Dolls as Fundraisers

[Drygoods]

Topic inspired by the Civility Historic Preservation Fundraiser thread in Events:


What about doing a 'doll' for the members of this forum as a fundraiser to help fund the place? I know that forums are expensive, but I just thought it would be neat if the doll was outfitted by the people here, and raffled off to a member. Add to it a male china head doll and have uniforms made for him. Have the tickets go right to the AC and have Mr. Calloway pull the ticket at some special date, say some great battle, anniversary date of this forum, or Christmas Eve? It's just a thought.;)

If a male doll were made, consider all the various units it would represent with uniforms, all handmade of course, with battleshirts, and handcarved guns and canteens. Just imagine all the furnishings these dolls could have, maybe even a tent, chair and desk! With all the people who hand sew their uniforms, I could see plenty of men helping with this task. I know that a lot of people may not be aware that they had male china head dolls then, but dolls were often sold in sets.

[ElizabethClark]

Re: Preservation Project

Let's break it out into a new topic for further discussion. I'll go start a thread in a moment.

A few logistics issues that will be helpful to anyone who wants to undertake a similar fundraiser:

1: It's imperative to use a repro doll. Civility is replaceable. An original would not be. In fact, Civility had a travel mishap in the central portion of this great nation, and had her leg replaced before her trip to the Fair. The person responsible for creating the doll/doll body also has to be willing to render hospital services. :)

2: Most life-scale fabrics get tricky on a quarter-scale or smaller figure (Civility is about quarter-scale, though not anatomically balanced--she's done to mimic cloth bodied fashion dolls of the era, with exagerrated proportions). Military-weight fabrics will generally be too bulky on a doll figure.

3: To do male/female sets of dolls, it's important to find molds that are similarly scaled, and dated to the right era... workable molds can be a challenge. There are some male molds out there, but they tend to *not* be mid-century, as the collecting fashions for the last while have been focused on slightly later century. This can be got around, but it's a challenge.

4: It takes a nag to coordinate things. The coordinator has to be willing to harass people just enough to get them to mail things, but not so much they get annoyed and drop out. :)

5: It also takes a lot longer than most people anticipate. For every single stop of the doll, anticipate a 4 week time gap. It may not take the full four weeks, but many times, it will.

6: Most people comfortable working in real-life scale are perplexed by doll scale. It's a whole different set of rules, and drafting/draping for dolls does not follow human proportions. Also, notions and bits and pieces are *very* difficult to find in doll-scale... brass buttons that are 1/8" across for a uniform jacket? Ouch. Someone must be willing to draft or drape master patterns, and be willing to walk participants through the fine points of construction, substitutions, etc, as needed. (One thing I've been really impressed with for Civility is the sheer skill in translating human-scale patterns for needlework to doll-scale... gorgeous job by all!)

7: The doll patterns (for body and clothing) need to be given copyright and usage licensing by the creator. Not every doll designer will be willing to have their work used for fund raising. Most will gladly say yes when asked, but it's important to ask. With Civility, things were made simpler by the fact that I am the doll body designer, and I drafted the master patterns, so I had legal ability to grant use of the patterns for this fundraising effort. Others who have used my doll patterns have done the legal thing and asked me for permission before using them for fundraising. (In the case of historic preservation or site fundraising, I grant it. General hobby-club fundraising, I don't.) But, whomever coordinates things needs to take care of that little nicety, too.

Okay, off to break out!

[Virginia Mescher]

Re: Dolls as Fundraisers

Topic inspired by the Civility Historic Preservation Fundraiser thread in Events:

If a male doll were made, consider all the various units it would represent with uniforms, all handmade of course, with battleshirts, and handcarved guns and canteens. Just imagine all the furnishings these dolls could have, maybe even a tent, chair and desk! With all the people who hand sew their uniforms, I could see plenty of men helping with this task. I know that a lot of people may not be aware that they had male china head dolls then, but dolls were often sold in sets.

Of all the research I did for the article on Benefit and Fund Raising Dolls (on our website now), I found only two male china dolls. One was part of a bride and groom set and the whereabouts of the dolls now is unknown and the other "male" doll ended up being a female doll during its lifetime but was raffled as a male soldier doll, plus an infant doll who was supposed to be a baby George Washington. The doll that Lincoln pardoned, Jack, was dressed like a soldier but I've not been able to ascertain what kind of doll Jack was.

