WEBVTT - 9 Incredible Classic Toys (and How They've Changed)

0:00:00.040 --> 0:00:02.160
<v Speaker 1>Guess what, mango, what's that? Well, I thought it was

0:00:02.200 --> 0:00:04.280
<v Speaker 1>pretty funny. Recently when we were coming up with our

0:00:04.320 --> 0:00:07.440
<v Speaker 1>list of underrated toys from childhood, and both of us

0:00:07.480 --> 0:00:09.920
<v Speaker 1>put Silly Putty on the list, right, and it was

0:00:10.039 --> 0:00:12.040
<v Speaker 1>such an awesome I don't even know if you could

0:00:12.039 --> 0:00:14.120
<v Speaker 1>call it a toy. But not only did it come

0:00:14.120 --> 0:00:16.680
<v Speaker 1>in a plastic egg for some reason, which is really

0:00:16.720 --> 0:00:19.720
<v Speaker 1>the world's best carrying case, you asked me, but you

0:00:19.800 --> 0:00:22.440
<v Speaker 1>know you could stretch it, it bounced, And the weirdest

0:00:22.480 --> 0:00:24.360
<v Speaker 1>and maybe best thing of all was that if you

0:00:24.440 --> 0:00:27.360
<v Speaker 1>pressed it against the newspaper, it actually picked up the

0:00:27.400 --> 0:00:29.720
<v Speaker 1>text and images right off the page. Did you ever

0:00:29.760 --> 0:00:32.400
<v Speaker 1>do this? Yeah, with like the funny pages. And to me,

0:00:32.560 --> 0:00:35.560
<v Speaker 1>that just like elevated it from just another like piece

0:00:35.560 --> 0:00:38.400
<v Speaker 1>of slime or a bouncy ball to a spy gadget

0:00:38.640 --> 0:00:42.000
<v Speaker 1>like you could almost imagine Carmen San Diego carrying one

0:00:42.040 --> 0:00:45.080
<v Speaker 1>of these in her pocket. Well, today kids just don't

0:00:45.120 --> 0:00:48.839
<v Speaker 1>get that joy because Silly Putty no longer picks up newsprint. Now.

0:00:48.880 --> 0:00:51.640
<v Speaker 1>Apparently it isn't because the silly Putty formula has changed.

0:00:51.640 --> 0:00:55.480
<v Speaker 1>It's because newspapers have started using a different kind of ink. Now,

0:00:55.840 --> 0:00:58.120
<v Speaker 1>I don't know if this is just so silly putty

0:00:58.160 --> 0:01:00.160
<v Speaker 1>can't pick it up. I think maybe it's because they

0:01:00.160 --> 0:01:02.280
<v Speaker 1>don't want reader's hands to pick up the print. But

0:01:02.880 --> 0:01:05.959
<v Speaker 1>it made me wonder, like, how have classic toys changed

0:01:06.000 --> 0:01:08.319
<v Speaker 1>over the years. And that's what today's nine Things is

0:01:08.319 --> 0:01:32.400
<v Speaker 1>all about. So let's dive in. Y Hey, their podcast listeners,

0:01:32.400 --> 0:01:34.600
<v Speaker 1>welcome to Part Time Genius. I'm Will Pearson and as

0:01:34.640 --> 0:01:36.959
<v Speaker 1>always I'm joined by my good friend Man Guesh Ticketer

0:01:37.319 --> 0:01:40.360
<v Speaker 1>and sitting behind the soundproof glass djaying music on his

0:01:40.480 --> 0:01:43.320
<v Speaker 1>old Teddy Ruxman doll. That doll looks pretty worn out

0:01:43.360 --> 0:01:46.320
<v Speaker 1>at this point. That's our friend and producer Tristan McNeil.

0:01:46.600 --> 0:01:50.200
<v Speaker 1>So Teddy Ruxman is such an old reference, you know.

0:01:50.280 --> 0:01:52.560
<v Speaker 1>I actually had this memory from when I was a

0:01:52.640 --> 0:01:54.880
<v Speaker 1>kid in the summertime, and I want to say it

0:01:54.920 --> 0:01:56.360
<v Speaker 1>was like nine or ten at the time, and I

0:01:56.360 --> 0:01:59.440
<v Speaker 1>remember staying up to watch Johnny Carson and he did

0:01:59.480 --> 0:02:02.640
<v Speaker 1>this joke I just thought was hilarious. Uh. He was

0:02:02.680 --> 0:02:05.600
<v Speaker 1>like on stage doing his monologue and he goes, Hasbro's

0:02:05.640 --> 0:02:08.000
<v Speaker 1>just come out with a Milli Vanilli talking doll? But

0:02:08.080 --> 0:02:10.040
<v Speaker 1>it had to be pulled off the shelves because it

0:02:10.080 --> 0:02:13.960
<v Speaker 1>was using Teddy Ruxpin's voice and as a kid. For

