The was recently an interview conducted with Mike Mozart (Disney Artist and toy collector) by the Super Carlin Brothers in which Mike tells of a story from Joe Ranft (Pixar's head of story until his death in 2006). However, once the video aired on YouTube, Andrew Stanton (writer on all Toy Story films) posted on Twitter that the story was "fake news".

Still I feel that story does such a great job connecting some of the unsolved mysteries, and is worth an answer. I am going to paraphrase the key points from video below.

Woody was the only one of his kind. He was part of promotion of Cowboy Crunchies (the cereal that sponsored the show Woody's Roundup). Andy's father was entered this promotion, not with the required number of boxes, but with a detailed letter of how much he loved the show and was Woody's number one deputy. The company went out of business before the Woody dolls went into production. However, the secretary of the company saved the prototype Woody and decided on her own to send the doll to the child who was most worthy. This ended up being Andy's father.

This means that Andy's father was the only one to play with Woody, that Woody we see was not on the Roundup show, and therefore never met Jessie, Bulls-eye, etc.

(The only problem I have with the whole story is that in Toy Story 2, when Woody sees the show, there is a Woody doll. So my own addition to Mike Mozart's story would have to be that there was two Woody dolls.)

While not "canon", Pixar's head of story for the films said Woody was one of a kind

The was recently an interview conducted with Mike Mozart (Disney Artist and toy collector) by the Super Carlin Brothers in which Mike tells of a story from Joe Ranft (Pixar's head of story until his death in 2006). However, once the video aired on YouTube, Andrew Stanton (writer on all Toy Story films) posted on Twitter that the story was "fake news".

Still I feel that story does such a great job connecting some of the unsolved mysteries, and is worth an answer. I am going to paraphrase the key points from video below.

Woody was the only one of his kind. He was part of promotion of Cowboy Crunchies (the cereal that sponsored the show Woody's Roundup). Andy's father was entered this promotion, not with the required number of boxes, but with a detailed letter of how much he loved the show and was Woody's number one deputy. The company went out of business before the Woody dolls went into production. However, the secretary of the company saved the prototype Woody and decided on her own to send the doll to the child who was most worthy. This ended up being Andy's father.

This means that Andy's father was the only one to play with Woody, that Woody we see was not on the Roundup show, and therefore never met Jessie, Bulls-eye, etc.

(The only problem I have with the whole story is that in Toy Story 2, when Woody sees the show, there is a Woody doll. So my own addition to Mike Mozart's story would have to be that there was two Woody dolls.)

The was recently an interview conducted with Mike Mozart (Disney Artist and toy collector) by the Super Carlin Brothers in which Mike tells of story from Joe Ranft (Pixar's head of story until his death in 2006). However, once the video aired on YouTube, Andrew Stanton (writer on all Toy Story films) posted on Twitter that the story was "fake news".

Still I feel that story does such a great job connecting some of the unsolved mysteries, it is worth an answer. I am going to paraphrase the key points from video linked above.

Woody was the only one of his kind. He was part of promotion of Cowboy Crunchies (the cereal that sponsored the show Woody's Roundup). Andy's father was entered this promotion, not with the required number of boxes, but with a detailed letter of how much he loved the show and was Woody's number one deputy. The company went out of business before the Woody dolls went into production. However, the secretary of the company saved the prototype Woody and decided on her own to send the doll to the child who was most worthy. This ended up being Andy's father.

This means that Andy's father was the only one to play with Woody, that Woody we see was not on the Roundup show, and therefore never met Jessie, Bulls-eye, etc.

(The only problem I have with the whole story is that in Toy Story 2, when woody sees the show, there is a Woody doll. So my own addition to Mike Mozart's story would have to be that there is was two Woody dolls.)

The was recently an interview conducted with Mike Mozart (Disney Artist and toy collector) by the Super Carlin Brothers in which Mike tells of a story from Joe Ranft (Pixar's head of story until his death in 2006). However, once the video aired on YouTube, Andrew Stanton (writer on all Toy Story films) posted on Twitter that the story was "fake news".

Still I feel that story does such a great job connecting some of the unsolved mysteries, and is worth an answer. I am going to paraphrase the key points from video below.

Woody was the only one of his kind. He was part of promotion of Cowboy Crunchies (the cereal that sponsored the show Woody's Roundup). Andy's father was entered this promotion, not with the required number of boxes, but with a detailed letter of how much he loved the show and was Woody's number one deputy. The company went out of business before the Woody dolls went into production. However, the secretary of the company saved the prototype Woody and decided on her own to send the doll to the child who was most worthy. This ended up being Andy's father.

This means that Andy's father was the only one to play with Woody, that Woody we see was not on the Roundup show, and therefore never met Jessie, Bulls-eye, etc.

(The only problem I have with the whole story is that in Toy Story 2, when Woody sees the show, there is a Woody doll. So my own addition to Mike Mozart's story would have to be that there was two Woody dolls.)