ID X and fill in the blanks!

X applied for his Hungarian patent in January 1975 and left his invention with a small toy making cooperative in Budapest. The patent approval finally came in early 1977 and the first ____ appeared at the end of 1977. By this time, X was married.
Two other people applied for similar patents at about the same time as X. Terutoshi Ishige applied a year after X, for a Japanese patent on a very similar ____. An American, Larry Nichols, patented a ____ before X, held together with magnets. Nichols' toy was rejected by all toy companies, including the Ideal Toy Corporation, which later bought the rights to X's ____.
All blanks are same.