Old Antique Toys: Bill Buttaggi's Fine Collection of Slush Toys

Tuesday, April 21, 2020

Cloudy with rain,
10 C 50 F

Bill Buttaggi's

Fine Collection of Slush Toys

Please click here to visit this excellent website about slush toys

Yesterday, I posted a blog post about Mr. Bill Buttaggi's new book. Bill had asked me if could write a blog about a book that he was writing and would be selling, and of course I said yes. While researching his website, and where one could buy his book, I came across his website that was all about slush toys. Bill had been collecting since he was 16, some 34 years ago, and had amassed an excellent collection.

When I went to Bill's website, there was a fantastic collection of "slush" toys. I wasn't sure how I would present them, so I decided to present them by brand name. The ones presented today are:

Tootsietoys

A Brief History of the Tootsietoy Company

The Tootsietoy company was created by Samuel Dowst. He visited the World's Fair in 1893,and saw a new casting machine (die-casting). Mr. Dowst was in the business of making buttons for the collars of shirts of the time. He decided to buy one of the new casting machines, and see if he could make buttone from them. He most certainly did. As well, he decided to get into the die-cast toy making business. From there, as they say, "the rest is history". Initially, made miniature trinkets, such as miniature irons, shoes, and frypans.These "charms" would be sold to candy companies who would place these miniatures as a "treat" for having bought the candy. The name "Tootsetoy" was not always used for all of the toys. However, when one of the Dowst brothers had a grand-daughter who was named "Toots", the name "Tootsietoy" was used for all the toys that would be produced by them.