This site really struck a chord with me. Back when I was in high school in the 80s studying the vocational secretarial program the juniors and seniors split the lab time and our little office desks. Seniors had lab in the morning, juniors in the afternoon. The senior who shared my desk had a fuzzy little creature stuck to our IBM Selectric typewriter and she left it behind when she graduated, so he became mine for my senior year. I didn’t leave him behind at graduation. He stuck around my college apartment for luck and he’s somewhere in a box in my house right now. As a kid of the 70s and 80s, I’ve seen plenty of little figures like him, but never knew what he was called. Now I do!
My fuzzy friend Stanley is Weepul! These fuzzy round fellows with googly eyes and big sticky feet started life as a promotional trinket. But I also remember seeing them in gumball machines and claw machines.
This fun article details the beginnings of these furry guys.
There’s even a video featuring a song about them that charted in Europe. It’s a fun. nostalgic read that brings back a log of great memories.