The winners were selected from a list of 12 finalists, which included items as diverse as Dungeons & Dragons, the Pogo Stick, the Rubik’s Cube, Jenga, Simon, "Star Wars" action figures, Transformers, Twister, the puppet, and radio-controlled vehicles.
But those contenders were edged out in a vote of educators and historians who selected Hot Wheels, the miniature-sized toy cars made by Mattel, which has produced over 3 billion of them in some 800 models and 11,000 variations, according to the toy hall, part of The Strong, which also operates the National Museum of Play in Rochester.
The toy hall also recognized the dollhouse, which was traced to “baby houses” in which wealthy European women would display miniature furnishings as far back as the 16th century. German toymakers began making dollhouses in the 17th and 18th centuries, and they were mass-produced by the 19th century.
And of course, who could forget the blanket? The NTHF pointed out its uses a superhero’s cape or a bride’s veil in “imaginative play,” in addition to its well-known utility for building tents and forts. “The blanket joins the cardboard box, inducted in 2005, and the stick, inducted in 2008, as honored toys of the imagination,” the hall said in a statement.

source: msnbc