I was walking through a hospital when I was taken by surprise by a pair of googly eyes. I shouldn’t have been that surprised. It’s not exactly pareidolia but people like to turn things into faces by sticking googly eyes on them. There’s even a Googly Eyes Foundation that promotes the googlification of everyday items by providing free googly eyes.
That led me down a rabbit hole of the history of googly eyes but that’s where murky. The name may come from the syndicated comic strip Barney Google And Snuffy Smith which debuted in 1919 and more than a century later is still making lazy, awful jokes based on tired stereotypes of rural people. Check out The Comics Curmudgeon to see the strip regularly get the treatment it deserves.
Googly eyes may have originated from German dolls made in the early 20th century, and the term “googly” may even have come from German. Like I said the history is murky. They really became popular in the early 1970’s with the invention of Weepuls which were a really big fad at one time and while it’s died down it never completely went away—there’s still a Weepuls organization.
As much as I like digging into history I also like it that there are some things that remain mysteries, that may always be mysteries. Like who put the googly eyes there.
I work in a hospital, on the mechanical engineering staff and have to inspect valves just like those. Might start doing the googly eye thing myself.
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I hope you do! And even if you don’t I feel like people are lucky to be working with you.
For those who wish they had face pareidolia but don’t, googly eyes are the next best thing!
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It’s hilarious to me that googly eyes just magically transform everything. I can’t find it now but as I was writing this I stumbled on a picture of a cracked rock and someone had added googly eyes that made the crack look like a mouth. Really brilliant and not something I would have ever thought of but now I can’t un-see it.
Your posts are a sight for sore and googly eyes, Chris.