Accidental Origins of Four Classic Toys

Wallpaper cleaner or spray-on instant casts for injuries don't sound like loads of fun at a party or in a playroom, but what inventors created with these particular goals turned out to be some of our most classic toys.

Four popular classic toys came out of inventive experimentation with more practical aims in mind.

Silly Putty

Silly Putty is a simple little toy that is still very entertaining to children. Children of the '60s, '70s or '80s might remember flattening a wad against comics or newspaper text to copy it, but this is no longer possible due to changes in the inking process. The sticky goo can still be bounced, stretched, molded or contorted in all sorts of interesting ways.

Silly Putty was invented by James Wright in 1943 as a kind of rubber substitute during a period of World War II rubber rationing. In General Electric's laboratory in New Haven, Connecticut, when Wright combined silicone oil with boric acid, he discovered the resulting strange putty had all sorts of unusual qualities like a greater elasticity and bounce than rubber had as well as a higher melting temperature. He knew it wouldn't work as a rubber substitute and couldn't think of any other practical use for it, so he sent samples of it out to scientists all over the world.

It wasn't until much later that it became a popular toy. In the years between 1943 and 1949, the putty, which was first known as Nutty Putty, sometimes found its way to parties where it was entertaining to adults. In 1949, Ruth Fallgatter had good success selling the putty at her toy store, The Block Shop. With the help of marketing consultant, Peter Hodgson, she sold the putty in plastic cases through a catalog. By 1950, she lost interest, but Hodgson, who was $12,000 in debt already, borrowed $147 to buy all the samples he could and eventually the production rights. An article in the New Yorker began to bring Silly Putty more attention and success, with Hodgson selling 250,000 in three days. Initially, it was marketed to adults, but by 1955, most customers were children. In 1957, the first TV commercial was aired during the Howdy Doody show.

Play Doh

Play Doh, that colorful molding clay, is still a staple in nursery schools, and it was a nursery school teacher who played an important role in finding a new child-friendly use for this invention.

Play Doh started out as a wallpaper cleaner for a company called Kutol back in 1933, during a time when most people heated their homes with coal, leaving a sooty residue all over the walls and wallpaper. Vinyl wallpaper hadn't been invented yet, and wallpaper which could not get wet was difficult to clean, but Kutol's pliable dough cleaner made it possible.

The product became obsolete in a few years when coal was no longer used for heat, and gas and electric heating made cleaner walls. Kay Zufall, a nursery school teacher and a sister-in-law to Kutol CEO Joe McVicker, had an idea when she read an article about wallpaper cleaner used as modeling clay for children. She tried it out with her nursery school students who loved playing with it and molding it into shapes. She only suggested that the company add some color to it, which they did, in addition to some almond fragrance. Zufall also suggested the name Play Doh, a much catchier name than the original Kutol's Rainbow Modeling Compound.

Play Doh began to gain success when it was promoted on the Captain Kangaroo show. McVicker showed the product to Bob Keeshan (Captain Kangaroo), explaining that he had no money for a national campaign but promising 2% of the proceeds if he used it on his show once a week.

Slinky

Slinky has stayed in production since the 1940s and and has had some renewed popularity with the Slinky Dog character featured in the Pixar Toy Story series of movies.

The Slinky was invented in 1943 by Richard James, a naval engineer working on torsion springs for a device intended to keep sensitive naval equipment steady onboard ship. He was astonished when he accidentally knocked over one of these springs and saw it "walk," tumbling over itself from one end to the other from the shelf to a stack of books to a tabletop and then to the floor. Unlike how things unfolded in the previous examples, James immediately saw its potential as a toy. This inspiration led him to spend the next two years experimenting with different metals and lengths of spring until he discovered the perfect model that could walk down stairs. The final result was 80 feet of steel wire in a two and a half inch spiral.

James and his wife, Betty, formed James Industries in 1945. That year, Gimbels put his Slinkys on a Christmas display. The toys, which looked boring in their boxes, weren't selling very well until James came to the store and did a demonstration in person. As a result, he sold 400 Slinkys at $1 a piece in less than two hours.

Silly String

Silly String is a fun, safe way to do non-violent battle with friends or to celebrate in a colorful, confetti-like way at birthday parties or weddings. It also has, believe it or not, a more practical use in the military, for discovering tripwires.

Silly String was invented in 1972 by Leonard A. Fish, an inventor, and Robert P. Cox, a chemist. The crazy substance is a mixture of a polymer resin, a plasticizer and a surfactant. The partners' purpose was to invent an instant spray-on cast to treat injuries. Although the duo's invention worked, they discovered something new while experimenting with different nozzles to package the spray. One of these shot a long string about 30 feet across the room.

Fish became inspired from this incident to make the product a toy, and the two tweaked it to be less sticky and added color. Later, the pair demonstrated the product for Wham-O in California. Fish sprayed the silly stuff all over the person who agreed to meet with them and all over his office, but the man who met with them was not amused and asked them to leave. Later, when another Wham-O worker saw a bit of the string hanging on an office lampshade and heard the story, the inventive pair were called back to sign a contract.

Perhaps, the moral of the above stories is that there often can be something redeemable or a new direction found even in our failures.