered. As you pulled the hand lever towards you, you pushed the sturrups with your feet. I don’t remember anyone getting hurt with the working parts of it, but when 4 kids powered the thing, we could get it moving very fast, and the object of that was to see who fell off first! The more sensitive kids would throw up too. LOL. Good times!!!! I’ve never seen another one like the one I had, but I’d love to find a picture of one. I imagine that they were popular at one point in time.

By: Dennis Watts

Dennis Watts — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 00:47:51 +0000

todd i am new at this.my son emailed me a picture of my toy.iam not sure how to email it to you.i am trying to figure it out .my email is metalmanwatts@hotmail.com if you are interested i will kept trying.

By: Todd

Todd — Sat, 19 Sep 2009 06:38:49 +0000

I also had one of these when i was a kid. we had hours of fun and had the whole neighborhood on it at times. we had two to the seat sometimes. Wish I could find one or a picture of one. Thanks Todd

By: Dennis Watts

Dennis Watts — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 18:16:00 +0000

i have the toy you are talking about. we called it a whirlly bird.i found it in the bushes on an old plantation. icould not get it to work. so i built one in my fabshop .it works great but it does have pinch points in the center

By: jami

jami — Tue, 19 May 2009 13:38:43 +0000

What is the name of that contraption with the 4 seats. I have been looking for one all over. My neighbor had one and it was sooo much fun. Any idea where I can purchase one now Do they even still make them?

thanks.

By: Toronto

Toronto — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 03:27:20 +0000

Matt – I think it’s been reprinted a few times, in some of those ‘100 things for Boys to Make’ books.*
Similar things are in some of the Lee Valley reprints series (either The Boy Mechanic or the Popular Mechanics series.)

* Look for the ones with a warning against actually making things from their articles – they tend to have all the cool stuff. ;0)

By: Matt DeGroot

Matt DeGroot — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 00:54:22 +0000

Cool, so does anyone know where you can get plans for one of these??

By: Toronto

Toronto — Sat, 03 Jan 2009 05:14:40 +0000

I remember those too, both the commercial ones and some big home rigged ones at campgrounds and such. Our school, on the other hand, had two massive merry-go-rounds of the traditional sort – 2″ diameter steel pipe welded to a 6″ center pipe and connected by 2×10″ wooded seats. To get it really going fast, you’d get some kids to run inside the wheel, then try to hop up. If you tripped, you could break a leg or crack your skull. If you slipped off, it was your arm in danger.

No pinchy bits, though, and the bearings were covered (and very very smooth.)

By: M. Dittmer

M. Dittmer — Sat, 03 Jan 2009 02:18:50 +0000

Oh my gosh. Our neighbors had one of these. It was so much fun. It had four seats and it was red and blue. 1,2,3,or 4 children could ride on it. This was the best toy ever. It was so, so, so , much fun. I guess there is always a safety problem with anything that is fun but this was the best toy ever. Bikes can be dangerous too, it all depends on how they are used. This toy was the best.
Lots of hours of fun.

By: carmengratton

carmengratton — Sat, 17 May 2008 01:26:15 +0000

We had this contraption of a toy too in the early 60s ours had 4 seats and one day we were playing on it and all 4 seats were taken..sooo I had the big idea to sit in the middle on the metal that turns the whole machine Well once all the kids started pumping hard to get the thing spinning it took a whole 30 seconds or so to turn that metal and trap half my buttocks I flew off screaming and crying and ended up with a very large and painfull bruise that covered all of me. There was no such thing as safety c aps or covers for them. This was a horrible experience and I think Im still tramatised. I wonder if I have a lawsuit?

By: Noam

Noam — Wed, 21 Nov 2007 21:12:36 +0000

I had a more modern version of this contraption when I was a kid. Mine was a bit smaller, and it had 4 seats and was VERY heavy. It must have been made in the forties or early fifties. My dad brought it home on the back of the truck. The worst that ever happened to me or any kid who played on it was throwing up all the way home! But that’s what we were trying for!

By: James

James — Wed, 24 Oct 2007 18:33:11 +0000

How about generating electricity with a merry-go-round?

http://news.byu.edu/archive07-.....round.aspx

By: Stannous

Stannous — Mon, 23 Jul 2007 10:45:49 +0000

There was similar one of these that used foot pumps rather than hand levers in the town where I grew up on the Jersey Shore.
I loved it becdause you could operate it alone and still get in really spinning.
Dangerous? Sure, but considering that all the kids there spent the summer evenings chasing and running through the clouds of DDT sprayed by anti-mosquito trucks, probably pretty small change.
*cough*

By: MAKE: Blog

MAKE: Blog — Sun, 22 Jul 2007 21:13:33 +0000

Merry-go round driven by hand…

Kid powered merry-go round, Popular Science 1934 – Link. More: PlayPumps – Kid powered merry-go-round water pumps – Link. Propeller drives homemade flying merry-go-round – Link…….

By: Blurgle

Blurgle — Sun, 22 Jul 2007 15:26:01 +0000

I don’t know if we’re overprotecting our children. I think we’re under-estimating the dangers because we were never killed by them, and the ones who were killed aren’t here to point that out.

There’s that chain e-mail about how “everything was dangerous in 1979, and we survived, so safety rules are stupid”. The thousands upon thousands worldwide that didn’t survive because of lack of safety rules aren’t here to rebut the e-mail.

Accidental child deaths have been cut in half since the 60s in most of the Western world, and that’s specifically due to laws. Without laws, thousands more would be dead.

By: Jim Dunn

Jim Dunn — Sun, 22 Jul 2007 13:05:52 +0000

For extra fun, count the finger mashers and leg manglers in the picture.

I’m not one to play the Ralph Nader card, and I do think that at times we’re overprotecting our children today. But that thing scares me to death.