A man named Thomas Dam invented these as a toy for his daughter.
Troll dolls
Thomas Dam lived in Denmark with his family. He was a bricklayer, a fisherman, a bakerβeventually he tried being a woodworker. In 1959, he made a small doll out of wood with glass eyes and wool for hair and gave it to his daughter Lila for her birthday. He based the design on local legends about trolls that lived in the woods.
It wasnβt long before his daughterβs friends all wanted one and Thomas was struggling to keep up. He built a shop in his shed and started making the dolls out of rubber. However, that wasnβt enough to keep up either. In the 1960βs, Thomas bought a factory and started a business, Dam Things, and started marketing the Troll Dolls all over the world.
Unfortunately, Thomas never patented the dolls and his sales in the United States eventually stopped earning him money. It wasnβt until 2003 that Dam Things started making money on the original toy again from the United States.)