The HAPPY SMILEY FACE was painted by Harvey R. Ball in 1963 to encourage employees of two insurance companies that had just merged. State Mutual Life Assurance Companies paid $45 for this smiling face painting. In the 1960s, N.G. Slater Corporation made smiley faces into badges. Then the smiley face appeared in a series of ads, the most recent of which was Wal-Mart.