By
Mary
Bellis
D.F. Duncan
Sr. was the co-patent holder of a four-wheel hydraulic automobile brake and the marketer of the first
successful parking meter. He was also the genius behind
the first premium incentive where you sent in two cereal box tops and received
a toy rocket ship. However, Duncan is best known for being responsible for
promoting the first great
yo-yo fad in the United States.
Duncan was
not the inventor of the yo-yo; they have been around for over twenty-five
hundred years. In fact the yo-yo is considered the second oldest toy in
history, the oldest being the doll. In ancient Greece, the toy was made
of wood, metal and terra cotta. The Greeks decorated the two halves of
the yo-y with pictures of their gods. As a right of passage into adulthood
Greek children often gave up their toys and placed them on the family alter
to pay homage.
Around 1800,
the yo-yo moved into Europe from the Orient. The British called the yo-yo
the bandalore, quiz or the Prince of Wales toy. The French used the name
incroyable or l'emigrette. The word yo-yo is a Tagalog word, the native
language of the Philippines, and means 'come back.' In the Philippines,
the yo-yo was a weapon for over 400 hundred years. Their version was large
with sharp edges and studs and attached to thick twenty-foot ropes for
flinging at enemies or prey. People in the United States started playing
with the British bandalore or yo-yo in the 1860s. It was not until the
1920s that Americans first heard the word yo-yo. Pedro
Flores, a Philippine
immigrant, began manufacturing a toy labeled with that name. Flores became
the first person to mass-produce yo-yos, at his small toy factory located
in California.
Duncan
saw the toy, liked it, bought the rights from Flores in 1929 and then trademarked
the name Yo-Yo ®. Duncan's contribution to yo-yo technology was the
slip string, consisting of a sliding loop around the axle instead of a
knot. With this revolutionary improvement, the yo-yo 'slept' for the first
time. The original yo-yo shape, first introduced to the United States was
the imperial or standard shape. The Duncan Yo-Yo introduced the butterfly
shape, a design that reverses the halves of a traditional imperial yo-yo.
The butterfly allows the player to catch the yo-yo on the string easily,
good for certain tricks. Both the imperial and the butterfly designs co-exist
today.
Duncan also
worked out a deal with newspaper tycoon William Randolph Hearst to get
free advertising in Heart's newspapers. In exchange, Duncan held competitions
and the entrants were required to bring a quantity of new subscriptions
for the newspaper as their entry fee. The first Duncan Yo-Yo was the O-Boy
Yo-Yo Top, the toy with a big kick for all ages. Duncan's massive factory
produced 3,600 of the toys every hour making the factory's hometown of
Luck, Wisconsin the 'Yo-Yo Capital of the World.' Duncan's early
media blitzes were so successful that in Philadelphia alone, three million
units sold during a month-long campaign in 1931. In general, yo-yo sales
went up and down as often as the toy. One story tells how after a market
dip in the 1930's the Lego company was stuck with a huge inventory, they
salvaged the unsold toys by sawing each yo-yo in half, using them as wheels
on toy trucks and cars.
Yo-yo sales
reached its highest peak in 1962, when Duncan Yo-Yo sold 45 million units.
Unfortunately, this 1962 hike in sales led to the end of Donald Duncan's
Company. Advertising and production costs far outstripped even the sudden
increase in sales revenues. Since 1936, Duncan experimented with parking
meters as a sideline. Over the years, the parking meter division grew to
become Duncan's main moneymaker. This and bankruptcy made it easier for
Duncan to finally cut the strings and sell his interest in the yo-yo.The
Flambeau Plastic Company bought the name 'Duncan' and all the company's
trademarks, they began producing their line of all plastic yo-yos soon
after. The yo-yo continues today, its latest honor is being the first toy
in outer space.
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Duncan
photo of
Duncan Advertisement LOC
Artwork
Mary bellis
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