Evening Star Newspaper, December 17, 1934, Page 12

A-12 « T0FS JRE RS (F IR LT Sireamline Trains, -Autes ¢ and Planes Demanded ¢ by 1934 Child. Even toys have gone streamline. When Santa Claus yisits the modern child this year; he will bring, stream- line trains, autos, airplanes and or.herl playthings which reflect the trend of the times. b “Toys, most of them miniature images of actual articles used in the adult world, have mirrored current life all through the ages,” says a bul- letin from the headquarters of the National Geographic Society. “The Egyptian child was content with a crude figure whose arms moved, sup- posedly to knead bread. The 1934 child demands sleek trains, tricycles with inverted V-shaped handlebars, and even roller skates with wheels protected by streamline fenders. ¢ Egyptians Used Rag Dolls. f’roy washboards and wooden tubs wére popular not long ago. Today, la@indry-minded little girls demand miniature electric washing machines. Small Egyptians cuddled the first rag dalls—rough shapes of linen' stuffed with papyrus grown on the Nile banks. nqthing less than lifelike reproduc- tigns of quintuplets satisty Jittle mothers’ today. Even educational toys have gone modern. Blocks have win- dows indicated on them so that tiny mkers may build apartment houses. Steel construction sets duplicate the bridges, engines, looms and other me- chanical wonders of the age. #“To determine what types of toys are preferred by children, and to evolve new ones, toy makers meet annually New York, Leipzig and other toy cepters. Very young children, it has been found, prefer simple, bfight red School children show & pref- ergnce for blue ones. Toy makers t constantly invent new toys, dress ol ones in new disguises or pack them in different cartons to attract buyers. Although few toys, except staples, are popular longer than five years, some, after a lapse in popularity, stage a comeback. An outstanding example is the revival of ping-pong. *To be in demand, toys should be e&psnonal‘ full of action, or dupli- s of large articles. Most toys used thyough the ages fall into one of these three categories. Card Games Modernized. *Today’s educational toys, such as A B C blocks, bead-counting racks, map games and ‘Authors,’ find their prototypes in the playing cards of France and Italy produced in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, which were designed to teach children heraldry, history and geography. Lon- don children of that period received card games teaching them rules of grammar, arithmetic or religion. #Such toys are usually bought by adults. If left to themselves children select different kinds. Noisy toys, such as drums, whistles and rattles, are a‘?ong the most treasured playthings over the world. Children in an- ciént Athens rolled hoops to which were attached jangling metal disks. Young Japan and India beat drums and shake tambourines. The Lapp mother hangs silver bglls on the hood of, her baby's cradle. *The urge to ride or drive, push or pill articles or other children around in wagons, is strong in children. Just a$ the modern youngster pedals up and down the sidewalkiin a miniature afrplane, so early Greek boys delighted in dragging along their two-wheeled clay carts, and the son of the first Napoleon enjoyed riding in his’ tiny carriage drawn by white lambs. Action Toys Favored. *“Toys of action are always favorites. Egyptian boys threw balls of reed, leather or wood. Young Athenians had swings, whipping tops and threw knucklebones, similar to our jack- stones. Roman children also spun tops and caught balls stuffed with feathers or fig seeds. Children who age pleased with celluloid pinwheels ngw would probably have gone into eéstasy over the pearl-studded, gold windmill given in 1930 to Isabella of Bavaria. #*The recent Yo-Yo craze and the Jigsaw puzzle fad were duplicated in the eighteenth century in France, when every one, man, woman or child, played with animated pasteboard fig- ures called Pantins. “Mechanical toys, which found their apotheosis in the toy nightingale of Apdersen’s fairy tales, are not new. e early Greeks had them. They were favorites of Louis XIV, and broke the monotony for women in the har- ems of Arabia. In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, when