0:02:14.000 --> 0:02:16.520
<v Speaker 1>some reason, that joke was so funny to me, like

0:02:16.560 --> 0:02:20.679
<v Speaker 1>it's a throwaway joke, but I always recycle it. I mean,

0:02:20.720 --> 0:02:22.760
<v Speaker 1>if admit it's not a bad joke, though it is

0:02:22.800 --> 0:02:25.760
<v Speaker 1>funnier to me think about how old these references are,

0:02:25.840 --> 0:02:29.679
<v Speaker 1>like Johnny Carson, Milli Vanilli, Teddy Ruxman, And I will

0:02:29.720 --> 0:02:31.760
<v Speaker 1>say the timing on this is really weird because, as

0:02:31.800 --> 0:02:33.880
<v Speaker 1>you know, this past weekend, I went camping with our

0:02:33.919 --> 0:02:36.280
<v Speaker 1>family and it was raining one day and I started

0:02:36.280 --> 0:02:39.040
<v Speaker 1>singing Blame It on the rain, and the kids didn't

0:02:39.040 --> 0:02:41.880
<v Speaker 1>know the reference, and so I actually pulled up a

0:02:41.919 --> 0:02:43.600
<v Speaker 1>Milli Vanilli song. I love the fact that we were

0:02:43.600 --> 0:02:47.160
<v Speaker 1>in the middle of nowhere listening to Milli Vanilli on Spotify,

0:02:47.200 --> 0:02:49.880
<v Speaker 1>But anyway, we were listening to this and it hit

0:02:49.919 --> 0:02:52.160
<v Speaker 1>me like, it's not as though that I thought this

0:02:52.200 --> 0:02:54.680
<v Speaker 1>had been a great song or a great group, like

0:02:54.720 --> 0:02:58.000
<v Speaker 1>whoever was doing the actual singing, but it is so

0:02:58.120 --> 0:03:01.480
<v Speaker 1>much worse than I remembered it. Like it is bad.

0:03:01.600 --> 0:03:04.600
<v Speaker 1>So I'm encouraging anyone to pull up Milli Vanilli and

0:03:04.639 --> 0:03:07.200
<v Speaker 1>just appreciate how terrible it is. It makes sense that

0:03:07.240 --> 0:03:11.880
<v Speaker 1>Teddy Rux been saying. It makes sense that Teddy Ruxy

0:03:11.919 --> 0:03:14.480
<v Speaker 1>say But anyway, none of those references mean anything to

0:03:14.639 --> 0:03:17.840
<v Speaker 1>kids anymore at this point. Well, I do hope some

0:03:17.919 --> 0:03:20.040
<v Speaker 1>of the toys on this list are still things people

0:03:20.080 --> 0:03:22.320
<v Speaker 1>play with. You know, you talked about silly Putty at

0:03:22.360 --> 0:03:24.160
<v Speaker 1>the top of the show. But I thought it was

0:03:24.200 --> 0:03:27.200
<v Speaker 1>fascinating that the reason we have this ridiculous invention in

0:03:27.240 --> 0:03:29.760
<v Speaker 1>the first place is because during World War Two we

0:03:29.800 --> 0:03:32.320
<v Speaker 1>had to ration rubber because of the limited access to

0:03:32.400 --> 0:03:36.320
<v Speaker 1>rubber plants. And it was this unexpectedly delightful thing that

0:03:36.400 --> 0:03:38.920
<v Speaker 1>came out of this search for synthetic rubber. And this

0:03:38.960 --> 0:03:42.840
<v Speaker 1>was during wartime desperation. Oh, that is pretty interesting. I

0:03:42.840 --> 0:03:44.960
<v Speaker 1>feel like maybe you're stalling Omego what do you do?

0:03:44.960 --> 0:03:48.160
<v Speaker 1>You have a fact you prepared for this episode. I

0:03:48.200 --> 0:03:51.320
<v Speaker 1>did bring some facts, so I wanted to talk a

0:03:51.360 --> 0:03:53.680
<v Speaker 1>little bit about the etch A sketch first, and and

0:03:53.760 --> 0:03:56.480
<v Speaker 1>this is actually an invention that comes from France. It

0:03:56.560 --> 0:04:01.080
<v Speaker 1>was originally called Lecron Magic. I don't French, obviously, and

0:04:01.080 --> 0:04:03.600
<v Speaker 1>then when it debuted at toy fairs, it had a

0:04:03.640 --> 0:04:07.400
<v Speaker 1>slightly different design because instead of those two white knobs,

0:04:07.640 --> 0:04:10.200
<v Speaker 1>it actually had a joystick on it, which is how

0:04:10.320 --> 0:04:13.119
<v Speaker 1>none of us remember it, of course. But the other

0:04:13.160 --> 0:04:15.440
<v Speaker 1>weird thing about the edge of sketches that toy companies

0:04:15.440 --> 0:04:18.440
<v Speaker 1>were very lukewarm on the idea, like almost all of

0:04:18.440 --> 0:04:20.560
<v Speaker 1>them passed on it. In fact, all of them did.

