The family

The Magnetic Personalities family tree

Willy got siblings almost immediately. Dapper Dan, Hair-Do Harriet and a miniature licensed cousin: who they are and which ones you can still buy.

One hit, then a cast

Once the bubble trick worked, the factory did the obvious thing and printed other faces under it. The line got a name, Magnetic Personalities, which still runs across the top of the boxes today. Willy stayed the star; the relatives came and went with the decades.

Dapper Dan

The big brother, on a larger board with a gentleman waiting for a proper mustache. The bigger canvas takes more powder and rewards patient hands, so he suits older kids and adults who want room to work. Out-of-print boards surface on collector listings at roughly three times the cost of a standard Willy, and the condition of the bubble is everything: a cracked dome is a dead board.

Hair-Do Harriet

The sister. Same mechanism, a woman’s face, decades out of regular production. She is the one to look for at flea markets and estate sales, usually sitting in a box of games for a dollar because nobody recognized her. Check the dome for cracks and the powder for clumping before you pay collector money.

World’s Smallest Wooly Willy

A licensed miniature from Super Impulse’s World’s Smallest line: the whole toy shrunk to palm size, wand and all. It is genuinely playable, if fiddly, and makes a good desk ornament for an adult who had the original. It moves in and out of print; at the moment the listings are dry, so treat any live one at a sane cost as a lucky find.

Which one to actually buy

For a kid: the standard board, no contest, and our shelf compares the four live listings. For a collector: Harriet, because she is the hardest to find honest. For a desk: the miniature, whenever it resurfaces. Dan is for people who already own a Willy and want the deluxe canvas.