My Childhood Highway Patrol Car

Just the other day when I went to visit my brother, I came across an old toy that I have totally forgotten about. It was still in the original package. It is none other than a battery Operated Highway Patrol Car.


I vividly remembered that this toy was a gift by an late uncle in the late 1970s or early 1980s. It was a gift to my elder brother and I didn't get much chances to play with this toy. It was a siblings thingy that I was not allowed to cross the line to play with some toys.

Anyway I was not really drawn to this toy as it is noisy and  I cannot push it around as a car. I will explain later the reason why.


The features of this toy car consist of an Mystery Action, Alarm Siren and Blinking top light. Take note of the above patrol car drawing for now.


I was excited to open the box of the toy again after say like more than 20 years or more. I was more surprised to see the condition of the toy. There it is, the full glory of the colors and design was intact!


The front bumper and the metallic color was not that bad. It could be because we hardly take it out to play for a very long time.


Remember the illustration of the box? The speakers are suppose to be on the front of the Police car but for the toy it was on top of the car seats.

However such details doesn't really bother much for children at that age. What matter was this toy can move, have blinking lights and sound. I was very impressed that the chrome coloring look as good as new.

At the back view of the car was the license plate of this vehicle PD-741. I would make a safe guess that PD means Police or Patrol Department. No idea about 741 tho. Both license plate and back lights were painted on it. No stickers.


How this toy move has nothing to do with the four visible wheels. At this angle, you can see all four wheels were off the ground reviling a hidden wheel under the car. That is the mechanism that drive and make the car turning.


At a closer look, you can see the surface of the car is not that "new". What do you expect for a toy that was played by two kids? However it's a mircale the paint job was still well intact.


Below the back booth was the On/Off Switch of the vehicle and the battery compartment. I didn't try out if the mechanism of that still works today but I wouldn't really bet on that.

For me, this toy is in retirement stage. As long as it look good, that all that matter for display and memory purposes. Yes some toys do goes through retirement stage by the owners for keeping while some were given away. For this toy, my brother has kept it for memory and we had a good time talking about the history of it and piecing the memories together.

So that's all for now. Do you any memory of your childhood toy car? Are they still around?

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