Companies A-C » Vintage Doll Collector

1950 Hard plastic Cinderella uses the Margaret face mold. Photo courtesy of Lisa Hanson.

Beatrice Alexander Behrman, or “Madame Alexander,” as she became known,
grew up in the doll business. As the daughter of Maurice Alexander, a Russian immigrant who opened the first doll hospital in this country in 1895, she learned to appreciate the beauty of dolls from her early years. Her father’s teachings stayed with her into adulthood, and seeking a professional and artistic challenge, she founded the Alexander Doll Co., Inc., in the 1920′s. She went on to become the leading lady of the doll industry as she guided a company famous for the beauty and high quality of its dolls and their clothing.

Early Alexander dolls were cloth and composition. They had big hits in the 1930′s with their licensed Dionne Quintuplets and Sonja Henie composition dolls. During this period they also introduced characters from literature, including the Little Women series and McGuffey Ana. In the late ’40s, they turned to hard plastic and their Margaret and Maggie face dolls were the epitome of the well-dressed little girl. The 8″ Alexander-kins were introduced in 1953. Baby dolls such as Little Genius were produced in several sizes.

From the very beginning, Madame Alexander focused on producing the highest quality, most beautiful doll clothing in the world. The same molds were used over and over again, with the costume and hairstyling creating the character of the doll.

Alexander initiated the modern era of the fashion doll with the introduction of Cissy in 1955. In the company’s catalog for that year, Madame describes her as “A Child’s Dream Come True.” Elise, a doll with jointed ankles to enable her to wear low or high heels, was introduced in 1957, and in 1959, 10″ Cissette joined her “big sisters” as Alexander’s newest fashionable lady. All of these dolls had extensive lines of extra clothing and accessories which could be purchased.

In addition to the fashionable ladies, Alexander produced some of their most enduring child dolls in the 1950s. Baby Kathy was produced in several sizes, and little girl Kelly was dressed in beautiful, classic styles. The Little Women dolls that had always been big sellers for Alexander got an update with the introduction of pre-teen Lissy.

Marybel, the Doll Who Gets Well by Madame Alexander

Marybel, the Doll Who Gets Well utilized the Kelly face. Scan from 1963 Sears Toy Book.

In the 1960s, Alexander introduced a number of new dolls with unique head molds, including Brenda Starr, a slim teen fashion doll to compete with Mattel’s Barbie, and Coco, a new 20″ high fashion doll. While these dolls had a fairly short production run, the company also introduced some new faces which would become classics in their line. The 21″ Jacqueline doll was one of these. Initially a representation of First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy, the mold was later used for the Portrait Series of lady dolls which were produced for decades. 14″ Mary Ann and 12″ Janie, both little girl dolls, became mainstays of the company’s line as well.

Also in the 1960s, the International Series using the 8″ Alexander-kins molds were introduced. They have become Alexander’s most popular line, and are still being manufactured today.

Netherlands Boy and Girl by Madame Alexander

8″ Netherlands Girl and Boy, 1980s.

The 1970s and ’80s saw Alexander staying the course, with few innovations, producing the beloved babies and children, characters from classic literature, and ladies in Portrait gowns that had always done well for them. After Madame’s death in 1990, the company went through a challenging period. They were the last of the major doll manufacturers still located in the United States, and having difficulty competing for collectors’ dollars. In 1995 the company was sold to an international banking group and production began to be moved overseas.

Today the Alexander Doll Company is going strong, producing high-quality play dolls for children, and several lines for collectors, as well as reproductions of their best-loved dolls of yesteryear.

See also:

Learn More:
Madame Alexander 2010 Price Guide by Linda Crowsey More info here from Amazon.com.	Madame Alexander Dolls: An American Legend by Stephanie Finnegan Find it on eBay.	Madame Alexander’s Ladies of Fashion by Marjorie Sturges Uhl More info here from Amazon.com.

Vintage hard plastic Nanette doll by Arranbee.
Photo courtesy of Nancy McKee.

Arranbee Doll Co. was founded in 1919 in New York City. In the early years of the company, they imported bisque head dolls from Armand Marseille and Simon & Halbig in Germany. They also sold all-bisque dolls and composition mama dolls, as well as doll hospital supplies including wigs, parts, and shoes. In 1925, they opened their own factory in New York manufacturing composition dolls. They kept up with changes in the industry, switching to hard plastic in the ’40s and vinyl in the ’50s. The company made many of its own dolls, but also purchased dolls from other manufacturers to dress and market under their own name. While not being ground-breakingly original, Arranbee dolls are noted for their beauty and high quality, both in the dolls and their clothing. Company founder and president William Rothstein died unexpectedly in 1957; his family continued the firm for a short while, then sold it to the Vogue Doll Co. Vogue continued the Arranbee name and some of the lines until 1961. Fortunately for collectors, many Arranbee dolls are marked. Here are some of their more notable dolls:

Dream Baby or My Dream Baby was the first of Arranbee’s dolls to have a name. There is a closed-mouth version (A.M. mold number 341) and an open-mouth version (mold number 351). Some dolls have stuffed cloth bodies with compo or rubber hands, while others have full jointed compo bodies. After the company started making their own composition dolls, they continued using the Dream Baby name. There is a wide variety of compo Dream Babies, including dolls with painted eyes or sleep eyes, molded hair or mohair wigs, in a range of sizes. Dream Baby continued into the ’50s in a hard plastic version.
Nancy was first made in composition starting in 1931. A few different head molds were used for this molded hair Patsy-type doll (complete with bent right arm) who ranged from 11″ to 14″ in height. Nancy was also made in a line of 16″ to 20″ chubbier toddler dolls with sleep eyes and mohair wigs.
Debu’teen was introduced in 1938. She represented a young teenage girl, with a slim body and a wistful expression, and was made in sizes from 13″ to 22″. Larger dolls have a compo socket head on a shoulder plate, with cloth torso and compo limbs, while the smaller dolls are all composition. She was sold in a wide variety of well-made outfits including school clothes, dressy clothes, sporting outfits and military uniforms. The Sporting Women series of dolls by Vogue greatly resemble Debu’teen, and were probably made by Arranbee for Vogue in an unmarked version.
Around the World and Storybook dolls from the late ’30s and early ’40s are 9″ all-composition characters with molded hair and painted eyes. The same doll was used for both boy and girl characters, such as Snow White, Pirate, Dutch Boy and Girl, etc.
Nannette is a composition and cloth mama doll with swing legs. She was sold from 1937 until 1943, when the spelling of her name was changed to Nanette. She was sold until about 1947, when the company switched production to hard plastic dolls. The hard plastic version of Nanette is a little girl doll, virtually indistinguishable from Nancy Lee. In the fifties, Nanette was made with a vinyl head and hard plastic body. The last version of Nanette was an 18″ all vinyl high-heeled glamour doll.
Nancy Lee was a true little girl doll. She did not have the chubbiness of the Nancy and Nannette toddlers, but she was not quite as slim as Debu’teen. The compo version, who made her debut in 1943, generally has smoky eye shadow. The hard plastic version was sold from the late ’40s into the late ’50s.
12″ Little Angel and 10″ Littlest Angel are toddler fashion dolls. Many extra outfits were available for them. Little Angel was not as popular as her smaller sibling, and was discontinued in 1955. Littlest Angel was later made with jointed knees, and starting in 1956 had a vinyl head with rooted hair. Littlest Angel was one of the dolls that Vogue continued to sell under the R&B name after they bought the company.
Coty Girl was a 10″ vinyl glamour doll made to compete with Ideal’s Little Miss Revlon. She had many extra outfits and was advertised extensively. This doll is very difficult to identify because she is marked only with a P in a circle, as were many other small glamour dolls of the era. The 18″ Coty Girl is the same doll as the high-heeled Nanette.

Sources for this page include:
Arranbee Dolls by Suzanne L. DeMillar and Dennis J. Brevik More info from Amazon or Find it on eBay.	Dolls & Accessories of the 1930s and 1940s by Dian Zillner More info from Amazon or Find it on eBay.	Dolls & Accessories of the 1950s by Dian Zillner More info from Amazon or Find it on eBay.

I picked this item up at an auction last night. This cardboard wardrobe measures 18.5″ tall, 12″ wide and 6″ deep. It has double doors on the front, a wooden bar to hang the clothes from, and another wooden bar holding up the shelf above. The colors and the logo on the top indicate that it was made for Cosmopolitan’s Ginger doll, a hard plastic toddler introduced in 1954, who was a competitor to Vogue’s Ginny doll. I call it Ginger’s Mystery Closet because it is a mystery why an 8″ doll would have a wardrobe so huge. She has a wardrobe trunk that is in scale for her, about 9″ tall. Why would she need this behemoth? If you hung her little dresses on the rod, there would be several inches of empty space underneath. Any thoughts?

At the San-D-over Doll Club meeting today, we had a program on Toni dolls. We watched the DVD “Which Doll is the Toni?” from UFDC and members brought in a variety of Tonis to share, including the original Ideal hard plastic dolls, the 10″ vinyl version from American Character and her larger sisters, and newer reproductions. I normally don’t care much for newer dolls, but was very impressed with the repros of the Ideal Toni by Tonner/Effanbee. They look just like the vintage dolls, with beautiful hair and lovely dresses. I wasn’t too taken by their repros of the American Character 13″ Toni though – she doesn’t have the charm of the original, in my opinion.

This type of program, with a DVD and show-and-tell, works well for a small doll club. What has your club been doing lately?

I am still recuperating from the UFDC convention in Chicago. That was one exhausting week! Chicago is a beautiful city, much nicer than I expected.
I took over 600 photos while I was there. Most of them are of the Competitive Exhibits. Unfortunately, per UFDC rules, I cannot use them on the website, except in an article devoted to the convention. I am working on putting together an article now.

But here are a few photos from the Theriault’s auction that was held at a nearby hotel. If you have not been to one of their auctions, the antique dolls are just unbelievable. They are displayed in lovely vignettes with flowers and accessories. The highlight of the auction was “The Great Man’s Doll,” a French doll made by Huret about 1860, which author Victor Hugo purchased and gave to his granddaughter. The doll and her trousseau sold for $160,000. In keeping with the literary theme, there were several artist dolls in the auction from writer Anne Rice’s collection. There were some stunning examples of vintage dolls, too, including Barbie and Ken, Ginny, Nancy Ann Storybook dolls, and several wonderful Lencis.

The first picture shows part of the set of Dionne Quintuplets by Madame Alexander. These babies are lucky to have their original furniture, nurse and Doctor Dafoe.

And here are a few of the antiques:

There was an amazing collection of Schoenhut circus figures in the auction. In addition to the set, several figures were sold individually.

Vintage Doll Collector

Alexander Doll Co. Inc.

Learn More:

Arranbee Doll Company (R&B)

Sources for this page include:

Ginger’s Mystery Closet

Doll club program on Toni

UFDC convention / Theriault’s auction