0:04:20.600 --> 0:04:23.000
<v Speaker 1>And then finally Ohio Art decided to take a second

0:04:23.000 --> 0:04:25.520
<v Speaker 1>look at it, and they picked it up in nineteen sixty.

0:04:25.880 --> 0:04:28.320
<v Speaker 1>They decided to make it more sleek. They changed the

0:04:28.360 --> 0:04:32.160
<v Speaker 1>control to those two infuriating white knobs now and and

0:04:32.200 --> 0:04:36.520
<v Speaker 1>they started advertising it on TV and it flew off shells.

0:04:36.520 --> 0:04:39.440
<v Speaker 1>Over a hundred million EG sketch have actually sold ever since.

0:04:39.680 --> 0:04:41.559
<v Speaker 1>You know, it was never very good at them, and

0:04:41.600 --> 0:04:43.280
<v Speaker 1>I'm still not any good at them, But I do

0:04:43.440 --> 0:04:45.880
<v Speaker 1>like looking at those galleries of portraits and you know

0:04:45.920 --> 0:04:48.520
<v Speaker 1>the other artwork that an ETA sketch can do. Yeah,

0:04:48.640 --> 0:04:50.880
<v Speaker 1>it's it's pretty cool that you can preserve those things

0:04:50.920 --> 0:04:54.159
<v Speaker 1>by like drilling through the back and you take out

0:04:54.160 --> 0:04:57.640
<v Speaker 1>the powder and it makes those drawings permanent. But for me,

0:04:57.760 --> 0:05:00.200
<v Speaker 1>like the ability to shake the pictures and rest art

0:05:00.279 --> 0:05:02.279
<v Speaker 1>is the best thing about it. Like I can't imagine

0:05:02.320 --> 0:05:08.120
<v Speaker 1>saving any artwork I've ever created on cane. Alright, well,

0:05:08.160 --> 0:05:10.719
<v Speaker 1>going in a very different direction and something that I

0:05:10.760 --> 0:05:13.200
<v Speaker 1>have no memory of, but it was interesting to read about.

0:05:13.200 --> 0:05:15.720
<v Speaker 1>Did you know that the precursor of My Little Pony

0:05:15.880 --> 0:05:20.520
<v Speaker 1>was called My Pretty Pony? No, so what's the difference? Well,

0:05:20.680 --> 0:05:23.159
<v Speaker 1>color and size for starters. So My Pretty Pony was

0:05:23.240 --> 0:05:26.240
<v Speaker 1>brown and about ten inches tall, and according to an

0:05:26.279 --> 0:05:29.719
<v Speaker 1>article in Gizmoto, it was part of Hasbro's Romper Room line.

0:05:29.760 --> 0:05:32.800
<v Speaker 1>And it also wiggled its ears and its tail and

0:05:32.839 --> 0:05:36.440
<v Speaker 1>it winked at you, apparently very very contemperent. But you know,

0:05:36.480 --> 0:05:38.800
<v Speaker 1>the big attraction was the main and the tail, and

0:05:38.839 --> 0:05:41.080
<v Speaker 1>they were both extra long. And you can imagine kids

0:05:41.120 --> 0:05:43.120
<v Speaker 1>really enjoying this because they could just brush it for

0:05:43.200 --> 0:05:45.240
<v Speaker 1>days and days. But it really was just like a

0:05:45.240 --> 0:05:49.080
<v Speaker 1>toy horse. So it debuted in nine and then the

0:05:49.120 --> 0:05:51.640
<v Speaker 1>following year they decided to shrink it down. They took

0:05:51.680 --> 0:05:54.960
<v Speaker 1>out some of the movable features, added all those colors

0:05:55.000 --> 0:05:57.720
<v Speaker 1>that we associate with them, and make them a little

0:05:57.720 --> 0:05:59.760
<v Speaker 1>bit more like the ponies that we know today. So

0:06:00.240 --> 0:06:02.640
<v Speaker 1>every time I hear My Little Pony now, I I

0:06:02.680 --> 0:06:05.520
<v Speaker 1>think about how people thought Bill Clinton was a brony

0:06:05.680 --> 0:06:08.400
<v Speaker 1>because he answered like three questions straight on. Wait, weight,

0:06:08.480 --> 0:06:11.440
<v Speaker 1>don't tell me about My Little Pony friendship is magic?

