Who invented the yo-yo? No one knows, but it’s an object that has existed as a toy—and for Ancient Greeks, as an offering to the gods—since at least the 5th century B.C.

But in 1928, the life of the yo-yo took off. That year, Filipino immigrant Pedro Flores opened the Yo-Yo Manufacturing Company in California. The name was perhaps a little too grand for Flores’ initial operation; he started with 12 handmade yo-yos.

And yet, just 18 months later, the Yo-Yo Manufacturing Company was churning out more than 300,000 yo-yos everyday.

That same year, perhaps unsurprisingly, Flores sold the company. Three years later, in 1932, the first World Yo-Yo Championships was held, in London.

Why the yo-yo held such appeal to the 1920s and 30s population is unknown, but possibly, like bubble-gum, it provided a cheap and fun distraction from the woes of the Great Depression.

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