The 70’s Toys That Were Stand-Ins for Computers to Come

In the 1970’s we already knew we wanted computers — and the lack of chips didn’t stop us.

People may be familiar with the stories about “Cargo Cults” from World War II, but the brief summary for those who don’t know (and don’t want to click the link) is: Troops occupied islands in the Pacific during the war, and often gave or traded goods to indigenous people living there. After the war the troops left, the goods stopped coming, and in some cases this spawned rituals and religious activity intended to bring back the troops and goods.

Approximations of higher technology things, such as airplanes, were sometimes constructed from simple local materials. These constructions of course had no plane-like capability, but served the immediate purpose of being a stand-in for the real thing, for use in these rituals.

I’m an old guy, but not so old that I remember World War II. But I do remember a time in the late 1960’s and early 1970’s, watching all sorts of sci fi shows featuring cool and sometimes dangerous computers. These machines had bright colorful buttons and displays, and some you could even talk to and they would answer back, like in movies like 2001: A Space Odyssey or the TV show Star Trek.

And I wanted to be the one pushing those buttons and interacting with these…