On November 20, 1866, James L. Haven and Charles Hittrick received U.S. Patent No. 59,745 on a Whirligig or Bandalore, or what we today call a Yo-yo:  

This was not the first yo-yo — they have been known since at least 440 B.C., but it is the first patent on an improvement to a yo-yo.

The yo-yo business has had its ups and downs in the U.S. In 1928, Pedro Flores, a Filipino immigrant, opened the Yo-yo Manufacturing Company in Santa Barbara, California. Shortly thereafter entrepreneur Donald F. Duncan purchased the Flores Yo-Yo Corporation. In 1946, the Duncan Toys Company opened a yo-yo factory in Luck, Wisconsin. The Duncan yo-yo was inducted into the National Toy Hall of Fame in 1999.

In a trademark case in 1965, a federal court held that “yo-yo” had become a part of common speech and that Duncan no longer had exclusive rights to the term. The expenses incurred in this legal battle as well as other financial pressures, the Duncan family sold the company name and associated trademarks Flambeau, Inc., which operates the company today.