Dolls&History

A 14" play doll the original creation of L. Evans. Dec.2005 Copyright

.Recitation On Dolls

Designers & Doll Artists showcase their creations of original Art Dolls in Cloth.

Ancient Dolls.

Dolls fashioned of flat pieces of wood, painted with geometric designs and with “hair” made of strings of clay or wooden beads, have been found in Egyptian graves dating from 3000 to 2000 bc. The presence of such dolls in children’s tombs suggests that they were cherished possessions as well as cult objects, like the shawabtis, or tomb figures buried with adults to serve them in the afterworld. Dolls were also buried in Greek and Roman children’s graves.

Most ancient dolls that were found in children’s tombs were nonpretentious, humble creations, made of common clay, rags, wood, or bone; better examples were fashioned of ivory or wax, or of terra-cotta (a baked reddish-brown clay). The objective was to achieve a lifelike image. Indeed, some dolls made as early as 600 bc had movable limbs and removable garments.

Early European Dolls.

The first dolls known to have been commercially produced as children’s playthings were made in Germany in the early 15th century, in factories at Nuremberg, Augsburg, and Sonneberg. Production methods were crude; the products, costumed to represent German women of the time, were made of wood, clay, rags, and wax.

Beginning in the 15th century, manufacturers in England, France, Holland, and Italy, as well as Germany, began to produce dolls dressed in fashions typical of their respective locales. The more ornately costumed “lady” or “fashion” dolls were often used by rulers and courtiers as gifts. By the 17th century, however, simpler dolls, made of cloth or leather, were used as playthings by boys and girls.

The 1600s saw several improvements in manufacturing. Dolls’ heads were fashioned of glazed stoneware; later, manufacturers used tragacanth (a gum derived from an Asian plant) and alabaster (a soft gypsum resembling marble). In 1636 a doll with glass eyes that moved was offered in Holland, and in 1675 another firm’s dolls wore wigs of human hair.

Until the 18th century Germany remained the leading producer of dolls and toys. Early in that century it was discovered that soft leather could be treated to feel like human skin and used to cover a doll’s torso and limbs. Virtually all dolls before the 19th century were designed as adults. In 1737 walking dolls were made in Paris. Dolls had begun to look, feel, and move more like humans, but the popularity of high-fashion “lady” dolls, typically manufactured in Paris, remained paramount. Such dolls were often used to illustrate style trends and were sent from one country to another to show the latest fashions.

The 19th Century.

Nineteenth-century progress in doll making was extraordinary. In 1810 papier mâché was adapted in Germany for making dolls’ heads. Another of the major developments before 1850 was the introduction of ball joints, which gave dolls more natural limb flexibility. New materials included gutta-percha (a rubberlike Malayan gum), glazed porcelain, unglazed parian (a soft-bodied china), India rubber, and bisque (lustrous, unglazed ceramic ware). Imperfections were covered with gesso (a mixture of plaster of Paris and glue) before the dolls were painted. In the 1840s the Montanaris, a family of English doll makers, perfected wax for the construction of dolls’ heads; they also made some of the earliest “baby” dolls. Another 19th-century development was the cutout paper doll.

Events in the second half of the 19th century altered the course of the industry. At the same time, however, simple rag and corn-husk dolls remained popular, distinctively American products. In 1851 American-patented vulcanized rubber dolls were introduced by the Goodyear Rubber Co. In 1860 the first “baby” doll that could sit upright was shown in Europe. Manufacturers introduced metal heads in 1861 and celluloid heads in 1862. In the meantime, they experimented with “composition” (mixtures of varied pastes with other undisclosed ingredients), which could be molded into smooth, practically unbreakable heads and limbs. In 1865 the first American doll-manufacturing enterprise was founded, and at least ten similar operations were functioning in the U.S. by 1900. These firms imported French or German bisque and composition heads and limbs for assembly with domestically produced bodies. When the century ended, the overwhelming preference had changed from “lady” dolls to “baby” dolls made of bisque or composition. Dolls then resembled human infants but did not quite feel human.

Modern Dolls.

The year 1909 brought European baby dolls with bent legs; in 1913 the “Kewpie,” one of the first American “character” dolls (dolls fashioned to resemble real or fictional personages), was introduced. These chubby-faced figures with pointed heads became very popular. “Raggedy Ann” was created in 1918. World War I curtailed European doll production, but by 1917 American doll companies were for the first time able to produce satisfactory bisque. Americans also created the hot-pressed method for producing composition in 1916, and their composition doll heads became superior to all others. At the end of World War I it was clear that the U.S. had become a leading contender in doll manufacture. Noteworthy innovations between 1925 and World War II included sleeping eyes with lashes, dimples, open mouths with tiny teeth, fingers with nails, and most important, dolls that drank water and wet, made of latex rubber.

After World War II, vinyl plastics provided doll makers with the kind of basic material they had long been seeking. Late 20th-century dolls of vinyl appear and feel as if alive, and many are equipped with various action features. Some of today’s dolls walk and have facial expressions that change. Hair can be repeatedly washed and styled because each strand is firmly embedded in the scalp. Among the recent popular character dolls are teenage “Barbie” dolls, for which a variety of clothing and accessories is available; and “Cabbage Patch Kids,” custom-made dolls with stylized features, which gained popularity in the U.S. and abroad from 1983 on.