Danbo first appeared in Chapter 28 of the manga Yotsuba&! by Kiyohiko Azuma, published in April 2006. In the issue, the main character Yotsuba Koiwai mistakes her friend Miura Hayasaka dressed up as a science project for a real robot. When Yotsuba asks the robot its name, Miura does not want to crush her friend’s dreams, naming the costume “Danbo,” a play on the Japanese word for corrugated cardboard, danboru. While the robot was originally named “Cardbo” in the first translation, when Yen Press re-published the manga, they chose “danbo” which senior editor JuYoun Lee thought sounded cuter.
