I had the original base station Johnny Astro when i was 9. It was so cool to be able to control those balloons. Base unit was much easier to control your spacecraft with. Smoother thrust control lever and your control fan was lower in relation to your balloon . You really could rescue tiny stranded astronauts with it. Being a kid i eventually got tired of it and i mounted mine on a piece of wood and i made an airboat out of it. It was really fast and could make the Kessel run in 12 parsecs.
@jimroberts2808
Жыл бұрын
I had one and loved playing with it. Christmas 1969
@paulwhetstone0473
2 жыл бұрын
Me, my wife and 7.5 year old daughter just read a book where the protagonist, a 2nd grader named Alvin Ho, brought his vintage Johnny Astro to show-and-tell.
@sinsagoodmansbrother
11 жыл бұрын
That's great! LOL... I wish I had thought to do that back when I was 11 years old back in 67... Great, Great memories...
@Rocketryman
13 жыл бұрын
I had one of those! I want that one! lol My favorite toy.
@boomer3150
5 ай бұрын
It WAS great..had one in Chicago in 1967 or 8.
@kennethschlatmann776
11 жыл бұрын
Cool but the original, a desk top controller with a joystick for direction, a throttle and a landing platform was a lot more like a real space toy. I loved that toy. It was truly one of the best.
@johncarpenter624
7 жыл бұрын
I had the base station and control levers as well. Set the balloon on the target, set the controller to blow it upward etc. lots of fun remember it well.
@beatler11
3 жыл бұрын
I had one. I wish it was 1967.
@MichaelKrick-hn2tu
Ай бұрын
VERY COOOOOOOOOL !
@Aerochalklate
13 жыл бұрын
I read a book called Alvin Ho which was published in 2009. He and his dad played with Johnny Astro.
@ComicManGus
5 жыл бұрын
I HAD NEVER HEARD OF GARLOO OR JOHNNY ASTRO UNTIL TODAY AND I AM AN OLD GUY - THANKS SO MUCH FOR POSTING THESE - COMIC MAN GUS
@cyh4031
4 жыл бұрын
Base unit was way easier to control! That was one of my two favorite toys growing up. My other favorite, was the virti copter space edition...where you could pick up a space capsule with a helicopter, and return it to base. I had these during the 60's at the height of the space race...and they were probably both very instrumental in developing my love for space flight and aviation!
@ToyKingWonder
15 жыл бұрын
These are fantastic toys. I have one of the consoles that was NOS, I have played with it (had to fix a soft spot in the throttle) but kept the astronaut in his original bag never opened. Nap Pepin has great new balloons with proper markings on them and re-usable clips so you don't have to tie the balloons.
@Cacher29
11 жыл бұрын
I just found one in my parents attic!
@Modmart
15 жыл бұрын
Had this as a kid! Loved it but was never able to do anything more than just blow the balloon all over the place. I had the more 'Control Panel' version though. Not this hand held thing. Maybe I would have been better with this but hey I was only 6 when I had one. Nice video Thanks!
@mikewilensky1322
5 жыл бұрын
I had this too, too, and the base station control panel. What a wonderful toy in the pre-drone era. You used your hand and eye skills to "pilot" it and you used your imagination. I wonder what happened to mine, as I'm in my 60's now. Toys back then are nothing like toys now. It was a SWELL toy!!
@bauertime
3 жыл бұрын
You can build one if you take a shop vac and put the hose on the exhaust end and put a very small weight on the bottom of a balloon.
@c3cubed
12 жыл бұрын
Yep, one of my favourite toys as a little kid. Had the console/joystick model. The commercial made the fan look like a "radar" so it was a bit deceiving. I thought the balloons had some sort of miniature self-propulsion unit until I opened the box. Nevertheless, the simplicity of it worked surprisingly well. The fan design had an excellent wind force and velocity focus for such a small unit.
@armandmora1232
4 жыл бұрын
BALLOON SEEMS TOO HEAVY, I HAD SAME TOY WHEN I WAS KID
@boomer3150
5 ай бұрын
I had that, a Wham-o Air Blaster, a Monster Magnet and other cool toys.
@TallshrewFishing
6 жыл бұрын
I always wondered what they were exactly and suspected they would be no good as the advertising back then was allowed to take great liberties with the facts but this really is rather cool. Thanks for the demo.
@boomer3150
5 ай бұрын
It was as cool as advertised. Well, almost. The TV commercial showed it flying outside...really couldn't do that.
@twombonu
9 жыл бұрын
Controlling the trajectory of a balloon, much less a round balloon instead of an oval shaped dirigible seems like an impossible feat. This is truly a cool gadget! Makes you wonder if they ever considered that kind of balloon control in the old days for a full size balloon carrying passengers! I suppose a control fan of the size needed for that would have been cost prohibitive. I remember seeing the commercial on TV for this toy back in 1965, when I was 10 years old!
@5urg3x
5 жыл бұрын
Lol dude, wind would’ve killed it from ever working outside
@boomer3150
5 ай бұрын
@@5urg3x Exactly, but the TV commercial I saw showed it working outside. Still, it was great indoors!
@TralfazConstruction
12 жыл бұрын
I hooked-up my Lionel train transformer to the terminals on my Johnny Astro. Until the motor burned out I was flying my balloons up to 30 feet away (my recollection); under control too. At higher power settings on the transformer/rheostat the air stream bordered on being too diffuse.
@TralfazConstruction
11 жыл бұрын
You'd only have brought on Johnny's premature end as I did. For what it was it was a really neat device. Would that I had thought to keep all of my toys from that era in pristine condition. I hope I have smartened up a bit since then. Best wishes.
@ikyuhoho
14 жыл бұрын
i know this because i read alvin ho btw its a very cool toy !!
@borusa32
9 жыл бұрын
I had the original larger unit when I was a kid-I think I played with it for about a year then rebuilt the fan as a Jupiter 2 astrogation unit. It was pretty tricky to fly the balloons but you could shoot rubber bands at them from the other side of the room when they were hovering. Overall it now seems a fairly dumb idea for a toy -cashing in on the space race.
@dashfatbastard
8 ай бұрын
I have the original. It's actually easier to do it using the joystick. The linkages have a bit too much play in them, but having at least the affirmative point of the base seems to steady it.
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