Miss Revlon

In 1950's United States, there was a boom of dolls created that were a result of products geared towards grown women. These included Toni (who came with her own "permanent wave" kit,) Miss Revlon, and various other "makeup" or glamour dolls that came with their own hair styling or makeup kits.

Doll manufacturers are smart. They know that little girls like to emulate their mothers. There are few little girls that haven't watched their mother put on lipstick or do their hair. So, in 1956 Ideal licensed the Revlon name and created a fashion doll for little girls, with a name that they and their mothers (or aunts or grandmothers) would recognise.

Miss Revlon came in various sizes, from 15 to 20 inches tall. Some dolls have jointed elbows (like Madame Alexander's Cissy.) Most dolls have light brown hair, but some can be found with dark brown or very blonde hair. A modified version was introduced toward the end of Miss Revlon's popularity, and this doll was a pixie faced doll. She had pink hair, was called Pink Fairy, wore a fairy dress and only comes in the 18 inch size. Miss Revlon has a "high heel foot" and wears dresses and costumes that were representative of the high fashion of their day (including real fur wraps). Some dolls have pierced ears. Hair can either be short or long and worn in a pony tail. Dolls have sleep eyes. They are marked Ideal, followed by VT and the size of the doll, and are made of high quality vinyl and hard plastic.

I have a Miss Revlon and a Little Miss Revlon doll in my collection. Little Miss Revlon was introduced in 1958. She is a smaller version of Miss Revlon, and stands at about 10.5 inches tall. Little Miss Revlon is all vinyl and has a twisty waist. Both dolls have girlish faces on a teen body.

My Miss Revlon is a 20 inch doll. She wears an original Miss Revlon dress and replacement shoes. She is the shorter haired version and does not have pierced ears. My Little Miss Revlon also wears an original dress. Her vinyl has darkened slightly, but she fortunately is not plagued with a bad case of green ear, which is the case with so many pierced ear dolls of the 1950's.

Miss Revlon was sadly knocked off her pedestal by the introduction of Barbie in 1959. Barbie was more adult-like compared to the childlike Miss Revlon, and so a new era of dolls began. For some of us, however, the old era never really passed away.

O K Kader doll

Until I moved to Australia, I had never heard of these hard plastic baby dolls that were manufactured in the 1950s through the 1990s in Asia. OK Kader had factories in Hong Kong and Thailand. The Thai factory closed in 1993 after a massive fire killed many workers. There were both black and caucasian versions of these dolls.

Kader dolls seem to be popular among collectors in Asia and the Pacific, and no wonder. They have sweet chubby faces and characteristics unique to Kader dolls: a "clacking" tongue and twist wrists. The tongue is attached to the eye mechanism, so when the doll's eyes close, the tongue retracts and moves side to side. Wrists can be twisted so that the doll's hands can be posed. Dolls have hard molded eyelashes. My doll also wears replacement lashes.

All Kader dolls come with molded hair, although mine is wearing a wig (dolls usually lose most of their hair paint). The dolls may have residual glue on their head seams. I've seen them range in size from 13 to 25 inches (although there may be dolls on either side of that figure.) My doll is a 20 inch doll from about 1960. She has two little teeth in her rosebud mouth. Her matinee jacket and pants probably are not original to her, although I usually see OK Kader dolls for sale wearing knitted baby clothes. Most of the dolls I've seen for sale on eBay are vintage dolls that date from the 1950s and 1960s. Newer dolls have hard vinyl heads.

If you are a collector of dolls from the 1950's, you might want to have a look around for an adorable OK Kader doll.

Celebrity Doll - Sonja Henie

Sonja Henie was an Olympic ice skating champion from Norway. With her blonde girl-next-door looks and athletic abilities, she became a natural for the cinema and starred in several motion pictures in the 1930's and 40's.

Given her prominence and popularity (it's said that at the height of her acting career, she was one of the most highly paid actresses in Hollywood), it was natural that a doll was made in her likeness. In 1939, Madame Alexander released the Sonja Henie doll (a few years after Ideal released Shirley Temple and around the same time that the Deanna Durbin doll was released.)

Sonja Henie is an all composition doll with blonde curly hair and brown sleep eyes. She was available with several skating outfits, and also came with skiing outfits and skis. Sonja Henie dolls range from 14 to 21 inches tall, with the smaller sizes having a twist waist. Her toothed smile and dimples give her face a soft appearance, and her face mold was used for other dolls including a bride doll and some WW2 military dolls. Arranbee also made a Sonja Henie doll with the Nancy Lee head mold.

