Personally…..I felt sorry for Little Miss No Name

Some dolls just need a little extra love, that’s all.

My sis and I were reminiscing the other day…

When I was a little girl I loved to play with dolls as most little girls do and had quite the collection. My sister Lisa, on the other hand was not so much into them….except for one that she became obsessed with.  It was a doll which I handed down to her because she needed to be treated with care.  My dolls were always treated as if they were real (I know, scary).  It wasn’t the prettiest doll on the market either.  She was quite atypical for the time but something about her pulled at the heartstrings so I ended up adopting her but she never quite fit in with the others (like my tarted-up Barbie & her clones, with beach house, closets full of clothes, sports car and preppie boyfriend).  We didn’t know her name so we lovingly called her “poverty doll.”  Mattel played her like a pro – bringing out a doll young girls would pity.  Although it worked for us it wasn’t a big seller for them.

Lisa had been trying to locate this unusual doll for quite some time (as unfortunately we gave all the dolls up for adoption when we got tired of them) for sentimental reasons.  Mostly we wanted to know if she was still out there.  We found out her real name is “Little Miss No Name”- slight improvement to what we called her.  It was Lisa’s favourite doll.

A few days ago Lisa e-mailed me the photos of some other dolls I used to love.  You know, I keep forgetting you can find everything on the internet.  So we had some fun recalling stories about them and finding out their real names.  For instance our dad bought us an old man ventriloquist doll (don’t ask) who we called Mr. Winkles.  I used him to

terrorize our brother with (he was so easy to scare and it was so much fun to put that doll under his covers with ketchup on it’s face because it resembled blood just before he’d go to bed – then we’d hear a loud scream).  We laughed so much remembering this.

Not so long ago I found Mr. Winkles staring back at me from the window of an antiques store on Queen Street in Toronto.  If the price tag wasn’t $200 I would have snapped him up for old memories & as a gift for our brother (a bit of “mean girl”).

As it turns out, some are now collectibles (should have held on).

One more thing…..when I left Tokyo many years ago and had started to learn Japanese someone gifted me with a doll

at the airport on my flight back to Canada.  She came with 6 changeable language records and once you lifted up her dress you could fit the little record in her tummy.  The Japanese record was in her when I was going through customs; she was in my carry on……but something pushed up against her and she started to talk many phrases (she had the capability of 120) and wouldn’t shut up.  Funny at the time cause people were noticing and wondering what, or who was in my bag.  Her name was Talkin Charmin’ Chatty.  It felt like I was smuggling a tiny person.

Oh, to be a child again.  So what, if I was 25 – I was learning a language!

Here is what the company has to say:
Unfortunately, our Little Miss No Name was not a huge seller. But then, how could she be, when faced with the enormous marketing machine virtually throwing glitzier, more accoutrement-laden dolls at America’s little girls?

Maybe it took a special sort of little girl, a girl with real love in her heart, to want to purchase and take home a Little Miss No Name. Certainly, this toy should have awakened many children’s need to themselves act as surrogate parents, to take care of something smaller and more needful than themselves. Surely this is one of the functions of toys, and why almost all little girls – even those who are still toddlers themselves – feel an almost instinctual urge to carry around a ‘baby,’ their doll, whose needs they can look after and upon whom they can bestow love and attention.

Sure, Barbie is an enticing toy, which little girls can use to vicariously act out their fantasies of consumption, popularity, and mating rituals; but Barbie doesn’t seem to need anything for herself. What kid ever felt the need to hug a Barbie doll simply because it seemed to need one?

Little Miss No Name, aside from whatever cynicism was employed in her creation, gave little girls a truly needful toy with whom they could express honest feelings of compassion and mercy. God bless those girls who chose her for this purpose.

Oh, so sweet…..but we preferred her over the prettier more polished choices.  We rescued her from the store shelf and

gave her a better life.  Barbie felt humbled.