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Schaper Manufacturing Company

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Cootie game

Cootie game, 1949.

In 1948, Herbert W. Schaper was a mailman in Minneapolis and a fisherman who made his own lures. One day, he added six legs to a lure that he had whittled and called it a “Cootie.” Starting out with a basement factory in his home and $1200 in 1949, he transformed the fishing lure into the Cootie game that reached $1.5 million in sales by 1953.

World War I soldiers used the word “cootie” to refer to the lice that infested them. They may have influenced the early creation of games called Cootie, which were usually played with paper and pencil. Schaper created simple games that younger children could play even if they could not read or write. With them in mind, he used children in his neighborhood to test the games during their development.

Playing the Cootie game is fairly straightforward. The player rolls a die, with each die number corresponding to one of six colorful, plastic body parts of the insect. When rolling the die, a player must get the body first and then the head followed by, in any order, two antennae, two eyes, one proboscis (a mouth-like part), and six legs. The first player to fully assemble the Cootie wins. Prior to Cootie, similar games were usually played on a board.

The first production line to prepare a Cootie body for the game was simple. Workers sat in a circle and held glue pans in their laps. They dipped each part of the Cootie into the glue and held it until dry, then drilled holes into the body to insert the legs and eyes. In this way, they produced forty thousand games in the first year.

The Cootie games were first sold by Dayton’s Department Store. The two dozen games that Schaper initially convinced the store to take sold out within a few days. By Christmas, the store had sold over 5,000 games. Eventually, Schaper Manufacturing became known as the “Cootie Company.”

By 1952, Schaper located his first production plant and offices at 1800 Olson Memorial Highway in Golden Valley. Three years later, when equipment was added to replace some manual functions, over 1,200,000 Cooties were sold. By then, Cootie was one of the first games to be made in a plastic mold—a significant innovation.

By 1951, Schaper had developed seven games—Sparetime Bowling, Pickins, Scare Crow, Stadium Checkers, Skunk, Tickle Bee, and Cootie. Despite his ability to predict a game’s success, Schaper made a costly mistake in 1953 when he turned down the opportunity to buy the game Scrabble, which became a classic American board game. He did, however, take advantage of the new medium of television to successfully advertise his products in addition to newspapers and magazines.

By 1953, the company had 125 employees, and in 1957 the company expanded its headquarters in Golden Valley. The building held the administration and offices for Thunderbird Plastics, which manufactured the game’s plastic pieces, and Highlander Sales (the sales department).

In 1961, the company became publicly owned when stock was sold to the public. Sales increased to nearly $6 million by 1968. In 1969, the Schaper games Ants in the Pants and Don’t Break the Ice were two of the toy industry’s biggest sellers. In 1971, the company was sold for $5.4 million in stock and became a division of Kusan, Inc., a plastics manufacturer in Nashville, Tennessee.

By 1978, sales of Schaper games reached $40 million and there were more than forty toys and games manufactured under the Schaper brand. The company had production and warehouse/distribution facilities in Lakeville, Plymouth, and Edina. At peak times, there were 774 employees with a weekly toy production of 125,000. That year, a 2,500-pound Cootie float appeared in the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade, accompanied by clowns carrying a birthday cake and singing “Happy Birthday” to the Cootie on its thirtieth birthday. In 1986, the plant in Lakeville closed when Schaper Toys was sold to Tyco Toys, a company based in New Jersey.

In 2003, the Toy Industry Association released a list of toys of the 100 “most memorable and creative” toys of the past century. The entry for 1948 included the Cootie game along with the Slinky and Scrabble (which were not Schaper products).

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“Cootie Firm Expands into New Building.” Minneapolis Star, October 3, 1957.

Feyder, Susan. “Unlike Most Toy Firms and Despite Setbacks, Schaper Revenues Up.” Minneapolis Tribune, November 14, 1982.

Free Library. “Toy Industry Association Announces Its ‘Century of Toys List.’” Business Wire, January 21, 2003.
https://www.thefreelibrary.com/Toy+Industry+Association+Announces+Its+%60%60Century+of+Toys+List%27%27.-a096647851

Hopfensperger, Jean. “Fun of Toy Factory Job Ends Friday in Lakeville as Schaper Plant Closes.” Minneapolis Star and Tribune, November 13, 1986.