0:06:12.400 --> 0:06:15.960
<v Speaker 1>I had forgotten all about. Well, obviously, how you play

0:06:15.960 --> 0:06:17.719
<v Speaker 1>with My Little Pony is different than the kids who

0:06:17.720 --> 0:06:19.680
<v Speaker 1>have the original, and you know, then it was more

0:06:19.720 --> 0:06:22.159
<v Speaker 1>of like a horse toy and less of this magical

0:06:22.279 --> 0:06:24.880
<v Speaker 1>horse boy. But you know, the other thing I'd forgotten

0:06:24.960 --> 0:06:27.000
<v Speaker 1>is that My Little Pony cartoon that came out in

0:06:27.000 --> 0:06:29.839
<v Speaker 1>the mid nineteen eighties. It was actually called My Little

0:06:29.880 --> 0:06:33.400
<v Speaker 1>Pony and Friends because half the animated show was really

0:06:33.480 --> 0:06:36.320
<v Speaker 1>used to market these ponies to kids, and then the

0:06:36.360 --> 0:06:39.040
<v Speaker 1>other half was reserved to sell toys for for other

0:06:39.120 --> 0:06:41.120
<v Speaker 1>things like I was just looking back on this, like

0:06:41.200 --> 0:06:45.080
<v Speaker 1>Glow Worms, which I remember, and Potato Head Kids. I

0:06:45.120 --> 0:06:48.520
<v Speaker 1>don't remember this cartoon, but Gizmodo recapped it as quote

0:06:48.800 --> 0:06:51.680
<v Speaker 1>a bunch of potato children being marginally watched over by

0:06:51.760 --> 0:06:56.760
<v Speaker 1>Mr potato Head with a lazy dad. So I vaguely

0:06:56.800 --> 0:06:59.279
<v Speaker 1>remember glow Worms, but I have no memory of that

0:06:59.320 --> 0:07:02.760
<v Speaker 1>Potato Head cartoon. But speaking of Mr potato Head, Uh,

0:07:02.880 --> 0:07:05.560
<v Speaker 1>there's an old fact which always blows me away, and

0:07:05.600 --> 0:07:07.440
<v Speaker 1>we've mentioned on the program before but it's that the

0:07:07.520 --> 0:07:10.520
<v Speaker 1>original potato heads were just parts that you stuck into

0:07:10.600 --> 0:07:13.320
<v Speaker 1>any produce you had around the house, like it was

0:07:13.360 --> 0:07:17.560
<v Speaker 1>funny eyes, felt mustaches, hats and whatever. And the packaging

0:07:17.560 --> 0:07:20.880
<v Speaker 1>actually read any fruit or vegetable makes a funny face man.

0:07:21.480 --> 0:07:23.840
<v Speaker 1>So as I O. Nine puts it, it was b

0:07:24.040 --> 0:07:27.120
<v Speaker 1>y O P or bring your own potato. And apparently

0:07:27.160 --> 0:07:29.960
<v Speaker 1>the sales killed. It was one of, if not the

0:07:29.960 --> 0:07:33.160
<v Speaker 1>first toy to advertise on TV, and in ninetift two

0:07:33.200 --> 0:07:36.600
<v Speaker 1>they did over four million dollars in sales. I mean

0:07:36.600 --> 0:07:40.480
<v Speaker 1>that's actually about thirty seven million dollars in today's money.

0:07:40.560 --> 0:07:43.400
<v Speaker 1>But the thing is, like I always wondered, like when

0:07:43.400 --> 0:07:45.559
<v Speaker 1>did they stop this and and shift over to putting

0:07:45.600 --> 0:07:49.320
<v Speaker 1>these plastic bodies into the boxes? And this is according

0:07:49.320 --> 0:07:52.480
<v Speaker 1>to Ion nine again, but apparently in ninety eight some

0:07:52.520 --> 0:07:55.600
<v Speaker 1>of the toys got really elaborate and also really sharp,

0:07:55.800 --> 0:07:58.560
<v Speaker 1>and that's because they put out a Mr. Potato Head

0:07:58.600 --> 0:08:01.480
<v Speaker 1>on the Moon Set. I guess this was capitalizing on

0:08:01.520 --> 0:08:04.440
<v Speaker 1>the Space Race. But it came with super sharp plastic

0:08:04.480 --> 0:08:06.920
<v Speaker 1>parts that fixed into a cucumber to make it stand

0:08:06.960 --> 0:08:10.640
<v Speaker 1>up as a rocket. So you had potato parts, cucumber parts,

0:08:10.680 --> 0:08:13.000
<v Speaker 1>and uh, it's pretty cool to look at, but by

0:08:13.040 --> 0:08:16.080
<v Speaker 1>the nine seventies, all those sharp parts were just deemed

0:08:16.080 --> 0:08:19.480
<v Speaker 1>too unsafe for kids. You know, I've definitely seen a

0:08:19.480 --> 0:08:21.880
<v Speaker 1>few photos of those boxes, but I'm curious if you

0:08:21.880 --> 0:08:23.680
<v Speaker 1>can still get them on eBay. So so after we

0:08:23.720 --> 0:08:26.920
<v Speaker 1>finished the episode, let's look that up. Let's see. All, Well,