My Sonja Henie is 18 inches tall. She wears a skating outfit that I haven't been able to identify, new ear muffs, and her skates are original. Her wig is a soft mohair wig. My doll is marked MADAME ALEXANDER SONJA HENIE on the back of her head.

I love these old celebrity dolls. They're great reminders of days gone by.

More Patsy family dolls

With the phenomenal success of Patsy, Effanbee developed several other dolls with the same Patsy type face and right bent arm. These dolls were manufactured in the period from 1929 to 1946

First there was Patsy Ann, essentially a larger version of Patsy; Patsy Lou, Patsy Joan, Patsyette, Patsy Jr, and many others. All of the dolls have a typical Patsy-type face: chubby cheeks, puckered lips, short bobbed hair (some with molded headbands), painted side-glancing eyes or sleep eyes in all different colors with lashes, and a toddler proportioned body. Dolls are all composition. Some dolls came with mohair or caracul wigs.  There were also black versions of these dolls.

The dolls started to wane in popularity and in the last year of their manufacture, 1946, they were unmarked, otherwise, dolls are marked Effanbee and have the doll's name.

I have a Patsy Ann from the early 1930's and a Patsy Jr, from 1946. There's a big difference in the quality of the newer dolls versus the older dolls. I am guessing that when materials became scarce during World War 2, shortcuts had to be made. As you can see on my Patsy Jr from 1946, there is a top layer of paint that is peeling, revealing a lighter tint below. I've seen this on a few Patsy Jrs. Patsy Ann, however, looks almost as good as the day she was purchased. Patsy Ann wears an original dress (don't you love the penguins?) and shoes, and Patsy Jr wears a vintage mommy-made onesie and old oilcloth shoes.

Patsy Ann is 19 inches tall, and Patsy Jr is 11 inches tall. There were plenty of imitators during the years of Patsy's popularity, but one good way to identify your doll, if she is unmarked, is to closely check the pattern in the molded hair. It's unique to Patsy dolls. It's generally straight, slightly parted in the middle, and curves on her cheeks. Some dolls have the molded headband. Patsys did not come with bow loops (a loop of composition through which you can thread a ribbon.)

Patsy's face is so endearing - no wonder she had so many imitators!

Ginny, Jill and Jeff

Vogue Dolls, Inc. was created by Mrs Jennie Graves and grew from humble roots as a cottage industry, to be the largest doll-only manufacturer in the world. In 1957 Vogue bought the Arranbee doll company and used their R & B doll molds for a few years.

In the late 1940's, with the advent of hard plastic being used for doll manufacturing, Mrs Graves developed a little doll who was to be named after her daughter, Virginia (Ginny.) Ginny dolls are only eight inches tall, but came with extensive wardrobes and accessories that Mrs Graves designed herself.

These dolls are highly sought after and changed in small ways through the years. The earliest dolls had painted lashes and eyes and had molded hair under their wigs. Later dolls had molded eyelashes, sleep eyes, and came as bent leg walkers. Dolls are often marked Ginny and/or Vogue. Ginny connoisseurs will say that the best Ginnys have a hard plastic head and body (later dolls had vinyl heads).

Of course, a successful doll always has extended family. In 1957, Vogue introduced Jill (1957 - 1965), Ginny's big sister, and then in 1958, Jan came on board. Jan was Jill's best friend. Ginny and Jill also had a brother, named Jeff (1958-1961), who was Jan's boyfriend. There was even a baby sister, named Ginette (1955 - 1969). Jill and Jan are 10 1/2 inches tall, Jeff is 11 inches tall, and Ginny and Ginette are eight inches tall. Dolls are marked Vogue either on the head or the back.

Jill and Jan are teen dolls. My Jill is an early Jill, with a grayer skin than later Jills, and a pony tail instead of a bubble hair cut. She wears a vintage untagged dress. Jeff  is wearing original clothes tagged Vogue. My Ginny is wearing an original tagged Ginny dress. Together, they make a cute slice of 1950 's Americana.

Mrs Graves refused to advertise on television, so Barbie overtook sales of Ginny and Ginny faded into obscurity before becoming popular again with collectors. Thankfully, there are plenty of people who appreciate Ginny, Jill, and Jeff.

 

Pedigree dolls - older and newer

The Pedigree Doll Company was an English doll manufacturer that was active from the 1930's through the mid 1980's, when it eventually went bankrupt. Dolls are usually marked Pedigree Made in England.

