Play-Doh's History

1956 marks the day, I mean year, when the world's happiness level grew from moderately joyful to extremely cheerful. That was the year Play-Doh was released to the masses with! Noah and Joseph McVicker sent in a patent request, No. 3,167,440, for a "plastic modeling composition" that was originally planed to be a wall paper cleaner. Just like Silly Putty, its arch rival was also created by accident. Nearly 2 billion containers of Play-Doh have been sold already. At first, Play-Doh came in a 1.5lb cardboard cylinder in only one color: off-white.

Co-creator, Joseph McVicker, remembered how hard his school modeling clay was to manipulate, and how easy one of his non-toxic wall paper cleaner prototypes was. So, he decided to send a box of it over to his childhood school. It was a huge success. Sinse his invention was such a hit, he offered to supply the rest of the schools in the Cincinnati area with it too, getting an equally amazed reaction from them. Then, his product was showcased in a national educational convention. After that, department stores started to take a serious interest in the new modeling clay. With the help of his new company, "Rainbow Crafts", McVicker sold the first can in Woodward & Lothrop Department Store in Washington, D.C. The head of the 9 million pounds of Play-Doh to be sold over the next 50 years.

Over the next few years, modifications were made to the PLay-Doh recipe such as color and squishy properties. They also updater the PLay-Doh mascot's, Play-Doh Pete's, image. The cardboard can was made out of plastic too. And in 1991 the Play-Doh franchise was sold to Hasbro under the Playschool division. The exact formula for Play-Doh is carefully stowed in a safe location, but many common home-made recipes are out there. In 2000, Hasbro let people vote on their favorite Play-Doh colors. Over 100,000 people voted and the winners were rose red, purple paradise, blue lagoon, and garden green with many close runners up. Warren Brown from Food Network show "Sugar Rush" made an etible birthday cake mix of Play-Doh for it's 50th anniversary in 2006, Happy Birthday you creative, accident lucky, people.