0:08:26.920 --> 0:08:29.400
<v Speaker 1>here's another classic toy that's changed over the years, and

0:08:29.440 --> 0:08:32.080
<v Speaker 1>that's the Magic eight Ball. Now, one of the questions

0:08:32.080 --> 0:08:34.280
<v Speaker 1>I've always had about the magic eight ball was like,

0:08:34.480 --> 0:08:36.800
<v Speaker 1>why is it an eight ball? And it feels like

0:08:36.840 --> 0:08:39.720
<v Speaker 1>a weird choice for a kid's toy, But it turns

0:08:39.720 --> 0:08:42.400
<v Speaker 1>out there's a marketing reason behind it. So the toy

0:08:42.400 --> 0:08:46.000
<v Speaker 1>itself has this long, weird story and apparently was invented

0:08:46.000 --> 0:08:48.520
<v Speaker 1>by a kid whose mom was a fortune teller, I think,

0:08:48.920 --> 0:08:50.840
<v Speaker 1>And so she used to have some sort of rig

0:08:50.880 --> 0:08:53.280
<v Speaker 1>that she called the psycho slate, and she would ask

0:08:53.320 --> 0:08:56.120
<v Speaker 1>a client some questions and then the answers would be

0:08:56.160 --> 0:08:59.440
<v Speaker 1>magically produced on a magic chalkboard. And I don't quite

0:08:59.520 --> 0:09:02.320
<v Speaker 1>understand the setup of this, but it influenced her son,

0:09:02.400 --> 0:09:04.640
<v Speaker 1>his name was Albert Carter, to come up with a

0:09:04.640 --> 0:09:07.040
<v Speaker 1>product where you kept the fortune telling, but you took

0:09:07.080 --> 0:09:09.880
<v Speaker 1>the human consultant out of the picture, and so the

0:09:09.920 --> 0:09:13.960
<v Speaker 1>toy provided the answers directly. Those ninety four and he

0:09:14.040 --> 0:09:16.600
<v Speaker 1>invented what was called the psycho Sere, which was this

0:09:16.720 --> 0:09:19.280
<v Speaker 1>long tube with liquid in it and then a couple

0:09:19.280 --> 0:09:21.840
<v Speaker 1>of dice that floated up with different phrases on it.

0:09:21.920 --> 0:09:24.640
<v Speaker 1>And basically the concept of the magic eight ball was there.

0:09:24.679 --> 0:09:27.760
<v Speaker 1>And anyway, this this toy went through these various iterations.

0:09:27.800 --> 0:09:30.680
<v Speaker 1>They turned from a tube into a crystal ball. But

0:09:30.760 --> 0:09:33.560
<v Speaker 1>then it was Brunswick Billiard Tables. They were looking for

0:09:33.600 --> 0:09:37.400
<v Speaker 1>this promotional gimmick back in nineteen fifty and Carter's partner

0:09:37.480 --> 0:09:40.320
<v Speaker 1>redesigned the crystal eight ball into an eight ball, and

0:09:40.360 --> 0:09:43.160
<v Speaker 1>that idea just kind of stuck from there. That's crazy,

0:09:43.360 --> 0:09:46.000
<v Speaker 1>you know, it's funny to think of fortune telling being

0:09:46.040 --> 0:09:50.520
<v Speaker 1>the family business for for Albert Carter, but it's also

0:09:50.520 --> 0:09:54.360
<v Speaker 1>funny that this is just like a marketing tool. It's ridiculous. Yeah,

0:09:54.400 --> 0:09:57.120
<v Speaker 1>it was just supposed to be this paper weight for adults,

0:09:57.160 --> 0:09:59.240
<v Speaker 1>really nothing more than that, and something kind of sit

0:09:59.320 --> 0:10:01.600
<v Speaker 1>on their desk. It when it caught on with kids,

0:10:01.640 --> 0:10:04.360
<v Speaker 1>it was remarketed as a toy and and obviously really

0:10:04.360 --> 0:10:07.199
<v Speaker 1>took off from there. That's fascinating. I've actually read something

0:10:07.200 --> 0:10:10.360
<v Speaker 1>about like the psychology of eight balls and how they

0:10:10.400 --> 0:10:12.960
<v Speaker 1>wait the answers with positive ones. I think they're like,

0:10:13.280 --> 0:10:16.560
<v Speaker 1>uh ten positive answers and then like five negative and

0:10:16.559 --> 0:10:18.640
<v Speaker 1>five and different ones, So like you keep playing for

0:10:18.640 --> 0:10:21.320
<v Speaker 1>those answers. Yeah, I mean, I guess it makes sense

0:10:21.320 --> 0:10:23.680
<v Speaker 1>if you think about having that perfect mix that keeps

0:10:23.760 --> 0:10:25.920
<v Speaker 1>us wanting to flip it over and over, kind of