I own three Pedigree dolls which are examples of the Pedigree company through the decades.

The first is a baby boy doll made of composition. He has side-glancing painted eyes and teeth that need a wee bit of work to straighten out. He's in need of a good cleaning, but, as he dates back to the 1930's, he's not in too bad a shape. Baby Pedigree is approximately 16 inches tall.

The next is the much sought-after hard plastic toddler doll made from the late 1940's to the late 1950's. She was a Mama doll, but her cryer is now missing. This adorable dolly was literally rescued from a trash heap. She needed to be re-strung, her torso was split and warped, and her hair was bleached to a strange colour due to being left outside in the sun; however, being the kind of woman who takes pity on old abandoned dolls, I rescued her, and with the help of my husband, we managed to repair her body. She has silicone "collars" where her legs meet her torso so that they don't get pulled in by her new stringing. Her wig is original and full, and I dyed it to help mask the strange green tint that it had, and her eyelashes are replacements. She has flirty sleep eyes that still freely flirt from side to side, even if they don't open and close well any more.

After her body was repaired and some blush restored to her face, she was given a new outfit. Her shoes are original as far as I can tell, and I am eventually going to make a new set of front teeth for her. Truly, restoring this doll has been a labour of love. Toddler Pedigree is about 20 inches tall.

The 1950's was a heyday era for Pedigree. They made toddler dolls, walker dolls, and Brighton Belle, a playpal size doll that stood around 28 inches tall. All are highly collectible and sought after, especially if their plastic hasn't faded and they don't suffer from Pedigree doll disease. Pedigree doll disease is not treatable, unlike other hard plastic doll "diseases."  Once the plastic begins to break down, you may as well throw the poor dolly away, as she will melt over time.

The third Pedigree doll dates from the late 1960's. She's Pedigree's Sindy doll - their teen doll competition to Barbie, Tammy, and other teen dolls of the era.  My Sindy has a twist waist and posable legs. I am fussy about Sindy. When Pedigree went bankrupt in the mid 1980's, Hasbro bought the rights to manufacture the doll, and they changed her look. The Sindy of the 1960's is quintessentially a British Mod doll. Anything else just doesn't feel right. Sindy is 11 inches tall and like Barbie, came with an extensive wardrobe and accessories.

Pedigree dolls are great examples of dolls that were popular in England and other Commonwealth countries in the 1940's through the 1960's. Since living in Australia, I've been introduced to these dolls and love them as much as my American dolls. 

Madame Alexander Cissette

A couple years after Madame Alexander developed Cissy, she also came up with Cissette, a miniature version of the large fashion doll.

Cissette has all of the attributes of her larger "cousin," including bendable knees and a fabulous wardrobe. She is made from hard plastic and wears a synthetic wig.

The original Cissette was discontinued in the mid 1960's and then came back in the 1990's, with a few modifications. For one thing, she grew two inches! Early Cissettes came dressed in the couture of the day, but modern Cissettes are often sold as historical figures. My modern Cissette is dressed and coiffed to represent Veronica Franco, a celebrated courtesan of 16th century Venice. As you can see, the Alexander doll company is meticulous in their costume and hair style details!

Vintage Cissette has a matching bra and panties with rosebuds. She dates to about 1961 and is marked MME ALEXANDER on her back. Modern Cissette is from 2008 and is marked ALEXANDER on her back. They certainly are very "grown up" for such little dolls.

Kewty and Sue

In the late 1920's, toddler dolls started to take the nation by storm. Two such dolls were Amberg's Sue doll (a doll with molded curls and a swivel twist waist) and Arranbee's Kewty. (There was also another version of Kewty made by Domec which more closely resembles a carnival doll.)

Kewty and Sue rode the wave of success that Effanbee's Patsy had created. Toddler dolls with molded hair, about the right size for little hands to hold, became popular. There were also plenty of other imitators that cropped up along the way during the 1920's and 30's (I'll showcase a couple more in another entry.)

My Kewty and Sue dolls appear to be dressed in their original costumes with their original shoes and socks. Sue is about 14 inches tall, and Kewty is about 15 inches tall. Sue is marked on her back:Amberg/Pat. Pend./L.A.& S. © 1928 and Kewty is marked on her back: KEWTY. They both have painted eyes, and to be honest, I think they are just as adorable as Patsy. Both dolls have a little age-related wear, but considering that that are 80 years old, they've held up well over the years.

In these photos, Kewty is on the left, and Sue is on the right.