Mike Wood, Whose LeapFrog Toys Taught a Generation, Dies at 72

Summary

Mike Wood was a young father when his toddler’s struggles to read led him to develop one of a generation’s most fondly remembered toys.Mr. Wood’s 3-year-old son, Mat, knew the alphabet but couldn’t pronounce the letter sounds. A lawyer in San Francisco, Mr. Wood had a new parent’s anxiety that if his child lagged as a reader, he would forever struggle in life.So on his own time, Mr. Wood developed the prototype of an electronic toy that played sounds when children squeezed plastic letters. He based the idea on greeting cards that played a tune when opened.Mr. Wood went on to found LeapFrog Enterprises, which in 1999 introduced the LeapPad, a child’s computer tablet that was a kind of talking book.The LeapPad was a runaway hit, the best-selling toy of the 2000 holiday season, and LeapFrog became one of the fastest-growing toy companies in history.Children of the aughts remember LeapPads — like Game Boys and Tamagotchis — as among their first electronic devices. Many from that generation recall LeapPads helping them to read.Mr. Wood, who retired from his California-based company when it had some 1,000 employees, died on April 10 in Zurich. He was 72.His brother Tim Wood said he had Alzheimer’s and made the decision, before the disease progressed too far, to end his life at Dignitas, a nonprofit organization that offers physician-assisted suicide, where he was surrounded by family. He lived in Mill Valley, Calif.Former colleagues recalled Mr. Wood as a demanding entrepreneur who was driven by a true belief that technology could help what he called “the LeapFrog generation” gain an educational leg up.He had “famously fluffy hair,” Chris D’Angelo, LeapFrog’s former executive director of entertainment, wrote of Mr. Wood on The Bloom Report, a toy industry news site. “When stressed, he’d unconsciously rub his head — and the higher the hair, the higher the stakes. We (quietly) called them ‘high-hair days.’ It was funny, but also telling. He felt everything deeply — our work...