Divine Design Toy Company
Incorporated in 1979 as my first attempt at creating a company to make my toys and other items. But my family support work (growing and dealing pot) plus lack of funds for expensive patent processing kept me from developing any ideas except the Witch Stix which were fairly easily made and required only a design patent. For a year in 1993 I hustled toy companies and others for toy partnership and help starting my own company. Like I've said elsewhere, God keeps me on a very short financial leash, I just do not have good luck in trying to commercially exploit any of my invention and design ideas. Perhaps this is the problem as stated in the Gospel of Thomas: "Businessmen and merchants will not enter the Places of My Father."
I started off at age 16 as a young entrepreneur inventor going across LA by bus to a plastic extrusion plant to try to talk them into making my "Water Totters", plastic covered foam teeter-totters for swimming pool, lake and ocean use. Haven't succeeded yet in making Divine Design another Mattel and frankly, at this point in my life, I'm just as happy to share my ideas with whoever wants to take and develop them. After all, the ideas came freely to me.
Toy Designs
Whirligig-Exerciser: My very first invention idea when I was around 12 or 13 was based on the ages old "Button whirligig" string toy pictured above: I made a giant "button" out of plywood about a foot in diameter and used ropes where strings would go. You tied one end to a wall hook or tree and pulled on the handle to make the button spin with perhaps spiral designs to enhance the hypnotic effect while using the device for exercising arm and chest muscles. (c. 1956-57)
Fwows: My first plush toy design at about age 12 or 13. Fwows. An assortment of Fwow characters with differing color combinations, different names, e.g. "Fwed Fwow" above, "The Professor" below, Fwows to come in small, medium, large sizes. Most of my toy ideas are from my youth, late teens-early twenties, the late '1950's, early '60's.
"Stick-n-stak" toy blocks
Velcro covered toy building blocks
TV Finger Puppets
Pocket Thesaurus plush toy Catapillo
Water-Totter: Saw this ad last year (2011) and it's another one of my ideas somebody else later on had as well and developed whereas I didn't because of lack of funds for patent process. My idea I got when I was around 16 or so even was called "Water Totters" although my idea used extruded foam to make the teeter-totter while this one is a blow-up one.(c.1958)
Water hose-powered merry-go-round for kids: (c.1976)
"Witch Stix"/"Water Wands"/"Rainbow Rods", these are miniature dowsing rods for kids that really work.
Not really a new invention but making a small version of an old idea for kids to use. Now, 2012, there are several companies making essentially what you see above. If you're looking to see patents for my inventions and designs you'll be disappointed. I've only done one patent search and that for Witch Stix in 1980, finding I was about 150 years too late. The patenting process has just been too expensive for my non-profit activist budget. My father did some inventing and when I was a young man circa 1963 he showed me these pair of in-line skates he had made. Had wooden wheel mock-ups but the design was pretty darn close to what you see now with in-line roller skates. He was just too early by about 30 years but he told me he had run a patent search on the idea and like me, found he was way down the line of inventors for that concept that seemed so original at the time.(c.1977)
Splatter Ball: Splatter ball breaks into pieces that must be put together to win the game. Special plastic that is reformable.(c.1980) Saw this ad today in my email from a toy company: Splat Balls. Splat Balls are versatile Stress Balls for your Desktop! Splat Balls will "splat" when you throw them against a table or wall. BUT, they'll come right back into shape, SOOOO COOL! As if that's not cool enough, Splat Balls are awesome stress relief squeeze balls too. You'll find yourself alternating between squeezing and splattering them all day. And, believe us, these are VERY visually interesting for you and anyone who sees your desk. Your coworkers will want to play with it too. Check out our wide selection of Splat Balls!
Rainbow Dictionary. Yes, that is a Rainbow Bible but originally it was going to be a Rainbow Dictionary, a soft-felt educational toy for kids with 7 spectrum colors folded to make a book of 26 pages, one page for each letter of the alphabet. Felt letters and characters can be stuck to the felt pages and taken off again.(1976)
Letter Dolls: Alphabet Letters made with faces and little hands and feet as dolls for kids to play with and learn their alphabets.(c.1966)
Wacko Dolls: Plastic blow-up punching bags with silk-screened faces of your favorite nemesis, Boss, President, Wife, etc. so you can take out your aggression on them. (c.1966)
Creepy People: 2-3ft high dolls of your favorite nemesis to be posed around the house like they are watching you. (c.1966 - - 22 years before Chucky)
Blue whale solar balloons: Save the Whales advertising. Clear plastic on top, dark blue underneath. Solar heat heats up interior air making them air buoyant. Large versions have solar powered electric motors to run propellers as hot air blimps.(c.1966)
Finger Pens: They fit your index finger and your finger presses a flexible ink bladder in the pen as you press down to write.(c.1968)
"Nessie": inflatable Loch Ness monster for kids.(c.1965)
Giraffe Crane: a working crane with levers and pulleys, kid-sized. Made of wood and metal. No plastic.(c.1965)
Zebracorns: Plush toy Unicorns that are Zebra striped. (c. 1976)
"Betty Bears": Female Teddy Bears.(c.1985)
"Floppy Disks" Frisbees made of soft materials so they won't bust things when they are thrown in close quarters.(c.1990)
Nerdball
Played on big croquet field with giant size rubber croquet balls, wickets and stakes. Players roll the giant croquet balls with their feet as they stand on them. One player starts at one end of the field, the other at the other end. First one to get to the other side wins.
People's Non-Violent Volleyball Rules
1) 3 to 9 on a side
2) Height equalization arrangement of players
3) No overhand serves, only underhand
4) No spiking or slamming
5) Can hit the ball back over or set up for another player. No carrying the ball.
6) 21 is game
International volleyball rules take volleyball out of the people's hands. PNVV puts it back.
Anti-Monopoly game (circa 1980?)
For wild-eyed anarchists and such. A game to play during the coming Depression when you're out of work. Object of game is to get rid of surplus capital to equalize the board by giving to those who need capital most. Player tokens represent oppressed minority groups. Nationalization of utilities, RR, all Co-op, Bank of Earth. Power to the many people. Actually, the original Monopoly game itself was originated as a political protest of monopoly capitalism.
Water Bears, tardigrades, as plush toys, cartoon characters
