dollshow

dollshow

AUSTIN DOLL COLLECTORS SOCIETY

The Austin Doll Collectors Society is an organization of antique, vintage, and modern doll collectors, dealers, and artisans. We meet on the second Sunday of each month and our meetings are fun and educational. We begin with refreshments and socializing, and, following our brief business meeting, there is a special doll-related program and "show and tell." The Austin Doll Collectors Society is a nonprofit organization and is a member of the United Federation of Doll Clubs.

Friday, March 1, 2024

February 11, 2024, Meeting

Member Elaine Jackson lead the program, which was on books and dolls. She started out with one of the most famous books featuring a doll, Hitty. Hitty is the wooden doll heroine of Rachel Field's 1929 children's novel, Hitty, Her First Hundred Years. In the book, the eponymous Hitty (short for Mehitabel), a simple wooden doll carved by a peddler in the 1820s, narrates her adventures over her century of existence. Jackson explained that Fields was friends with illustrator Dorothy Lathrop and sometime in the 1920s, while strolling together in New York City they saw a small time-worn wooden doll in an antique shop window. All the shop owner could tell them about the doll was that she was at least 100 years old. Neither woman could afford the doll by herself, so they pooled their resources and purchased her jointly. Inspired by the diminutive doll, they created a history for Hitty, written by Fields and illustrated by Lathrop. The book was a success and was awarded the John Newbery Medal of Excellence in 1930.

Elaine discussed several other books with dolls as protagonists, including the famous Raggedy Ann series, the first book published in 1918 by Johnny Gruelle, a cartoonist and illustrator, and The Legend of the Bluebonnet by Tomie dePaola, in which a young Comanche girl sacrifices her beloved doll in order to bring much needed rain and is rewarded with the creation of the bluebonnet flowers. Another doll whose book won the Newberry Medal was Miss Hickory. Published in 1946, the main character is a doll made out of twigs with a hickory nut head.


Elaine shared two artists' interpretations of Miss Hickory and Hitty. 

Member Elaine McNally displayed her latest creation, this cloth frog doll she made using one of the original molds from artist Martha Chase for her series of dolls based on the book Alice in Wonderland. This mold was originally used for the frog footman.

 

Member Myrna Loesch shared the book, The Lonely Doll by photographer and author Dare Wright. Her version of Edith, the lonely doll of the book, is by Madame Alexander, but Myrna noted that the original Edith was actually a cloth doll by Lenci.

Member Kenneth Reeves discussed several books featuring dolls, including Little Mommy by Little Golden Book which features a little girl learning how to be a mommy by playing with her dolls, and The Doll's House by Rumer Godden about two little girls repairing a doll house they find in an attic. He also brought this Madame Alexander doll based on the story of Rapunzel. . . 

and this Effanbee doll portraying Sleeping Beauty. 

And finally, he presented a doll reading a book. This is Emma by Richard Simmons, but Kenneth replaced the mirror she once held with a book.

Member Sylvia McDonald brought the little girl in brunette braids who represents Pollyanna. The little wooden Pinocchio is a doll she inherited from a relative.  The other two little girl dolls are Muffie dolls by the Nancy Ann Storybook Doll Company belonging to member Pam Hardy.


Sylvia brought this book, Mimi, based on the famous painting "Doctor and the Doll" by Norman Rockwell. . . .


as well as these dolls based on the same painting by Rumbleseat Press.


She also discussed several doll related books, including the book Madeline by Ludwig Bemelmans about a little French schoolgirl, with the cloth doll it inspired.


Jan Irsfeld shared this Cissette doll by Madame Alexander representing Morgan Le Fay from the King Arthur legends.


Member Kathie Tovo brought a Raggedy Ann book that belonged to her mother and two cloth Raggedy Ann dolls. The larger doll is homemade while the smaller may be by P. F. Volland Company, which made the first commercially produced Raggedy Ann dolls beginning in 1918.


She also displayed doll related books from her collection, including the Racketty-Packetty House by H. Burnett, first published in 1906.


Kathie said that this German peg-wooden doll reminded her of the wooden dolls who lived in the Racketty-Packetty house.


Member Sharon Weintraub shared several books. The Better Homes and Gardens Story Book belonged to her as a child and includes "The Story of Live Dolls" by Josephine Scribner Gates. The tiny green book was published in 1863 and the full title is The Dolls' Surprise Party. The blue book is entitled The Story of the Little White Teddy Bear Who Didn't Want to Go to Bed.






Saturday, February 3, 2024

January 14, 2024, Meeting

Member Jenell Howell did a program on doll designer Joseph Kallus. 