0:10:25.960 --> 0:10:28.360
<v Speaker 1>getting those those different answers and knowing we might get

0:10:28.360 --> 0:10:30.640
<v Speaker 1>positive ones more often then we get negative ones. So

0:10:30.920 --> 0:10:33.360
<v Speaker 1>all right, what do you have next, Mengo? So I'm

0:10:33.400 --> 0:10:35.600
<v Speaker 1>going to talk a little bit about Lincoln logs and

0:10:35.720 --> 0:10:39.400
<v Speaker 1>how they were originally built to withstand earthquakes. So I

0:10:39.640 --> 0:10:41.560
<v Speaker 1>had heard the story that Lincoln logs were created by

0:10:41.600 --> 0:10:44.560
<v Speaker 1>Frank Wood rights son John, and I thought it was

0:10:44.640 --> 0:10:47.559
<v Speaker 1>cute that there was this architectural connection between them. But

0:10:47.920 --> 0:10:51.360
<v Speaker 1>it's actually deeper than that. So according to history dot com,

0:10:51.440 --> 0:10:54.840
<v Speaker 1>the first Lincoln logs weren't toys at all, but architectural models,

0:10:54.960 --> 0:10:57.400
<v Speaker 1>and they kind of come out of the father's son

0:10:57.480 --> 0:11:01.400
<v Speaker 1>designed for Tokyo's Imperial Hotel. Apparently, John used to work

0:11:01.400 --> 0:11:04.040
<v Speaker 1>for his father. In fact, at age twenty four, he

0:11:04.120 --> 0:11:07.600
<v Speaker 1>was his chief assistant. And when they were in depend

0:11:07.640 --> 0:11:09.120
<v Speaker 1>they were trying to come up with the system that

0:11:09.160 --> 0:11:12.040
<v Speaker 1>would help the building with stan tremors and also earthquakes.

0:11:12.440 --> 0:11:14.600
<v Speaker 1>So they built a model of interlocking logs that could

0:11:14.640 --> 0:11:17.040
<v Speaker 1>bend with the sheiks. And you know, the father and

0:11:17.080 --> 0:11:19.800
<v Speaker 1>son had falling out, and while Frank concentrated on building

0:11:19.840 --> 0:11:23.600
<v Speaker 1>the hotel, which actually managed to survive major earthquakes, John

0:11:23.600 --> 0:11:26.080
<v Speaker 1>Wright took that model, tweaked it and made a toy

0:11:26.160 --> 0:11:28.400
<v Speaker 1>that doesn't fallow when your kid, brother, kid's sister thumps

0:11:28.440 --> 0:11:30.960
<v Speaker 1>around right next to it. That's pretty cool. I had

0:11:31.000 --> 0:11:34.520
<v Speaker 1>never heard that story before. All right, well, very different toy.

0:11:34.559 --> 0:11:38.400
<v Speaker 1>Here's a quick story about transformers, which have outlasted gobots

0:11:38.480 --> 0:11:41.960
<v Speaker 1>and Voltron. You remember those two, remember all of these

0:11:42.080 --> 0:11:44.480
<v Speaker 1>very well. But the funny thing is that transformers weren't

0:11:44.520 --> 0:11:47.240
<v Speaker 1>actually the original. You know, Gobots had come to the

0:11:47.240 --> 0:11:49.720
<v Speaker 1>market before them, and there was also a line of

0:11:49.720 --> 0:11:53.120
<v Speaker 1>these mass toys that transformed, and they were like dozens

0:11:53.160 --> 0:11:57.160
<v Speaker 1>of other transforming toys. And at the time, regulations had changed,

0:11:57.200 --> 0:12:00.160
<v Speaker 1>and so TV was flooded with cartoons basically were king

0:12:00.200 --> 0:12:03.440
<v Speaker 1>as these advertisements for toys like he Man or we

0:12:03.440 --> 0:12:06.440
<v Speaker 1>were talking about before with My Little Pony cartoons. So

0:12:06.520 --> 0:12:09.320
<v Speaker 1>Transformers got in on this too. But the thing that

0:12:09.400 --> 0:12:11.880
<v Speaker 1>really set them apart was, you know, first of all,

0:12:12.000 --> 0:12:14.760
<v Speaker 1>their price. They were actually pricier than other toys of

0:12:14.800 --> 0:12:18.760
<v Speaker 1>the same genres. So newspapers referred to Transformers is it's

0:12:18.800 --> 0:12:21.280
<v Speaker 1>almost like being the status symbol that you'd have on

0:12:21.360 --> 0:12:24.920
<v Speaker 1>playground or the sandboxes. You know, the cool kids had these.

0:12:24.960 --> 0:12:27.680
<v Speaker 1>But more importantly, they took a lot of care in

0:12:27.720 --> 0:12:30.960
<v Speaker 1>the packaging. So every box came with this backstory for

0:12:31.000 --> 0:12:34.560
<v Speaker 1>the character, elaborately written by a Marvel Comics writer, so

0:12:34.600 --> 0:12:37.120
<v Speaker 1>the kids really got invested in these stories from the start.