all moving toys were extremely compli- cated, those of Nuremberg became werld-famous. Bewildering Selection. ““The 1934 child chooses from a be- wildering selection of talking dolls, nfusic boxes, boats and engines that run when wound up, toys worked by the pouring of sand or water, planes that fly by elastic and electric trains speeding around circles of track. SMany children, however, express the sentiment that they don’t want ‘{E"s that play with me,’ but ‘toys I cdn play with” One little girl, taken tHrough a toy department by the pro- ptietor and offered anything she ———— DO TRY THIS! Either spray or drop E-Z NASAL SPRAY into your nose. Smarting and gestion a quickly relieved and breathing through the nose many time Bring you nose comfort and also helps prevent many colds from spreading. lected, scorned the $100 mechanical dolls and chose a 35-cent stuffed squir- rel. Among the oldest toys are & limestone pig and & lion on a’stand found in Susa, Persis, showing that animals have always appealed dren. Mickey Mouse and the Three Little Pigs find a ready sale today. “Children like replicas of articles used in adult life. Miniature tool chests and geology sets with micro- scope and rock samples, catch the eyes of boys., Girls arc entranced by kitchen cabinets, stocked with tiny groceries, or doll houses complete from cellar to attic. Dolls Most Populaf.” " “No replica is more popular than the doll. Young Greeks mothered dolls of terra cotta, bone or wood. Roman dolls of wood had movable arms and legs attached by strings. American Indians possess dolls made of gourds, corn husks or beaded deer- skin, while Eskimos have dolls dressed in fur. Dolls with movable heads and eyes were familiar in France in the to chil- || -THE- EVENING ‘STAR, WASHINGTON, D. C. MONDAY, DECEMBER -17, 1934 early eighteenth century. As s girl, Queen Victoria cherished 132 wooden dolls, 33 of which she dressed herself court ladies and actresses. with its pean eighteenth centuries, when not only the knjves, forks and tea sets, but even the furniture and dolls as well were made of silver. These were mace not by toymakers, but by famous silver- smiths in Paris, London and Frank- fort. One of the dauphins (heirs to the French throne) had an entire tary weapons have been the playthings of boys from remote times. Models of machine guns ‘and barbed wire en- boys have their parallels in the models of the Bastile and the guillotine with which young Parisians once played.” ~AT THE 4-Piece Peg Ma Carefully constructed, artistically styled and nicely finished. One of the finest values we have Terms! — 3-Piece Kroehler Bed-Davenport Suite Covered in choice new materials. The daven- port provides- an extra needed. Easy Terms. Buy Now—Pay Next Year! RAILWAY WALKOUT IS SEEN WEDNESDAY Head of Trainmen Asserts Noth- ing Has Been Done to Avert Strike. By the Assocated Press. LOS ANGELES, December 17.—D. A. MacKenzie, international vice president of the Brotherhood of Rail- way Trainmen, declared no progress had been made to avert a strike of 1,600 workers of the Pacific Electric Railway, operating between Los An- geles and suburban cities, and indi- cated workers may walk out next ‘Wednesday. “It was just another meeting,” Mac- i Kenzie said, referring to a conference NATIONAL 2 ever offered. Easy full size bed when Buy Now—Pay Next ple Bed Room Sit *84 “If the others agree to with us, and there is no my mind what their attitude the ‘time of calling the strike Reich Spurs Industry. One-third of Germany's industrial activities are due to government stim- ulation. » | mony that nearly INSULL “JUNK” HELD RATED AT MILLIONS Firm Receiver Says Books Carry Pilss of Brick at $3,000,000 Value. By the Assoclated Press. CHICAGO, December 17.—Testi- property was carried at fictitious values amount- ing to millions of dollars on the books of the United Public Service. Co., a $50,000,000 Insull subsidiary, was disclosed here in a special master in chancery’s report filed with Fed- eral Judge Walter C. Lindley. Transcripts of the testimony of Samuel W. White, equity ‘receiver for the concern, said the books listed at $3,000,000 property consisting pally of “rusty junk” and “piles brick. 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