The majority of the benefit dolls were female and most had elaborate wardrobes with many accessories. In the listing of accessories that I found in a number of books, there was very little for male dolls. From the doll books that I have read, male dolls were mostly dressed as small boys, not adults. In looking at doll parts lists, there were only a few male heads listed. The arms and legs were not listed. The period books on how to dress dolls were all written for female dolls. That is not to say that a talented dressmaker or tailor could not fashion outfits for male dolls but if one is going for authenticity, a female china or wax doll would be the most correct.

As Liz mentioned, it takes a great deal of work and coordination to put together a project like this. I only coordinated our small portion of Civility's travels and that was a big job. I can only imagine what Liz has had to do these past months since she started the project.

In making the items I have for both dolls, it is very different from sewing for myself. There has been a lot of trial and error and it is much more difficult to sew the small clothing. Also, the fabric plays a big part as weight and pattern for a full sized person is often too heavy or too large for the doll. We also made miniature books which went fairly well but trying to keep the scale and still read them was a challenge. There are books out there to use polymer clay to make some of the material culture items (dishes, pots, pans, food, etc) but I was not satisfied with the results.

All in all, it is a great idea but one that would take a great deal of concentrated research, coordination and a huge amount of time and effort dedicated to the project.

[ElizabethClark]

Re: Dolls as Fundraisers

One benefit of keeping to a delicate-handed, mostly-quarter-scale doll is that there are very fine repro items nearly to scale, available from the better dollhouse suppliers. Thus, real brass pots and pans, real china teasets, etc. The entire industries set up to provide miniature, doll-scale items mid-century is really astonishing. Today, the industry is not nearly so extensive, but it can definitely get spendy!

Some polymer items *can* mimic plaster foodstuffs and other small items, but as Virginia mentioned, the results vary a lot, and replicating the very fine plaster casting of original accessory items can be very difficult. However, polymer reconstruction is about the only way to accomplish things like ivory fan blades (careful template cutting and a good blend of clays can do a nifty job). It takes a good bit of experimentation and trial/error to get a good match, though.

I adore dolls as fundraisers. But, as Virginia mentioned, the coordination is a big hairy deal, and it's a long-term thing. Do too many of them, and people do get burned out.

One thing we're doing that may be helpful to those who want to personally dress a doll, and perhaps donate a complete set for preservation, is due in part to some of the generous people who've helped with Civility. Several have been sharing their project process and even their patterns and notes, so I can type them up, add illustrations and make them available as free patterns on our site. (Of course, these patterns won't be available for items that will be sold... only personal enjoyment or historic preservation fundraising. Those who want to be in business need to do their own research and trial/error testing!)

My own research jives with Virginia's as to male dolls at auction. I've not come across reference to a male/female set where the male was a soldier. I had come across one or two brief mentions of "Jack"--Virginia has seen more on him than I have--but not notes on what sort of doll he was.

Virginia, as a side note: of the very few male dolls I've seen from the period, they all do seem to utilize "girl scale" hands and feet, if china parts are used (rather than sewn leather). It may be that the heads were the only distinctly "male" bit about them, along with some vague torso shaping?

[Drygoods]

Re: Dolls as Fundraisers

I think my intepretation of the project was misunderstood. I didn't mean that we must follow the same guidelines as a Sanitary Fair Doll Raffle, and I'm not knocking that at all, but my thoughts were far more simple, just provide a pair of dolls, with male doll and let others uniform him just as they would with their unit or civilian clothing. I've seen a few of these dolls, (civilian) complete with trunks of clothing, and they are impressive. Yes, it's work to sew clothing, especially for a doll, but you have to look past that and consider that this would be a forum effort. My own sons whittle little things at events to pass the time, such a minature cannons, swords, rifles, and chairs. I just thought that others might do the same thing and put energy into a forum project. Perhaps if you gave measurements with scale, or perhaps links of where to buy/donate items, it might go a bit easier? I dunno.

And I confess this, I'm not the most ambitious person to do a doll collection. I've got 5 antique dolls now that still are waiting for their clothes to be sewn. Three of them are china and two are wooden, but were originally bought as gifts for my daughter, but now I think they won't be done until I have a granddaughter.:confused_

You tend to find the best antiques in private collections, simply because those people have the passion and finances to collect certain things. I'll see if I can get some photos and post them.

This whole thing was just an idea, just something that we could do for ourselves here within the forum.:wink_smil