Originally created by Carey Orr, who was an editorial cartoonist for the Chicago Tribune, and first produced in 1925 by the Face Corporation of Philadelphia (corporations had a sense of humor back then, don’t you think?). And now reproduced by your friendly neighborhood optical toy company. It’s not an optical toy per se, but I thought it was very cool when I first found a very beat up old original. It was taken into the intensive care ward of Photoshop and reconstructed to look as good as new.

Carey Orr

It was this original toy, and these images, on which was based the “Changeable Charlie” toy of the 1940’s, 50’s, and 60’s.

There are 11 different blocks, each with 4 different images on each face: a head/hat block, right & left eyebrows, left ear, left eye, right eye, right ear… etc etc. You can turn any block and each combination fits in with all the rest to create a brand new face.

The resulting combination is 4 to the 11th power (4x4x4x4x4x4x4x4x4x4x4) or 4,194,304 different face combinations. Working at the rate of one change per minute, eight hours per day, six days per week, and fifty-two weeks per year, you can see every combination in exactly 28 years, 8 hours, 58 minutes and 48 seconds. A true heirloom toy. 6 x 7.5 inches; full color images on wood blocks.

̶$̶2̶5̶.̶0̶0̶ $20.00

Back to the home page www.opticaltoys.com or click the face.