Kiddicraft (1947)
The forerunner of the LEGO brick was the
Kiddicraft Self-Locking Brick, being marketed by Hilary Fisher Page. Godtfred
married Dana, the daughter of a cheesemaker, around the end of World War II.
They started a family of three children. Gunhild Kirk Johansen, née Kristiansen
(1946), Kjeld Kirk Kristiansen (1947), and Hanne Kristiansen (1949). Ole was visited by a salesman from Hull in 1947. The salesman represented a British machine-tool company, and was trying to sell Ole their injection molding equipment. Ole bought one of the machines, even though the people around him gave Ole advice that was against it. The machine cost 30,000 DKK. It costed more than twice the profits than the previous year. Ole received some samples of what the machine can do, including Hilary Fisher Page's Kiddicraft brick, made by Injection Moulders, Ltd. of London. Godtfred and Ole made some modifications to the brick. They straightened round corners, converted the sides from inches to cm and mm, altering the size of the brick by approximately 0.1 mm, and they also they flattened the studs on the top of the brick. LEGO produced its first plastic toys after two years of development (1949), and among these plastic toys was a brick named the Automatic Binding Brick. All of Ole's sons were working in the factory by the late 1940s. Later, in 1951, Ole suffered a stroke, but the sales of the plastic and wooden toys continued to go well. In 1952 Ole decided to expand the factory, one much larger than what they needed. They had just paid off the 1942 factory, and Godtfred protested against the new expansion, and besides, they didn't need to go right back into debt. But what Ole told him was, "I’ll decide what's to be built - your job is to raise the money!" So, they expanded the factory, and the cost was 350,000 DKK.
Image from http://www.neatorama.com/2008/01/28/10-neatest-lego-facts-and-links/