Gonk
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A gonk is a small furry soft toy which was extremely popular in the 1960s created by artist Robert Benson and Sheila Stanton. They were eggshaped soft toys with small arms and legs.
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[edit] History
Gonks were first "created" during World War I when the flow of teddy bears from Germany was halted. Other factories across Europe had to start producing soft toys. Because of the material shortages, the factories had to significantly simplify toy designs. World War II again brought soft toy production to a standstill — many factories never reopened. To keep the children's spirits high throughout the two wars, women at home made gonks from stuffing socks with rags and then sewing on button-eyes and material flaps for arms and legs.[citation needed]
In the 1960s, gonks became particularly popular, with new designs and colours. “Gonk” became a popular slang term in Britain for a brief time, meaning a hip and trendy person. Gonks were popular among teenage girls and Gonk inspired fashions became a trend[citation needed].
In the UK and Australia, gonks rapidly became a "must-have" playground accessory. Fortunately, their simplicity meant that they could easily be made at home, and thus even the poorest children could boast one. Pattern books contained instructions for making hand-knitted gonks. Gonk popularity reached its peak in the late 1970s and early 1980s. They were often given as good luck tokens, or won as prizes at fairgrounds.
Gonks were available in America too, but were not as popular as in the UK.
Promotional bugs, often appearing alongside corporate-branded pens or mugs, are often referred to as gonks. Promotional bugs often have fur in the "corporate colour(s)" and a short length of ribbon with a company name or slogan attached.
[edit] Popular culture
Perhaps the most famous gonk in the UK was Humpty from the children's TV series Play School. Gonks were also immortalized in the early 1980s in the TV comedy show The Young Ones, where Neil gets worried about his exam performance:
"I sat in the big hall and put my packet of Polos on the desk. And my spare pencil and my support gonk. And my chewing gum and my extra pen. And my extra Polos and my lucky gonk. And my pencil sharpener shaped like a cream cracker. And three more gonks with a packet of Polos each. And lead for my retractable pencil. And my retractable pencil. And spare lead for my retractable pencil. And chewing gum and pencils and pens and more gonks, and the guy said "Stop writing, please."
In 1965, the film Gonks Go Beat was released, and the music from the soundtrack became a cult classic. The advertisements for the film included circular gonk-like creatures dancing around. The Go Gonks spurred a wave of Go Gonk merchandise including plates, glasses, fashion, and toys. The Go Gonks were 6 distinct figures: Gone Gonk, with his long hair covering his eyes; Upside-down Gonk, who stood on his head; Beat Gonk, with his full make-up face and fashionable clothes; Ssshh Gonk, who is always trying to be quiet; Fred Gonk, wearing suspenders; Mac Gonk, in his kilt.
In 1985, Lyn Paul sang on a children's pop song called "The Gonks Are Here for Christmas", written and produced by Geoff Morrow. The 'B' side of this single, "The Gonks Landing" was a non-musical narration of a news reporter talking to gonks landing from Outer Space.
In the hit Scottish television comedy series Chewin' the Fat, one of its most famous sketches had two Neds at a carnival hold up the archery still with the stallholder's own crossbows demanding: "gie's a gonk, ya dobber!" ("give us a gonk").
[edit] Decline
Gonks fell completely out of popularity in the early 1990s, due to the name being assumed by small plastic dolls with a great deal of hair (Trolls). Fairgrounds started giving away less expensive furry toys, often made in China. The rotund and simple-to-manufacture gonk fell out of fashion.
