The two incidents, while having much in common, were each defined by their respective eras. The "prowlers"? A group of teens who thought it'd be fun to play Lazer Tag at night while wearing dark clothing. In Rancho Cucamonga, CA, deputies were called to investigate the scene at an elementary school after receiving a call that there were armed prowlers on the loose. It didn't involve an airsoft gun, but a misunderstood game of Lazer Tag. Nearly 30 years earlier, a situation with many parallels to the Crawford shooting played a contributing role in the failure of Worlds of Wonder. That led to an Ohio state representative, Alicia Reece, to introduce a bill that would require airsoft guns to have a brightly colored design that would differentiate it from a traditional gun. It was a tragedy, and one where a police officer mistaking a toy gun for a real one played a factor. Crawford's name is one of many that the Black Lives Matter movement has coalesced around. When they confronted the man, they believed the gun was real, shooting and killing the Ohio man and leading to ongoing protests. In 2014, a man named John Crawford III was walking around a Walmart location with an air rifle, raising concern among store-goers who called police. Worlds of Wonder's demise came about partly due to a police shooting (By the way, Kingsborough is still an active executive he spent a few years at PayPal and is now the managing director of Capital One's venture team. In other words, Kingsborough and his company was trying to sell high-priced toys that could offer significantly higher levels of fun and engagement than cheaper alternatives. Worlds of Wonder Founder Donald Kingsborough, in a 1987 Fortune article, discussing his philosophy around the toys his firm sold, including Lazer Tag, the firm's second-biggest hit and the inspiration for a Saturday morning cartoon. Lazer Tag teaches them to play with each other, and Teddy Ruxpin teaches bravery and friendship." What children gain from our toys is social value. "Having a lot of toys is not what Worlds of Wonder is about. Here's what happened to what might have been the weirdest toy company of all time. So why don't you remember Worlds of Wonder? Easy: Because it flamed out just as quickly as it hit the top of the Christmas list. In this environment, Worlds of Wonder, a firm mostly made up of former Atari employees, was destined to succeed-and it did, thanks to an animatronic teddy bear that could tell you a story. As the licence bounced to other companies, third and fourth versions were brought out, most recently in 2006 with a version that used digital audio cartridges instead of cassettes.Some companies, like Tiger Electronics, doubled down on the cheap silicon and thrived. The licence to manufacture the toy was sold to Hasbro, which released a new version in early 1990s. In 2003 Teddy Ruxpin was named by the Toy Industry Association as one of the most memorable and creative toys of the 20th century, and Time magazine later named it as one of the greatest toys of all time.ĭespite its popularity, Worlds of Wonder, the company that first made Teddy, struggled following the stock market crash of 1987 and filed for bankruptcy. These stories were featured in the toy’s accompanying story tapes as well as a 65-episode TV cartoon series. The toy’s creator Ken Forsse also wrote an accompanying Tolkien-esque fantasy world, following Teddy and his best friend, a caterpillar named Grubby, as they battled monsters and villains in the quest to find magic crystals. The bear came with a slot for cassette tapes, which it would “read” to children while moving its eyes and mouth. It eventually sold more than 8m units and 11m books, becoming one of the best-selling toys of the 1980s, along with Polly Pocket, Glo Worm, Pound Puppies and Glo Worm. Teddy Ruxpin was first launched in 1985 and was an instant hit, racking up $93m in sales (1.4m units) in the first year.
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