McCarty, Pat. “Toys are Simpler, Less Expensive this Year.” Minneapolis Sunday Tribune, December 8, 1963.

Podesta, Jane Sims. “Minnesota Toy Makers Gamble for Fun and Games—and Profit.” Minneapolis Star, October 5, 1977.

Roberts, Kate, and Adam Scher. Toys of the ‘50s, ‘60s, and ‘70s. St. Paul: Minnesota Historical Society Press, 2014.

P2511
Schaper Manufacturing Company records, 1950–1982
Manuscripts Collection, Minnesota Historical Society, St. Paul
Description: Advertisements, photographs, price lists, newspaper clippings, a "Cootie" history, and miscellaneous material relating to this Minnesota manufacturer of the popular Cootie game. See especially “Evolution of the Cootie” (August 1, 1978); “Fact Sheet” (1979), and “A Very Happy 30th Birthday to the Business ‘Built on a Bug’” (1979).

Wascoe Jr., Dan. “Tyco Toys will Acquire Schaper.” Minneapolis Star and Tribune, September 6, 1986.

Wickland, John A. “Million Dollar Toy Games from Little Cooties Grow.” Minneapolis Sunday Tribune, September 13, 1953.
——— . “Toy Maker Plans to Build Plastics Plant.” Minneapolis Morning Tribune, June 1, 1955.

Related Images

Cootie game
Cootie game
Schaper Company headquarters
Schaper Company headquarters
Gold-painted Cootie figure
Gold-painted Cootie figure
Filming a TV commercial for Stadium Checkers and the Cootie game
Filming a TV commercial for Stadium Checkers and the Cootie game
Put and Take game
Put and Take game
Skunk dice game
Skunk dice game
Squares game
Squares game
Stadium Checkers
Stadium Checkers
Herbert Schaper and children
Herbert Schaper and children
Completed Cootie figure
Completed Cootie figure
Cootie game in its original 1966 packaging
Cootie game in its original 1966 packaging

Turning Point

In 1971, Schaper Manufacturing is sold for $5.4 million in stock. It becomes a division of Kusan, Inc., a plastics manufacturer in Nashville, Tennessee, and a subsidiary of the Bethlehem Steel Corporation.

Chronology

1948

Herbert Schaper whittles the first wooden Cooties in Minneapolis.

1948

Schaper Toy Company is founded and the first Cootie production molds are made.

1949

Schaper Manufacturing moves out of Herbert Schaper’s basement (in 1952 it relocated to 1800 Olson Memorial Highway in Minneapolis).

1950

Schaper uses giant electrified Cooties to introduce the game to the toy industry at a New York toy fair.

1953

Schaper Manufacturing moves to a new location on Ottawa Avenue in Golden Valley that will house administrative, manufacturing, and sales offices.

1971

Kusan, a plastics manufacturer in Nashville, purchases Schaper Manufacturing.

1972

The Cootie figure is modified and described as “warmer, friendlier, softer, and rounder” than the original model.

1975

Schaper introduces the West German Playmobil toy line to the United States market. Super Jock figures and Stomper 4x4 toy trucks are among the company’s best sellers.

1976

The Cootie’s smile is modified to make it friendlier. The game durability improves when assembly and manufacturing methods are changed.

1977

Toy manufacturers in Minnesota include Schaper in Golden Valley, Tonka Toys in Mound, Animal Fair in Chanhassen, and Lakeside Games in Bloomington.

1978

Frances Munson is the longest-tenured Schaper employee. She joined the company on November 18, 1949, and was a member of the team that assembled the first Cootie by hand. Her initial hourly wage was sixty-five cents per hour.

1978

Schaper Manufacturing announces that the population of Cooties is thirty million. The Cootie game price decreases by 15 per cent to allow more consumers to purchase it.

1978

Schaper Manufacturing celebrates its thirtieth birthday on August 2. Gross sales are expected to be more than $30 million.

1986

Tyco Toys buys Schaper games from Kusan.

2019

The Cootie game is marketed by Milton Bradley, which is owned by Hasbro.