Originally known as Leprechauns, but also referred to as Dam dolls, Gonks, Wishniks, and Norfins, we simply called them Trolls or Treasure Trolls.
Who would have thought a scary fantasy creature such as a troll would be widely popular with young kids throughout the decades?
Before the Beanie Baby outbreak of the mid-90s, there was the Troll craze. Different stores in the mall would carry various Troll dolls, all with different colored hair and cute, clever outfits - there was a troll dressed for every season and almost any activity a kid could think of!
I remember I had a whole shoebox full of these guys! The first one I ever got had yellow hair, however I did have the ever popular Rainbow Hair Troll too.
They also created larger dolls with outfits you could interchange with other dolls (I sometimes used Cabbage Patch Kids clothes, as they fit!) - I had one that was like a ballerina. I also had the troll pencil toppers that caused plenty of fun at school! There was also the Treasure Trolls game - I forget the point of it, but it came with 4 mini troll dolls (about the size of the pencil toppers) and since we didn't play the game much, I just put them in my shoebox with my other troll dolls!Did you know that Trolls were originally created in 1959 and besides being popular in the late 80s and early 90s, they were also popular in the 60s and 70s? They also made it onto the Toy Industry Associations's Century of Toys list too!
In 2005 there was a short-lived and failed cartoon series called Trollz, and apparently it was recently announced by Dreamworks that a Trolls movie is in the works as well.
I had forgotten all about Treasure Trolls! I think I had one or two--I remember one with hot pink hair that had a little jewel in place of a belly button. But I had a teacher in 6th grade who had a huge collection of them, and she had them all decorating her room. But there was an incident where some student had pulled all their pants down and turned them around so they were mooning the classroom, and the next day they were gone, and the teacher said that the trolls were very upset and went home, and they weren't going to come back unless we treated them nicely. I can't remember if they ever did come back, but they probably did.
ReplyDeleteA Trolls movie? I think that sounds like a really bad idea.
Like Eleni, I too forgot about these things! I had a ton of them. Mostly mini ones, but I also had a huge one. ahaha. Trolls! hilarious.
ReplyDelete