"I had dolls as a child and loved them, but unfortunately none of my childhood dolls made it into adulthood with me. I had a rough brother, nephew, and niece who pretty much destroyed most of my dolls, and my mother would sometimes donate my old toys to the Children's Medical Center."I came across an image that forced me to acknowledge that I was complicit in the destruction of some of my dolls. If I still had my first Barbie doll, she would look almost exactly like the doll on the left, with the haircut of the doll on the right.
So if I loved my dolls so much, what could have happened, you may wonder. Well let me tell you, it was all accidental.
Accident #1 - I decided that I wanted my blonde doll to have black hair. I colored my doll's hair with a permanent black marker. As I recall, it actually looked pretty good. All was well until I decided that I wanted her to have blonde hair again. I washed my doll's hair, and the ink from the permanent marker stained my doll's face a blackish color. I scrubbed and scrubbed my doll's face to no avail. She was stained for the rest of her days. The good news is that all of the black washed right out of her hair, which did not comfort me in the slightest.
Accident #2 - I decided that it would be humorous to see what Barbie would look like with no neck. I pushed Barbie's head way down on her neck. Well it did amuse me for a while. I laughed, showed her off, and I may have said that my doll looked like a White Florida Evans. It was no laughing matter, however, when I tried to put the doll's head back in it's original position. The doll's head wobbled around precariously. I had permanently stretched the neck hole. From then on, my Barbie had a shortened neck because I had to position the doll's head further down in order for it to stay securely in place. After that, I felt like I knew how Florida Evans felt in that one episode of Good Times.
So when I came across that photo of the Barbies above, I laughed so hard and wondered how it was even possible that some other child had done the exact same things to Barbie that I had done. I wondered for a moment if that person had ended up with one of my childhood dolls. But surely, my mother would not have donated one of my dolls if it was in that kind of condition. I never threw any of my dolls away, so they were all either given away, or thrown away by someone else. For me, they just simply disappeared. The doll above closely resembles what my first Barbie doll looked like at the time of her disappearance.
Other 1/6 scale dolls from my childhood:
Darci
I loved my Darci so much. Not only did her legs bend, but her arms did, too! And she had articulated wrists as well! I had hours of fun posing her. I also had fun combing, brushing, and cutting her hair until she was nearly completely bald in the back. So I had my first and only experience with re-rooting with Darci. My mother had a large crafts needle, and I had a Styling Head Barbie. I cut hair plugs from the Styling Head, "threaded" the needle with it, and used the needle to re-root Darci's hair in the back. I was only about 9 years old at the time, so I'm impressed with my younger self when I think back on it. I have dolls that need to be re-rooted right now that I haven't done. I found out several years ago that Darci had an African American friend named Dana. My inner child is demanding that I get a Dana doll. I keep telling that child "one of these days."
My Darci doll was in pretty good shape at the time of her disappearance. She had blonde hair in the back that was brighter and longer than the hair on the rest of her head.
The Bionic Woman
One very happy Christmas, I got The Bionic Woman and my nephew (who is 2 years younger than me) got The Six Million Dollar Man. I never had a Ken doll as a child, so I can tell you that the BW and the SMDM fell madly in love with each other. I was content with having the dolls in the house making out, and washing and styling the BW's hair over and over again. Do you remember those dolls from the 70's with horrible hair that would frizz and shrivel up and become nearly impossible to comb? The BW was one of those. At any rate, my nephew and brother got to have her for quality time outside, which included jumping from the garage, being run over by large Tonka trucks, lifting "boulders", being buried alive, etc.
My Bionic Woman doll was in bad shape at the time of her disappearance. She had matted hair and missing limbs.
Kissing Christie
She was my first Black fashion doll. I was so thrilled to have her. I remember generously applying her lipstick, and she would give my brother's GI Joe lots of kisses on the cheek. My mother had always told me not to take my toys to school, and not to loan my toys to my friends. I did not listen to my mother. My doll was so beautiful that I had to show her off. I took my doll to school, and loaned her to a friend, who promised to bring her back the next day. She did not bring her back the next day. And she did not bring her back the day after that. I asked day after day for my doll, only to be told that she "forgot". She finally brought my doll back to me, with the doll's neck split wide open. We never spoke again after that to the best of my recollection. I put glue on my doll's neck and wrapped her neck in tape.
My Kissing Christie was in bad shape at the time of her disappearance, with a neck held together with glue and tape.
I had a lot of dolls of many different sizes, from huge Lorrie Walker dolls, to the 4" Glamour Gals dolls. Most of my dolls were in pretty good condition at the times of their disappearances.
Do you still have your childhood dolls? Which ones? Did any of your dolls suffer the same abuse as my first Barbie doll?
Hello from Spain: I unfortunately do not keep the dolls of my childhood. I have returned to collecting dolls in adulthood. Children destroy dolls in childhood. Keep in touch.
