The hottest new trend for the season are smart toys; you know, those toys like Hello Barbie that listen to information given by a child, upload said information, and actually learn through a relatively simplistic AI to be the most interactive toy yet.
I guess that cool – I’m not one that freaks out at the inevitable machine uprising and welcome our robot overlords.
Anyway, when I was younger there was one toy that DOMINATED the whole interactive toy market. A toy that would talk to you, tell you stories and sing…
Teddy Ruxpin.
Introduced in 1985, Teddy Ruxpin is an animatronic bear that would display basic expressions through its eyes and mouth. Although later versions would use a specialized cartridge, the earlier Teddy used a simple cassette tape that would be inserted into the toy’s back.
Teddy Ruxpin was designed by Ken Forsse (with a little help from Larry Larsen and John Davies) and built by RKS Designs – the same company that designed the Panavision Millennium. You see, Ken Forsse got his start building animatronic characters for some Disney shows and Sid and Marty Krofft, so Teddy Ruxpin was a natural extension of his talent.
As mentioned above, when placing either the cassette or cartridge in Teddy, he will “interact” with a child by asking questions and reciting stories that the child can follow along using an accompanying picture book. Although the interactivity is about as advanced as Mr. Rogers asking his audience if they know how to tie their shoes, it was pretty cool considering it was coming from an expressive toy bear.
The toy was voiced by Phil Baron, who’s soothing talent to carry a child though a story brought him straight into the music world until he eventually became a cantor.
Teddy was a very popular toy, as it was in in stores for around 20 years, going through 4 different upgrades, over 50 separate story cassettes/cartridges, its own short-lived cartoon series, an Ice Capade, and became the Official Spokesbear for the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children in 1985.
However, one of the coolest things I remember about Teddy Ruxpin was that the toy would work regardless of what cassette tape you put in. That’s right – Teddy would sing along with NWA, Alice Cooper, Prince or any other badass cassette you could pull out of your tin Scooby Doo lunchbox!
Unfortunately, the later Teddy Ruxpins would use their own, independent cartridges – but man the one I had was fun hearing Teddy say “You have to purify yourself in Lake Minnetonka.”
Until next time and happy holidays!
