GI joe with a working parachute

Quoted: I'm glad I could stir a few memories.  It sounds like a lot of you have some decent stories to tell.

Great post - I played with those things alot when I was young and hadn't thought about them for a long, long time...

Quoted: www.users.vance.net/grayarea/fantastic%20free%20fall%201010.jpg GI joe with a working parachute

Holy crap i think i had one of those. I remember having a highspeed version of the cheapo jumpers .

Quoted: Quoted: www.users.vance.net/grayarea/fantastic%20free%20fall%201010.jpg GI joe with a working parachute Holy crap i think i had one of those. I remember having a highspeed version of the cheapo jumpers .

IIRC there was a D-Day commemorative GI JOE with real working 'chute a few years ago.

Saw some in a store in the Houston Galleria when I was getting Christmas presents

I think the name of the store is "The Discovery Zone"

IIRC they cost between $10-15

Back in the "good old days" we made our own using regular toy Soldiers, string and hankerchiefs

A few buddies and myself bought some and deployed them on Jump #5 on Fryar DZ. The black hat was laughing his arse off.

My brother and I used to make chutes out of some white cotten cloth, that was tied to strings, and the little man was actually a steel or brass nut.  

Man did we have fun!  We were always getting our paratroopers caught in the neighbors phone and electrical lines!

Dont feel too old guys, Im 21 and I fondly remember playing with those army men.  

They just never lasted long with me.


Fortunately the local thrift store kept me fairly well stocked with army men to explode.

yes, We would tie firecrackers on them and drop them off the barn roof. Lot's of fun. circa 1967

Those things were great!  I'm sure that there are still a few buried in my parent's yard that went MIA.

Like a lot of you have mentioned, I also grew up with the house being a pit-stop.  If I took a can of spaghetti-o's and a pocket knife along, I was gone all day.  I would buid forts in the woods, catch frogs in the pond and fight off the German Army in some epic battles!  I can't imagine what it would be like growing up without places to roam, and the freedom to do so.    

Quoted: I miss my youth

+1

Quoted: The root of my BRD.

thats a great website
I had 1000s of those guys my mom would get big bags of them at the goodwill

alot of the sets i got from the goodwill were hella old 30years ago I can only imagine what some of those tanks artillary and planes  are worth today


had a couple od complete US vs German sets in boxes
From that website

Why Army Men are Better Than Action Figures


Arms don't fall off Army Men unless you chop them off

Army Men never lose their weapons because they're molded right on

With Army Men, you get an army.  Action figures come one at a time

You don't have to read the associated comic books to understand who's on which side with Army men.  It's simple - one side is green and the other is another color

You don't have to worry about buying accessories for Army men.  They come with everything you need.

Army Men's vehicles don't break, run out of ammo or need new batteries.  The only problem with Army Men is that wheels can fall off the jeeps.

Army men are the same yesterday and today and tomorrow.  They never go out of style when a new TV show and comic book series is released.

Army men can be had in abundance for a small percentage of what it costs to buy a team of Action Figures.

It costs a fortune to buy a whole series of Action Figures.  With Army Men, you get the whole set for one low price.

You don't have to wait for a new accessory or figure to be released so you can complete the set.  Army Men are always available with all the goodies, all the time.



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You mean like these?????

Quoted: cgi.ebay.com/Plastic-Parachute-Men-1dz-Party-Favors_W0QQitemZ5641434325QQcategoryZ3200QQssPageNameZWD1VQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

Those are the liberals idea of soldiers.....fruity colors and no guns. How does one expect to defend the country without guns?

Quoted: yup, I remember them.  You can get them here for aroung $4/dz. Paratroopers

they dont have guns, wtf are they going to do with no guns???

Quoted: Quoted: cgi.ebay.com/Plastic-Parachute-Men-1dz-Party-Favors_W0QQitemZ5641434325QQcategoryZ3200QQssPageNameZWD1VQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem Those are the liberals idea of soldiers.....fruity colors and no guns. How does one expect to defend the country without guns?

They parachute in behind enemy lines, and then peacefully protest.

My Fiance and I went to the Aviation Museum in Hampton VA this summer.  I found a Parachute guy for my Nephew in the gift shop.  This is not your average parachute guy from our youth.  This thing it pretty cool and does not tangle or rip without some effort.


I found this site that carries them.  The museums online shop does not have them listed.
Parachute Men

Quoted: Those are too big. These are closer, and cheaper.

Those are exactly the ones that I used to get.  The parachute even has the name printed on it:  "Poopa Troopers".

Thanks much, link saved.  The little "animal parachutists" which are also available (they show up as one of the pictures near the bottom) also look really cute.  Gonna have to get a bunch of both!

had plenty of them, great fun

Quoted: I loved them when I was a kid. I tossed one off the roof of a 27 story dorm building when I was in college.

Pearce-Ford Tower?  WKU Alumnus?

here are ones with guns!

yea, I had those... also the little rubber space men with the parachutes

I rember my mom buying me those.  I am not even that old, but ya you dont see them any more.  

I had some HAHO jumpers I lofted with model rockets.

Along with the little para dudes, the corner store used to carry those balsa gliders and rubber band powered planes that actually flew pretty well. I spent hours trying to figure out how to get the para dudes to deploy from the planes, launched from the roof of the garage. I don't think I ever got it figured out.

I used to attach "Piccolo Pete"s to the gliders. They made a pretty decent rocket type engine. Then my dad showed me how to pinch the end of the piccolo pete, to make it exxplode. Many fighters and bombers were blown out of the sky after that. You didn't even have to hit them with the bb guns, but you could claim you did.

Younger brother had "adventure people", and the adventure people had a parachute with a molded soft plastic harness that buckled, a nice sized cloth chute, and very tangle resistant thick plastic lines.

Younger brother also had gerbils.

House had four floors.

Today we'd be sent for psychological evaluation for animal cruelty, although the gerbils were never harmed and we'd tested thoroughly withplaydough molded onto an 'adventure person' to approximate the weight of the gerbil as determined by a postal scale.

Gerbils didn't seem to mind at all. If we'd have had a bigger chute we'd probably have launched my guinea pig but I could never get parental approval to buy a surplus drag chute from the army navy store, I think they suspected something...

But also used model rocketry parachutes to bring down other things, like various star wars figures. Yoda was a great paratrooper.