Latest / New Books in Economic and Business History
Michael Kimmel, "Playmakers: The Jewish Entrepreneurs Who Created the Toy Industry in America" (W. W. Norton & Co, 2026)
The untold story of the first-generation Jewish American toymakers who literally manufactured “the century of the child.”
In 1902, Morris and Rose Michtom invented the Teddy Bear―bound by clothing scraps, stuffed with sawdust, and given button eyes with a sad, longing expression―in the back room of their Brooklyn candy store. Together they launched the Ideal Toy Corporation, joining a set of other poor, first-generation Jewish toymakers: the Hassenfeld brothers of Hasbro, Ruth Moskowicz and Elliot Handler of Mattel, and Joshua Lionel Cowan of Lionel Trains.
From Barbie and G.I. Joe to Popeye…
The skinny
The skinny isn't ready yet — notes appear once the transcript is processed.