The bobbleheads of today had their heyday during the 1960s sports scene, but nodding figures are documented in Europe as far back as the 1700s. Chinese nodding plaster figures are depicted in the background of painter Johann Zoffany’s 1765 portrait of Queen Charlotte, and similar figures are among the most valuable bobbleheads today. The first written reference is in the 1942 novel The Overcoat by Nikolai Gogol, in which a character’s neck is compared to a plastic, nodding animal. Ceramic animal bobbleheads were produced in Germany and became the precursor to the popular 1960s versions.