0:12:37.679 --> 0:12:39.920
<v Speaker 1>And they also had those stickers that warmed with your

0:12:39.960 --> 0:12:41.880
<v Speaker 1>hand to tell if they were good guys or not

0:12:42.559 --> 0:12:46.199
<v Speaker 1>an autobot or what were the others called the Decepticons.

0:12:46.240 --> 0:12:48.439
<v Speaker 1>But and this is how the toys have changed. The

0:12:48.480 --> 0:12:51.760
<v Speaker 1>Transformers also came with these cards that had power levels

0:12:51.760 --> 0:12:54.319
<v Speaker 1>secretly written on them, and you can only tell a

0:12:54.400 --> 0:12:58.160
<v Speaker 1>Transformer strengths and weaknesses by putting a red plastic It

0:12:58.240 --> 0:13:00.480
<v Speaker 1>was like a three D glasses type limb is over it,

0:13:00.520 --> 0:13:03.040
<v Speaker 1>and then you could read the numbers, and so, you know,

0:13:03.120 --> 0:13:06.520
<v Speaker 1>just like kids obsess over Pokemon stats for characters, those

0:13:06.559 --> 0:13:09.880
<v Speaker 1>three D readers gave Transformers kind of that nerdy fun

0:13:10.040 --> 0:13:12.960
<v Speaker 1>quality that kids could obsess over, you know, in addition

0:13:12.960 --> 0:13:15.560
<v Speaker 1>to just transforming into things and crashing them into one another.

0:13:15.559 --> 0:13:18.560
<v Speaker 1>We almost forget what they actually did. But anyway, I know,

0:13:18.600 --> 0:13:20.720
<v Speaker 1>we've got two more facts for you. But before that,

0:13:20.800 --> 0:13:36.800
<v Speaker 1>let's take a quick break. Welcome back to Part Time Genius,

0:13:36.800 --> 0:13:39.560
<v Speaker 1>where we're talking nine classic toys and how they've changed

0:13:39.600 --> 0:13:41.920
<v Speaker 1>over the years. All right, mano, you got one last

0:13:41.960 --> 0:13:44.760
<v Speaker 1>fact of the day. What is it? So I think

0:13:44.800 --> 0:13:46.880
<v Speaker 1>I want to talk about or No, Rubik who invented

0:13:46.880 --> 0:13:49.440
<v Speaker 1>the Rubik's Cube. So you and I have both heard

0:13:49.480 --> 0:13:52.200
<v Speaker 1>a lot of this story before that Ruby was Hungarian

0:13:52.559 --> 0:13:55.880
<v Speaker 1>and a communist country, and he designed this cube partially

0:13:55.920 --> 0:13:57.679
<v Speaker 1>because he was just curious if there was a way

0:13:57.720 --> 0:14:00.520
<v Speaker 1>to create a cube with moving parts. He figured that

0:14:00.679 --> 0:14:03.560
<v Speaker 1>you'd need a round core inside and and he only

0:14:03.600 --> 0:14:06.320
<v Speaker 1>did this after contemplating the pebbles under his feet while

0:14:06.320 --> 0:14:08.840
<v Speaker 1>he was on this long walk. But kind of like

0:14:08.960 --> 0:14:11.920
<v Speaker 1>with Lincoln logs, this was originally supposed to be a model,

0:14:12.080 --> 0:14:14.319
<v Speaker 1>like in this case, it was something to teach geometry

0:14:14.400 --> 0:14:17.400
<v Speaker 1>and spatial relations. But once he put stickers on the

0:14:17.400 --> 0:14:21.160
<v Speaker 1>thing and then twisted it, it became something totally different.

0:14:21.280 --> 0:14:24.440
<v Speaker 1>So mental Floss found this unpublished memoir of his and

0:14:24.760 --> 0:14:27.720
<v Speaker 1>in it he writes quote only after a few turns

0:14:27.760 --> 0:14:30.880
<v Speaker 1>the colors became mixed. It was tremendously satisfying to watch

0:14:30.960 --> 0:14:33.720
<v Speaker 1>this color parade. And of course, when he tried to

0:14:33.760 --> 0:14:36.160
<v Speaker 1>reset the colors, he couldn't like it. Took Rubik a

0:14:36.320 --> 0:14:38.280
<v Speaker 1>full month and a half to put the cube back

0:14:38.280 --> 0:14:41.200
<v Speaker 1>in order. But here's the funniest part. Like when he

0:14:41.240 --> 0:14:43.880
<v Speaker 1>finally did, he went home to brag to his mom

0:14:43.920 --> 0:14:47.320
<v Speaker 1>about it, and her reaction was that he was just

0:14:47.400 --> 0:14:49.520
<v Speaker 1>thrilled he was no longer wasting his time working so

