Some of you may have heard of a man by the name of Ole Kirk Christianson. Ole Kirk Christianson lived in Denmark in the 1920s. He was a carpenter; he had a small carpentry shop where he would make various wooden products. Life got pretty difficult around 1932 for Ole Kirk Christianson. His wife passed away very suddenly, leaving him as a widower with four sons to raise. Not only that, the Great Depression hits and so his wooden products weren’t selling very well and business was really tough.
So he started to launch into making wooden toys. He started making wooden yoyos and wooden animals and wooden vehicles. Business went pretty well. Even during the Great Depression, children would buy toys for their kids. Fast forward about a decade and around 1942 another tragedy hit Ole Kirk Christianson’s life. His factory burnt to the ground. He had to lay off a bunch of his employees and business was very, very tough. In fact, as the years went on, WWII came and wood was very expensive and so everything was so difficult in his small carpentry business.