11 Bizarre Products That Actually Made It to American Store Shelves in the 1960s
The 1960s had no shortage of unusual ideas for what people might wear, eat, play with, or put in their homes. A dress made from paper, a lamp filled with moving wax, cheese squeezed from a can, and a toy that gave children an extra finger all became real commercial products during the decade.
Some were short-lived novelties. Others became lasting parts of American consumer culture. Together, they show how willing manufacturers were to turn unusual ideas into products people could actually buy.
Disposable Paper Dresses
Paper clothing sounds like something from a futuristic fashion experiment, but it became a real retail novelty in the 1960s. Scott Paper introduced its Paper Caper promotion in 1966 through coupon redemption, and other manufacturers soon followed with their own paper garments. The nonwoven material could be trimmed with scissors and was designed around the novelty of clothing that could eventually be discarded rather than routinely washed.
Lava Lamps
The lava lamp turned a simple piece of home décor into a constantly moving display. Its heated liquid creates floating wax-like blobs that rise and fall inside the lamp, producing the distinctive effect associated with the product. Smithsonian records 1965 as the year British inventor Edward Craven Walker sold U.S. manufacturing rights to Lava Lite. The result was an unusual decorating item that made motion part of the appeal.
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Nabisco Snack Mate
Before Easy Cheese became the familiar name associated with cheese in a can, Nabisco had Snack Mate. Introduced in 1965, the product allowed shoppers to squeeze ribbons of cheese spread directly onto crackers. A 1966 advertisement promoted it as “instant cheese for instant parties,” capturing the era’s fascination with convenience and novelty. The dispenser itself was part of the attraction, turning a grocery staple into something much more theatrical.
Royal Shake-A-Pudd’n
Royal Shake-A-Pudd’n turned dessert preparation into an activity. The 1960s product came with pudding mix, lidded cups, and spoons, with water added before the mixture was shaken and allowed to set. One historical account describes roughly 30 seconds of shaking followed by about five minutes of setting time. Instead of simply preparing pudding in a conventional kitchen, the product made the preparation itself part of the experience.
Kenner Easy-Bake Oven
The Easy-Bake Oven arrived in 1963 and gave children something more ambitious than a pretend kitchen appliance. Its original design used the heat from a household light bulb and miniature baking pans, allowing children to make actual food. The concept was unusual because it brought a scaled-down version of an everyday kitchen process into a toy. Rather than merely pretending to cook, children could participate in a miniature baking experience.
Mattel Thingmaker: Creepy Crawlers
Mattel’s Thingmaker arrived in 1964 with a particularly memorable idea: let children make their own rubbery creatures. The original Creepy Crawlers set used metal molds, liquid material marketed as Plastigoop, and an electric heating unit to produce insects and other small creations. Instead of purchasing finished bugs, children created them themselves. It was essentially a miniature molding activity packaged as a toy, making the manufacturing process part of the fun.
Mattel Vac-U-Form
Vac-U-Form took another manufacturing process and turned it into a children’s activity. Released in the early 1960s, the Mattel toy used heated plastic sheets, molds, and vacuum suction to form small plastic objects. Unlike Thingmaker, which used liquid material in molds, Vac-U-Form worked with sheets of plastic that were shaped over molds. The unusual selling point was simple: children could experience a miniature version of an industrial forming process.
Sixfinger
Sixfinger took the idea of a toy gadget in a very literal direction. The 1965 play set featured an artificial extra finger that concealed several functions, including a pen and signaling features, along with toy projectiles. The Strong Museum’s collection documents the product and its advertising from the period. Its appeal came from packing several pretend spy-gadget functions into something that looked like an extra finger, making it one of the decade’s stranger toy concepts.
Ideal’s Mouse Trap
Mouse Trap debuted in 1963 and brought an elaborate mechanical contraption into the world of board games. Players not only competed on the game board, but also built and operated a three-dimensional mechanism inspired by a Rube Goldberg-style chain reaction. The construction was part of the entertainment, giving the game a very different feel from traditional tabletop play. Its unusual design clearly did not prevent it from becoming a successful product.
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Milton Bradley’s Twister
Twister reached the market in 1966 and changed the basic idea of what a board game could be. Instead of moving pieces around a board, players became the pieces, placing their hands and feet on colored circles spread across a floor mat. The concept was unusual enough to stand apart from conventional games, yet it quickly found an audience. The Strong reports that more than three million copies were sold in 1967.
Mattel Chatty Cathy
Chatty Cathy arrived in 1960 with a feature that made the doll seem remarkably interactive for its time. Pulling a string activated its voice mechanism, producing recorded phrases rather than simply leaving the doll as a silent plaything. The Henry Ford records 11 original phrases, with the number increasing to 18 by 1963. The concept helped make recorded speech a defining feature of this particular doll and inspired related talking products from Mattel.
The strangest products of the 1960s were not necessarily failures or forgotten curiosities. Some became lasting names, while others captured a particular moment when novelty itself was a powerful reason to buy.
