In 1961, a greeting cards salesman, Leonard Marks, was in a small mom-and-pop shop to sell his line of cards. As he waited for Robert Gilbert, the shop owner, he fiddled with an open box of snow-tire-replacement chain links. Marks became so engrossed in playing, he did not realize how much time had passed. When he told Gilbert that the links would make a great toy, Gilbert referred Marks to Milton Dinhofer, a successful toy inventor in the area. Marks already knew Dinhofer from his high school days and immediately reached out to his old acquaintance. Dinhofer asked Marks to make a plastic sample of the hooks for their meeting.