She said that she was inspired by member Elaine Jackson's collection of segmented composition and wood character dolls. Jenell explained that George Borgfeldt and Company in 1912 contracted with Rose O'Neill to produce dolls and figurines based on her Kewpie characters and the company advertised for a sculptor to make a model. Kallus, a 17-year-old student at the Fine Arts College of Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, submitted a plaster model and was hired to design the dolls. This began Kallus' long and creative career in doll design. When WWI disrupted the import of German bisque dolls, he founded the Rex Doll Company in 1916 to produce composition Kewpie dolls that were distributed by Borgfeldt. Rex Doll also made composition carnival dolls that were distributed by the Tip Top Company. Two years later Kallus received his first copyright for his design of Baby Bundie. 

Kallus became president of the Mutual Doll Company in 1919, which produced not only composition Kewpies and Baby Bundie dolls, but also Bo- Fair, Dollie and Vanitie, which had specially designed joints. He resigned from Mutual in 1921 and the next year established the Cameo Doll Company, which existed until 1982 when Kallus assigned all his properties to Jesco, Incorporated. Cameo produced Kewpies for Borgfeldt, as well as Baby Bo Kaye and the comic strip character Little Annie Rooney.  Many of the dolls and toys created by Cameo through the late 1940s had composition heads and segmented wood jointed bodies. Examples of these unusual and creative dolls include Joy, Pinkie, and Margie. Kallus also designed dolls for other companies, such as Felix the Cat for Schoenhut and Pinocchio for the Ideal Novelty Toy Company, cartoon characters such as Popeye and Betty Boop, and even company advertising mascots, such as the Hotpoint Man.

In 1944, Rose O'Neill died and Kallus was assigned the rights to Kewpie, and later to Scootles and Ho- Ho. Over the years Kallus would license, or attempt to license, Rose O'Neill designs with companies such as Strombecker of Chicago, Milton-Bradley, Incorporated, and American Character Doll Company, but Kallus was difficult to work with, demanding and litigious.

 In 1976, thieves broke into Kallus' home and stole his original models for Kewpie and other dolls, as well as other materials. By the 1980s, Kallus was struggling to protect his Kewpie patent from companies and individuals making unauthorized copies. In 1982, he started negotiations to sell the rights to Kewpie to Jesco, but on June 26th, he was fatally struck by a vehicle while crossing the street. Kallus' daughter completed the transfer. The following year, Jesco started making Kewpie dolls. 

Jenell brought this bisque Kewpie. The Kewpie started Kallus' long career in dolls. 


This example of a composition Kewpie by Cameo was the childhood doll of member Sylvia McDonald. The doll is wearing a dress crocheted by Sylvia's grandmother. Sylvia members her parents struggling to restring her beloved doll with a strip of rubber from an old tire inner tube.


Two all composition examples of Scootles, another Rose O'Neill character, made by Cameo. These dolls belong to Jenell.


Examples of Felix designed by Kallus for Schoenhut. One belongs to member Bette Birdsong and the other to Sharon Weintraub.


Kallus designed this Pinocchio, as well as other Disney characters, for Ideal, as well as Knickerbocker. This example belongs to Jenell. 


Two examples of the Margie with segmented wood joints. The doll in blue belongs to member Myrna Loesch and the red clad doll was shared by Elaine Jackson.



This is Pinkie, who belongs to Elaine.


Elaine also brought this example of "Sunny Sam," a "Flexy" doll designed by Kallus for Ideal. His arms and legs are bendable springs. 


This "Kewpie Gal" also belongs to Elaine. She was issued by Milton Bradley under contract with Cameo in the 1970s. 





Tuesday, January 2, 2024

Holiday Party, 12/10/2023

Member Jan Irsfeld generously opened her lovely home for our club's holiday party. The club provided a variety of pizzas and members brought many tasty sides and desserts. Jan's halls were definitely decked out for the holidays!





Several members brought dolls to share. Pam Hardy displayed this beautiful reproduction Bru by famed doll artist Patricia Loveless.


Elaine McNally brought this sweet carved wood Swiss doll she recently purchased at the auction of the Jonathan Green Collection. The smaller wooden doll sitting on her lap is one of Elaine's own creations.


Elaine's daughter, Allie, brought these two well-loved antique teddy bears. The larger one is by the English company Merrythought and carries the firm's label on the sole of its right foot. The other bear is an early Steiff.


This German character baby is a family heirloom from Sylvia McDonald's daughter-in-law's grandmother. The pretty pink sweater was made by Sylvia's grandmother in the 1940s for Sylvia's childhood dolls.


Myrna Loesch brought this Gene doll ready to hit the slopes in her fashionable ski outfit.


Jan dressed this Madame Alexander Cissy in an outfit inspired by the fashions of the early 1900s.


Speaking of inspiration, Jan recreated an entire ancient Egyptian burial chamber using her imagination, staging and seamstress skills, and several Cissy dolls.


This is the top of the sarcophagus.


Inside is a Cissy elaborately dressed as Egyptian nobility. 


