By the 1980s, WR stars were accepted as the descendants of massive OB stars, although their exact evolutionary state in relation to the main sequence and other evolved massive stars was still unknown. Theories that the preponderance of WR stars in massive binaries and their lack of hydrogen could be due to gravitational stripping had been largely ignore or abandoned. WR stars were being proposed as possible progenitors of supernovae, and particularly the newly-discovered type Ib supernovae, lacking hydrogen but apparently associated with young massive stars.