0:14:49.560 --> 0:14:53.640
<v Speaker 1>hard on this ridiculous puzzle. I'm curious that, like, how

0:14:53.680 --> 0:14:56.560
<v Speaker 1>did Rubik's cube become such a phenomenon? Basically when he

0:14:56.600 --> 0:14:58.600
<v Speaker 1>took his colored version into his class and saw the

0:14:58.680 --> 0:15:01.080
<v Speaker 1>kids going crazy for it. When Rubik knew you had

0:15:01.080 --> 0:15:03.760
<v Speaker 1>something more than a math model on his hands, it's

0:15:03.760 --> 0:15:06.000
<v Speaker 1>pretty fun, all right. So I thought i'd end this

0:15:06.160 --> 0:15:08.920
<v Speaker 1>on cabbage patch dolls, and I guess what's surprising to

0:15:08.920 --> 0:15:11.080
<v Speaker 1>me isn't that the toys have really changed that much,

0:15:11.120 --> 0:15:13.480
<v Speaker 1>but more that they started out as this mix of

0:15:13.600 --> 0:15:17.160
<v Speaker 1>craft and art. So according to Collector's Weekly, when Xavier

0:15:17.280 --> 0:15:20.520
<v Speaker 1>Roberts started making the dolls in nineteen seventy seven, it

0:15:20.640 --> 0:15:23.800
<v Speaker 1>was based on a German fabric sculpture technique, the idea

0:15:23.800 --> 0:15:26.000
<v Speaker 1>of adopting dolls they were they were called little people

0:15:26.040 --> 0:15:28.320
<v Speaker 1>at the time. That was there from the start, and

0:15:28.320 --> 0:15:31.200
<v Speaker 1>so he charged forty dollars for these sculptures and then

0:15:31.240 --> 0:15:33.760
<v Speaker 1>hand you a certificate with them. It's hard for me

0:15:33.840 --> 0:15:36.400
<v Speaker 1>to think of these dolls as sculptures. But after one

0:15:36.440 --> 0:15:39.080
<v Speaker 1>of his pieces, called Dexter One, first place at an

0:15:39.160 --> 0:15:41.960
<v Speaker 1>art show in Florida, he realized there was something there.

0:15:42.360 --> 0:15:44.600
<v Speaker 1>So he and a few friends formed this collective, and

0:15:44.600 --> 0:15:47.480
<v Speaker 1>then they renovated an old medical center in Georgia and

0:15:47.880 --> 0:15:50.480
<v Speaker 1>turned it into an art and performance space where the

0:15:50.480 --> 0:15:54.760
<v Speaker 1>little people were born from cabbages and delivered by licensed nurses.

0:15:54.800 --> 0:15:56.800
<v Speaker 1>I mean, it's it's all a little bit straightage, but

0:15:57.640 --> 0:16:00.680
<v Speaker 1>people could watch as they occasionally did cease actions or

0:16:00.840 --> 0:16:04.400
<v Speaker 1>cabbage sections kess and of course you could buy the

0:16:04.480 --> 0:16:08.440
<v Speaker 1>sculptures there Anyway, the hospital was featured on this documentary

0:16:08.560 --> 0:16:11.120
<v Speaker 1>and a national press picked it up, and people just

0:16:11.160 --> 0:16:14.720
<v Speaker 1>went bananas for these things. So Colleco licensed the dolls,

0:16:14.840 --> 0:16:17.680
<v Speaker 1>made them smaller, lower the prices some and the fat

0:16:17.800 --> 0:16:21.640
<v Speaker 1>just took off. That's crazy, you know. I always think

0:16:21.640 --> 0:16:24.760
<v Speaker 1>about the Snack Time cabbage Patch dolls that had to

0:16:24.800 --> 0:16:27.520
<v Speaker 1>be returned because they kept chomping on kids hair instead

0:16:27.560 --> 0:16:29.720
<v Speaker 1>of just the plastic snacks you had for them. Like,

0:16:29.840 --> 0:16:34.640
<v Speaker 1>those things give me nightmares. All right, well, we've got

0:16:34.640 --> 0:16:35.960
<v Speaker 1>to pick a winner, and there were a ton of

0:16:36.000 --> 0:16:38.640
<v Speaker 1>great facts today, but I really like that Lincoln Logs

0:16:38.680 --> 0:16:40.960
<v Speaker 1>fact and the idea that you built this little log

0:16:41.080 --> 0:16:44.360
<v Speaker 1>cabin it might just withstand an earthquake. So ango, I'm

0:16:44.360 --> 0:16:46.920
<v Speaker 1>going to give you today's trophy. Thank you so much,

0:16:47.160 --> 0:16:49.040
<v Speaker 1>and thank you guys for listening. We'll be back with

0:16:49.080 --> 0:16:50.480
<v Speaker 1>a full length episode tomorrow