ReplyDeleteHi Marta, thanks for posting. I wish that I did have the dolls from my childhood. But you're right, children tend to be rough with their toys, and with the toys of others.
DeleteI think accidents # 1 and 2 just sound like early experiments in customization! ;)
ReplyDeleteI only have a couple of my childhood toys, but I recently found out that my mother actually kept quite a few of them (and even more of my younger sister's toys), and sorting through them has turned into her retirement project.
Hi jSarie! Yes, I learned very early what NOT to do when customizing my dolls. :) That's so cool that your mother kept a lot of your childhood toys! Have you been reunited with any of the ones that your mother has?
DeleteYes!! I have everything. We were military kids so we moved around alot so it was our responsibility to pack our rooms and stuff if we wanted them so I have my free moving Cara and Curtis, plus pools, camper,bike, cruise ship, olympic ski villiage and town house. My son is instructed to sell them when I leave this earth!! Other than that they stay with me.
ReplyDeleteHi Brini, that is so impressive that you still have everything, especially with you moving around a lot! I do still have teddy bears and other stuffed animals from my childhood. I didn't tend to "play" with those, and I guess they didn't have much appeal to my brother, nephew, and niece(s), and my mother did not donate them, so the stuffed animals have held up quite well.
DeleteI am so jealous of Brini! When my mom thought I was too old for dolls etc. she put them in our basement. I used to check on the often. We had tenants on the first floor and the son stole all of my dolls and toys. We never found out what he did with them. I asked my mom to evict them, but for some reason she let them stay. LOL
ReplyDeleteHi The grandmommy, that's a shame that the son of your family's tenants stole your toys! I wonder if you would still have your toys to this day like Brini if that hadn't happened.
DeleteI remember one day my mother brought home a box from the Children's Medical Center, and it was full of some of my old toys that had "disappeared" years previously! I had such a good time playing with toys that I had outgrown, and then I lost interest. The toys disappeared again, and were never seen by me again.
I wasn't a huge fan of dolls when I was a tiny child, but I did own Cool Times Midge and Beachy Keen Maxie. My favorite thing to do with them was put them in the bathtub and swirl their hair around; in my toddler eyes they looked just like mermaids. Both dolls were well cared-for, though they did lose their clothes somewhere along the way (thanks to my younger sister). I don't know what happened to Midge and Maxie; likely they were in a box of toys that went to the local child shelter when I was about six. In recent years I've been able to replace them both.
ReplyDeleteHi RagingMoon1987, what was it like when you received the replacements for your childhood dolls? This is something that I've thought of doing, but the cost is prohibitive for some of these. I do want to get a Dana doll (the Black version of my Darci doll) one of these days. For a long time, I though of replacing one of my Lorrie Walker dolls, even though that's not the type of doll that I collect. I just have this memory of seeing a huge box under the Christmas tree with my name on it, and the feeling of pure joy and elation when I saw that doll that was almost as big as me.
DeleteOooo me, too. Me too. I want a Kenner Dana doll. I had a redhaired Darci. Did not know they had the Dana doll or about the Erica doll.
DeleteSomeday ....
This is a fun topic. I might do a similar post on my blog. Will refer to your post if I do ;-)
This post made me LOL! Even though I didn't have dolls of my own, I did "play" with my sister's old dolls by burying them in the dirt and then seeing how clean I could get them in the tub. I actually preferred to play with paper doll cutouts with egg carton cars.
ReplyDeleteHi Muff! At least you had the courtesy to clean your sister's dolls up after burying them. :) My dolls came back to me filthy dirt, broken, and naked. I did have my dolls in the bathtub quite a bit, which is why I disliked discovering that some of them had hair that would shrivel and frizz up. I remember that I had a Rub-a-dub Dolly, a doll that was made to be in the tub according to the manufacturer, but apparently her hair was not meant to get wet. Her hair became matted and uncombable within a short period of time. I tried to use a pressing comb once on one of my dolls, but that yielded disastrous results as you can well imagine.
DeleteYes, I still have some dolls from my child and teen doll years ;-)
ReplyDeleteMy older fashion dolls are mostly in good condition. Someone else might scream at the intense dark around my Suntan Tuesday Taylor's eyes - I was tired of light blue eyes so I darkened hers with something. Don't remember if it was a marker or paint. I cut Taylor Jones' hair to be "more realistic" in length - shoulder length. Maddie Mod has additional paint over her mouth, but she had a mental breakdown because G.I. Joe, who briefly dated her, was verbally abusive. So for her to look crazy, that's in-character. I made my My Black G.I. Joe aka Joe Johnson "blow his mind" one time too often, too rough. His stringing fell apart so he's now in pieces. Uhmm ... my sister punched off Suntan Eric's head because she was angry at something I "made" him say. My brother bit my TNT Julia's breast during one of his temper tantrums. I drew lines around one of my Jody dolls to show stress and madness because she was abused by Sunshine Grandfather, her father. (Yes, watched too many tv movie-of-the-week flicks.) Uhmmm ... those were the worst mishaps that I can recall. The Free Moving Ken and Curtis that I had fell apart because they were shoddily made. For Mattel products, they had the worst construction.
