Rest In Play - 2020 - 2029

Barry Harding passed away on February 11, 2024, He was an excellent salesman and a very well respected man. Barry enjoyed a long career in the toy industry of over 40 years. Within those years, he ...worked for multiple major companies, including Fisher Price, Playmobil, and Step2. He also opened his own sales agency, BG Marketing, which represented a number of international toy companies in the UK market, including Kiddesigns. His close friend John Mitchell described him as "honest, dependable, decent and totally committed – a salesperson of the highest integrity. He was dedicated to his craft and one of the most courteous people you will ever meet." Barry will be deeply missed by friends, family, and all those that knew him.Show more

Steve Kennedy Lynn passed away on January 12, 2024, due to complications related to Type 1 diabetes. Steve graduated from Wilson High in Long Beach in 1983, then attended Cal State Long Beach, whe...re he received a degree in art. As a student, he was a resident illustrated for published periodicals, and he designed and painted murals at both his high school and college. He had his own art studios in Long Beach, Anaglyph Studios and Sow's Ear Studios, where he had a successful career in art of all mediums, especially sculpture. He designed and sculpted the very first Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle action figures, and helped in the development of the characters themselves. He sculpted all of the best McDonald's Happy Meal toys, co-created and sculpted Mattel's Street Sharks and Street Dinosaurs, created and sculpted the Toxix Creators, and worked in the Disney Art Department at Disneyland, where he did illustrations, sculptures, and ride design. Steve also attended Burning Man each year, and designed and constructed many of the large sculptures and founded the Lost Penguin Tribe. Steve will be dearly missed by friends, family, and all who knew him.Show more

Gill Sheppard, owner of Rainbow Toys in Midsomer Norton, passed away on September 7, 2023 after a 19 month battle with cancer. Gill owned Rainbow Toys with her husband, Julian.

Scott Bennie, famous game designer, passed away in March of 2022 due to complications from pneumonia. He was 61. Scott Bennie became interested in games in high school, especially role playing gam...es. He submitted articles to Dragon Magazine, made his first sale in 1981, and became a freelancer for TSR, Inc. Scott graduated from University of British Columbia in 1986, and in 1990, he was hired at Interplay Productions. He became one of the four designers on J.R.R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings, Vol. I. He also designed Castles, and was one of the writers on Star Trek: Judgement Rites, Fallout, Starfleet Command, and many others. He will be deeply missed by friends, family, and colleagues alike.Show more

Paul Hyslop passed away on May 30, 2022. Paul spent much of his last two decades working at JustFlight, a UK-based publisher specializing in developing and publishing add-ons for Flight Simulator. ...Paul's career started at Microprose, where he helped to establish the military software brand in Europe. After, he worked at Tomb Raider publisher Eidos, before joining Just Flight in 2002. Paul was described by his friends as a man with no ego, a man with many friends, and and a man who knew how to have a good time. He will be dearly missed by friends, family, and colleagues alike.Show more

Douglas Thompson, former president of the Toy Manufacturers Association, passed away on October 22, 2021 at the age of 97. Douglas joined the TMA, now The Toy Association, as president in 1978 and ...led the organization in consumer safety and policy, public relations, and philanthropy. He was also a founder of the Fashion Institute of Technology’s (FIT) Toy Design Department.Show more

Lizzie Wilding, Vice President of commercial operations at UK studio Dovetail Games, passed away on May 26, 2022 after a battle against colon cancer. Lizzie spent over 5 years at Dovetail Games, or...iginally joining the company as vice president of publishing before taking over commercial operations last year. Previously, Lizzie had worked in marketing positions at PlayStation, Jagex, Codemasters, NaturalMotion, Gremlin Interactive, and Electronic Arts. Lizzie was one of the first recipients of the MCV Top 100 Women in Games Awards. She is survived by her husband and five children, along with her mother, uncle, and grandfather.Show more

Emilio Delgado was born on May 8, 1940 and passed away at the age of 81 on March 10, 2022. He was best known for his role as Luis on Sesame Street. Emilio began acting professionally in 1968, but d...idn't start on Sesame Street until 1971. He played Luis, a handyman and aspiring writer who ran the Fix-It Shop. He was one of the first human additions to the show, and his character was described as "an honest, upstanding, hard-working, affable person." Emilio expected the role to last one or two seasons, but he in fact played Luis from 1971 until 2016. He is believed to have played the same role on U.S. television longer than any other Mexican-American actor ever has. Emilio married Barbara Snavely in 1963, with whom he had a son with, and they divorced in 1975. He married Linda Moon in 1977, and they divorced in 1984. He married Carole Delago in 1990, and they were together until his death in 1990. He and Carole had a daughter, Lauren.Show more

Joe Ruby was born on March 30, 1933 and passed away on August 26, 2020 at the age of 87. Joe was best known for co-creating the animated Scooby-Doo franchise with Ken Spears. Together, they founded th...e television animation production company Ruby-Spears Productions. Joe attended Fairfax High School, and immediately afterward joined the Navy. He worked as a sonar operator on a destroyer during the Korean War. After his service, Joe studied art and began his career in animation at Walt Disney Animation Studios. A few years later, he met Ken Spears, who was also a Navy verteran, and they teamed up to become writers for several animated and live-action television programs. They worked for a number of companies, including Hanna-Barbera, Sid and Marty Krofft, and DePatie-Freleng Enterprises. For Hanna-Barbera, the duo created the Scooby-Doo franchise and its main characters, which debuted in September 1969. In 1977, ABC set Joe and Ken up with their own studio, Ruby-Spears Productions, where they animated different series for Saturday mornings, including Fangface, The Plastic Man Comedy-Adventure Hour, Thundarr the Barbarian, Saturday Supercade, Mister T, Alvin and the Chipmunks, and Superman, among others.Show more

Loretta Whitney was born on February 17, 1941, and passed away on December 27, 2020 at the age of 79. Loretta was a dollmaker, famous for creating Baby Whitney, a doll with realistic Black features. ... Loretta attended Howard University, and came into doll making when she was looking to gift her niece a doll and was having trouble finding a Black doll with realistic features. The Cabbage Patch Kids craze was in full swing, and while they did have a few Black dolls, they were made the same as white dolls, just using brown fabric. Her boyfriend, soon-to-be husband, Melvin Whitfield, had noticed the same thing—that even though there may have been Black dolls on the shelves, they were modeled after European faces and bodies. So, after getting married in 1984, the pair decided to design an alternative. They spent 3 years creating Baby Whitney, one of first realistic mass-produced Black dolls.Show more