about ME

This site was created because over the years my Slinky collection has grown to the point of "out of control".  I'm not sure how it began.  My earliest recollection of this Slinky / Spring fetish is a Christmas, many, many, many years ago when my parents got my step-siblings, Maria and Phillip and myself a Slinky for Christmas gifts.  I got into mine one night and played with it and then wrapped it up again. This went on for several nights until I accidentally tangled it one sneaky night so I unwrapped Maria's and traded the toy with hers and wrapped them up again deciding to leave them alone.....until Christmas.  Thus began the Slinky fever (I think) and I'm ready to apologize to Maria now.

The collection is now over 700 pieces strong and I find myself constantly looking for display options.  Thanks to many people who have taken professional pictures and to my dad, who loaned me his camera to take some black light specialty shots. It has been such fun setting up shots.  I welcome interested people to visit and take pictures of their own.

Visit the pages on my site and see this amazing collection. You will find metal Slinkys, plastic springs, animal Slinkys, vintage Slinky pull toys, Slinky clocks and various other odd ball items of the same venue.  If you see a picture you like on these pages, please let me know and toot sweet it can be hanging on your wall.  I am always adding to it and I'm pretty sure that I should never have been allowed to shop on line.  I am always thrilled to find one that I don't have and can assure you that any Slinky / Spring that comes my way as a gift is always appreciated and used in some fashion.


Slinky Creation


In 1943, Richard James, a naval mechanical engineer stationed at the William Cramp and Sons shipyards in Philadelphia, was developing springs that could support and stabilize sensitive instruments aboard ships in rough seas.  James accidentally knocked one of the springs from a shelf, and watched as the spring "stepped" in a series of arcs to a stack of books, to a tabletop, and to the floor, where it re-coiled itself and stood upright.  James' wife Betty later recalled, "He came home and said, 'I think if I got the right property of steel and the right tension; I could make it walk.'"  James experimented with different types of steel wire over the next year, and finally found a spring that would walk. Betty was dubious at first, but changed her mind after the toy was fine-tuned and neighborhood children expressed an excited interest in it.  She dubbed the toy Slinky (meaning "sleek and graceful"), after finding the word in a dictionary, and deciding that the word aptly described the sound of a metal spring expanding and collapsing.

With a US $500 loan, the couple formed James Industries (originally James Spring & Wire Company), had 400 Slinky units made by a local machine shop, handwrapped each in yellow paper, and priced them at $1 a piece. Each was 21⁄2" tall, and included 98 coils of high-grade blue-black Swedish steel. The Jameses had difficulty selling Slinky to toy stores but, in November 1945, they were granted permission to set up an inclined plane in the toy section of Gimbels department store in Philadelphia to demonstrate the toy. Slinky was a hit, and the first 400 units were sold within ninety minutes. In 1946, Slinky was introduced at the American Toy Fair.

courtesy of Wikipedia

SNEAK PREVIEW

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Just a little hang'n 'round
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When the lights go out.......
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The "big" ones work just as well

Jingle


Homer Fesperman and Charles Weagley wrote the Slinky commercial jingle in 1962. It became the longest-running jingle in advertising history.

The jingle has itself been parodied and referenced in popular culture. It is seen in the "Log" commercial on The Ren & Stimpy Show and sung by actor Jim Carrey in Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls. The song is also referenced in the movie Lords of Dogtown, where it is sung in full by Emile Hirsch, and is sung by Eddie Murphy as part of the final routine in the stand-up comedy film Eddie Murphy Raw.

“What walks down stairs, alone or in pairs, and makes a slinkity sound?
A spring, a spring, a marvelous thing! Everyone knows it’s Slinky.
It’s Slinky, it’s Slinky. For fun it’s a wonderful toy.
It’s Slinky, it’s Slinky. It’s fun for a girl or a boy.
It’s fun for a girl or boy!”