I never attempted to burn any of my figures. Didn't play with fire for one thing; wouldn't deliberately disfigure a doll like that for another. Dolls represented people - couldn't imagine doing something that awful to something that represented humans.
Your no-neck comment and that Florida video had me laughing. I think that you experimented with your dolls to improve or to alter them. But that's a lot different than burning a doll or blowing them up. Altering a doll or figure is part of playing.
Hi D7ana! I wish us both luck in obtaining a Kenner Dana doll in the future. If you do a similar topic on your blog, I'd love to see photos of what your childhood dolls look like now.
DeleteI was laughing at some of the mishaps that your dolls experienced, especially your sister punching the doll's head off because of something you "made" him say. And the biting - that reminded me that my first Barbie also had chewed feet thanks to my niece.
Do your siblings also still have their childhood toys? Not surprisingly, my brother, nephew and niece do not have their toys. My brother had a fuzzhead GI Joe that I liked playing with as a kid whenever I could get my hands on him. I remember one warm day sitting on top of one of the family cars in the driveway with my brother, watching as our older brother shaved GI Joe's mustache, beard, and the top of his head with a razor blade - making him look like a balding middle-aged man. My brother also had an Evil Knievel action figure complete with motorcycle, and the crashings that he experienced were quite legendary. He was destined for a short existence in our household. I can remember a tug-of-war with my nephew's Stretch Armstrong action figure, and finding out that there is indeed a limit to how far he can stretch.
I used to get so jealous and upset when my niece wold get great dolls, because for one thing I wanted them for myself, and for another thing I knew my niece would destroy them. One year, she got the first Black Barbie with the red dress and the afro. I had such a good time playing with her and using her little red afro pick to comb her hair. The next time I saw her, she was in pieces and there was no sign of her clothes, shoes or little red pick. But the ultimate was her Black Twirly Curls Barbie. One of my favorite things to do was to comb and style a doll's hair, and that one had so much hair! I loved using the little tool to twist and style Barbie's hair. I loved it while it lasted (not long at all).
Just recently, I was talking with my niece and the topic of our childhood dolls came up. We can laugh now about how she was destructive with my dolls. She said that she never liked dolls, but her mother kept buying them for her, and she kept destroying them. I don't know why my dolls had to get caught up in all of that. My niece now claims that she is "afraid" of dolls. I told her I find that hard to imagine, when as a child she would pop the heads off of dolls and pull their legs apart with no problem. I told her that she should come stay all night at my house in the spare bedroom (a.k.a. the Doll Room). She has declined the offer.
My siblings and their childhood dolls? HHHhhhhhhhhaaaa HHHHHaahaa
DeleteMy sisters did not like their fashion dolls. They barely liked their baby dolls and hair styling heads. They either destroyed them or lost them. My brothers were no better. Alas, none of them felt the way I did about my dolls and action figures.
I was wincing at the thought of someone shaving Joe's beard, moustache, and hair. Oh, no! Poor Joe!
My youngest brother had a Stretch Armstrong; so that we could "play together," my police dolls - Malibu Christie, Suntan Tuesday Taylor, and Taylor Jones - went out and fought the Stretch monster to keep him from destroying the doll kingdom. Those "lady" police did not suffer, but alas, poor Stretch is no more. Sigh.
I think it's hilarious that your niece is now scared of dolls. Although I do sympathize somewhat - if I kept being given something I disliked - say high heels or sports stuff, I might be destructive with it.
Yes, poor Joe indeed. He never seemed quite the same with his face and the very top of his head exposed like that.
DeleteI'm glad that the "lady" police came out just fine after battling Stretch Armstrong. I guess that having the ability to stretch isn't that great of a superpower, considering the children in my household and the Malibu Chrstie et al in your household could conquer Stretch Armstrong. Although having the ability to stretch would certainly come in handy around the house. :)
Yes, I think I have all my childhood Barbies, except the very first one that probably fell apart completely at some point. I also have all my sisters dolls - when we were little we'd always be given the same thing so we wouldn't fight, but she was never really that interested in dolls (she finds them scary too). So now all her dolls are in considerably better shape than mine! I never blew mine up or anything, hardly even cut their hair, I just played with them a lot (sometimes in mud).
ReplyDeleteHi Anderson's All-Purpose! That is so awesome that you not only have most of your dolls, but your sister's dolls too! That sounds like a good strategy - giving you both the same thing so that you wouldn't fight. Did that work? Did you ever get toys that your sister was interested in, but that you were not?
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