I thought about putting this in the Geocaching page, but thought it might be best here instead.

I was reading one of our Bathroom Readers while, um, taking a break, and I saw this entry in a section devoted to flops in the toy industry. To me it sounded like one of the first travel bugs.
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The Oobi
Product: It’s the world’s first – and so far, the last – hitchhiking toy, introduced by Parker Brothers at the time when hippies were bumming rides around the country and hitchhiking was still considered reasonably safe. Oobi was a clam-shaped plastic container with an address label and cartoon eyeballs painted on the lid. The idea was this: kids would write a note to a friend and put it inside, then put the friend’s address on the outside and leave Oobi someplace where strangers would find it. If the stranger was headed in the direction of the address of the intended recipient, they could “help Oobi on his journey, hitchhiker style, across the street or across the country.” With enough help, Oobi would eventually be delivered.
Problem: “Most parents,” Paul Kirchner writes in Forgotten Fads and Fabulous Flops, “even in that more innocent age, did not like the idea that some pervert finding the Oobi would not only get their child’s address, but be equipped with a splendid excuse to drop by. Parker Brothers quickly got the message – and Oobi was a dead letter.”
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Of course, I might just be thinking along these lines since I haven't been able to make time to go caching lately.

S-4-C

Welcome to Oobi land !!

Strange, some of the things we find by way of the web!!

D-man