The Marvelous Thing That Came From A Spring, a true Hollywood Slinky story

Our 5YO loves Slinky. Every time he gets the chance to enter a ‘prize bag’ where he gets to choose something he’ll always go for the Slinky. Of course, this isn’t the real metal Slinky that works, these are the cheap plastic versions that don’t really work but allow him to lasso other toys. The Marvelous Thing That Came From A Spring is the true story of how inventor Richard James’ accidental idea sprang into a toy that would last for generations.

 

The Marvelous Thing That Came From A Spring works as a book and as a story. That is sometimes a tricky avenue to navigate when you’re dealing with real people, known products and trying to tie it all together into an interesting children’s book. Author Gilbert Ford has done it though, thanks to brief, but effective storytelling, combined with incredibly detailed cut out art to make an educational and fun story that kids will marvel at and want to read.

The presentation in the book is what will grab your attention first. The illustrations are a diorama combination of colored cut outs and real toy objects to tell the story of how the Slinky was accidentally discovered in 1943.

At the time James was working for the United States Navy as a shipyard engineer. His specific task was to create a device that would minimize the vibrations that fragile ship equipment experience while out at sea. Because his experiments involved possibly using springs he had a couple of them lying around his desk. One day a spring fell off a book shelf, walked down a series of books and imagination took off.

After work he gave the spring to their son Tom who immediately put the spring on top of the stairs and let it go. The iconic jingle was then created and the mattress industry complained for years about their lack of coils. OK, that last sentence did not actually happen. It’s because there was struggle to get the toy to mass market that makes the Slinky story so fascinating.

His wife, Betty actually named Slinky, due to its swishing sound that it made when it walked down a slope. Richard borrowed $500 to produce 400 Slinkys but then faced the even more difficult challenge of getting a toy store to sell them. Eventually, Gimbels, a local toy store agreed to give Richard space to exhibit and sell the toy.

It sold out within 90 minutes and he then had to invent a machine that could produce the toy on a larger scale. He created a machine that could coil the 80 feet of steel wire needed to make each Slinky. It did this task in ten seconds which allowed him to create and then deliver the toys. Betty handled the bookkeeping and banking, but soon the business needed to grow again.

There were still ups and downs until the Slinky could rest completely-and that’s another reason that The Marvelous Thing That Came From A Spring succeeds as a book. Kids will realize that good things can happen accidently and that things sometimes will not succeed on the first attempt. There will be ups and downs, but the important thing is to never give up.

This is a fun story that kids (and adults probably) don’t know. Because it’s about a toy that is probably in their house it’ll resonate with them because of that and the unique artwork will seal the deal and make this a book that they’ll love reading.