Five cool facts about sock monkeys

Believe it or not the history of sock monkeys can’t be traced back to a certain company or person. They though are quite old. Winner says the most basic roots of the toys can be traced back to 1872. back then the Swedish immigrant John Nelson and his business partner William Burson developed an automatic knitting machine that could close the heel and toe of a sock.

This made the production of socks much easier and cheaper. So slowly people started to make toys. In the 1950s the Nelson Knitting Company found out that people started to use their socks for sock toys. Of a particular favorite were the sock monkeys.

The company filed to patent the sock monkey and got a grant for it in 1955. The firm then started to include a sock monkey pattern in each package of Red Heel socks.

Shortly after Roebuck and Co. started to sell a book which included instructions to make more than 50 sock animals, dolla, puppets. Thus turning the sock stuffed animals into a whole separate branch of the hobby.

Sock monkeys are some of the most popular to this day. According to Winner they were in their high throughout the 1960s and 1970s with a rebirth of popularity in the last few years.