Play set:Johnny Astro Space Vehicle Launcher

The Johnny Astro play set, manufactured by the Topper Corporation in the mid-1960s recalls the excitement of the United States' space program when astronauts first ventured into space. Designed by independent toy designer Sol Friedman, Johnny Astro launched a balloon space vehicle and controlled its flight by directing a whirling fan at it. The play set's box boasted that Johnny Astro "Really Flies, No Wires, No Connections." Many men who grew up in the 1960s recall their Johnny Astros, and many of them remember it as the best toy they ever had. One grown man quoted in the New York Times spoke of the toy with something like awe: "It's mesmerizing. It's hypnotic. There was nothing else like it ever made." The Internet has a number of sites dedicated to the Johnny Astro play set and to making and selling reproduction parts for the toy. The donation of the Johnny Astro set includes reproduction balloons and landing carriages, suggesting that numbers of men are reliving their childhoods--launching their Johnny Astro space vehicles and flying them through the universe.