Transcripts

Tim Walsh:
Well, Raggedy Ann is the longest continuously licensed character. She came out in 1918 and she's always been on a lunch box or as a doll or in a storybook somewhere.

Tim Walsh, author of the book, Timeless Toys says Silly Putty and Slinky are two toys that came out of the war effort in World War II.

Silly Putty was a synthetic rubber that we were trying to make for the war effort and it was terrible at that. But it was sure fun to play with and it became a fad. And then Slinky was a spring that was used to keep equipment- sensitive equipment-still on rough seas in the Navy. And a Navy engineer was the one that developed that he saw it walk when it bounced off his desk and brought it home to his wife, and said, "Hey, I think we can make a toy out of this."

Yahtzee debuted in the mid 50's and the origins of Yahtzee are a bit mysterious. The legend goes that it was invented by a wealthy Canadian couple to play on their yacht. Hence the name Yahtzee.

The story goes that ES Lowe the company that first produced it was asked to publish it for this rich couple. And it sold so well that ES Lowe went back to them and said, "We'd like the rights." And they said, "Well, print us some games in exchange for the rights." Apparently money was not an issue for them so they printed a thousand games for this Canadian couple and then they took over the rights for the game and of course it's still hugely popular. But no one really knows who that Canadian couple is or if they even existed.

Tomorrow, the controversy created by Mr. Potatohead. I'm Mike Carruthers and that's Something You Should Know.