Beneath her is her gem-bedecked mummy. 


This Cissy represents Hatshepsut, a female pharaoh who reigned in the fifteenth century B.C.E.


In 2016, researchers recreated the face of a mummified head of a young woman found in the archives of the University of Melbourne in Australia, whom they named Meritamun. This Cissy is Jan's own recreation of Meritamun. In front of her are four canopic jars topped with heads of Cissette dolls. In Egyptian tombs, the four jars held the stomach, intestines, lungs, and liver of the deceased, and each jar lid was carved with the head of the specific deity assigned to guard them.


This purple robe was displayed by Jan Irsfeld at the club's September 11, 2022, and was made by Alexander to commemorate the 20th anniversary of Elizabeth's coronation. Jan now has the version of the Cissy who would have originally worn this robe.

Jan also allowed members to peek into her meticulously organized workroom.







 

Saturday, December 2, 2023

November 12, 2023, Meeting

Member Sharon Weintraub did a program on Black all-bisque dolls. She explained the French and German companies, and later Japanese makers, created Black all-bisque dolls, although in far smaller numbers than white dolls. While sometimes a Black all-bisque doll was made in same mold as a white doll and simply tinted brown, companies also created these dolls with ethnic features. In most cases the dolls were not made expressly for Black children. Many were garbed in ethnic costumes representing French or German colonies or were dressed as servants or entertainers. This example by Simon and Halbig is incised 836 and is a standard mold tinted with a brown complexion. She has bare feet and wears her original bathing costume. The diminutive doll she holds is a French doll known as a Liliputien. Just 2.75 inches high, she  has a swivel neck with a molded loop and has peg-jointed arms and legs. These Les Liliputiens came in a wide variety of costumes; although the white versions generally wore painted light blue boots, the Black dolls were barefoot.


Sharon next discussed the Black all-bisque dolls by the German company Gebruder Kuhnlenz. She said the these dolls have appealing ethnic features with full lips and prominent lower faces. The complexions vary from brown to deep black, the dolls do not have painted lashes, and are barefoot. This pair in their original box wear the costumes of cakewalk dancers.  Inside one of the sections in the box is written in pencil "From Grace to Sadie Newell Christmas 1889." 


Three more dolls by Kuhnlenz. The red and yellow outfit is a copy of an original costume worn by a Black Kuhnlenz doll.


Sharon displayed these examples of Black all-bisque dolls attributed to the German company J.D. Kestner.  The two girl dolls have swivel necks. The one in the red gingham dress has a closed mouth while the one in blue has an open mouth with tiny inset teeth. The standing boy in the molded rompers has loop-jointed arms. All of the dolls have bare feet.


This is a frozen version of the boy in the molded outfit. 


Sharon said that the firm of Hertwig and Company made a wide variety of Black all-bisque dolls. The tallest doll in the "grass" skirt is painted bisque. Next to her is a tiny immobile figure of a Black man in a yellow top hat; he is part of a family of miniature Black figures. Behind him are two cute character dolls in their original matching ribbon outfits. In the back row are two more examples of German Black all-bisque does by unknown German companies. The one in the molded outfit and "straw" hat is wire-jointed. The doll next to him in a molded turban wears his original Middle-Eastern outfit. 


Sharon then shared examples of French Black all-bisque dolls. The one in the red and white outfit is marked on the back of her swivel neck with the "F.G." in a scroll mark of Francois Gauthier. Her all-original outfit may represent one of France's Caribbean colonies. She was made using a typical all-bisque mignonnette doll mold and has molded boots. The two little dolls are more examples of Liliputiens  and wear their original clothing.


Sharon explained that when German goods were embargoed during WWI, Japanese companies entered the bisque doll market, often directly copying German dolls. This example of a Japanese Black all-bisque doll may be early, because the modeling and decoration are of higher quality than is typically found on these Japanese products. The doll has unusual "snow" hair created with bits of ground bisque. 


Member Bette Birdsong brought several examples of Black all-bisque dolls. This tiny bare-foot example is by Simon and Halbig.


These are more typical examples of Japanese dolls. They are often referred to as "Topsy" because of the tiny pigtails inserted into their scalps. Such dolls were often sold in five and dime stores in the United States. Copies of these dolls with extremely black shiny complexions began being produced in China in the 1980s.  


A variety of itty-bitty Black babies ride in a tiny tin car. The one in red is an all-bisque doll and the other two are seated figurines (the one in the back is eating a watermelon slice). These seated figurines are often found attached to miniature cotton bales and were sold as souvenirs throughout the South.


Member Pam Hardy shared this black cloth doll with an embroidered face. It appears to be a commercially produced doll from the 1940s.


Member Jenell Howell brought these two tiny Liliputiens.


She also shared this stunning wooden Schoenhut doll.