Which to Keep?
“Do not be afraid to weed your collection” admonished Doll
Guru of Gurus, the late John Noble in his classic “Dolls”, which happened to be
my first book on the subject. My mom
bought it for me when I was 7.
I was horrified at the thought. At age 7, it was hard enough to be able to
get dolls to add the collection I officially started at age 3, let alone get
rid of them!
But, over the years, I did give dolls away, many of
them. My ne’er do well cousin in Greece
managed to talk my mother out of two after we visited there; then her mother
complained that they had to pay taxes on them.
“Then they can send them, back!” was my answer. The offer still stands, by the way.
Now, I buy dolls to donate for good causes, and will
occasionally make one as a gift, but I don’t weed, and I have never sold a
doll, and unless I have to, probably never will.
I’ve slowed down considerably over the years, after all, one
can’t have everything. But were I forced
to start shedding dolls, I wouldn’t know where to start. Which to keep? My goal is a brick and mortar museum that
will cover the history of dolls, and with it, a good deal of human history. It is precisely that dolls are ephemeral
that I feel they should be preserved. I
love the staggering variety of my dolls, from the tiny Ushabti and rice Kokeshi
dolls, to the 8 ft pirate for Halloween, and everything in between. It took years to find just a few French
bisques, and some of the automatons were mine by sheer luck. The dolls that my mother and family
bought? Nonnegotiable. They stay.
Same for the dolls my dad brought from trips, and the ones that my uncle
brought from Korea and Japan and later
gave to me.
I could probably fill the drawers of a good sized bureau
with Frozen Charlottes and penny dolls, and several file cabinets with paper
dolls and paper doll books. Yet, no two
are alike, and each has a story and a reason for being in the collection. Don’t even think the “H” word; we don’t
believe in such heresies here.
Crowded and cluttered we may be some time, but messy and
dirty we are not. As that great collector who inspired me, the late Lenon Hoyte
said in “Who won Second Place
in Omaha?” “clutter is clutter and a mess is a mess.”
It’s a worthwhile full time job to manage such a big collection,
but it’s rewarding, too. Now, when even
holidays are denied me, and I can’t decorate for lack of time, I can steal down
to my storage places and look through the ornaments labeled “Halloween” and
“Christmas,” “Thanksgiving” and “Easter”, and by looking at the holiday dolls
relive happier times.
Which to keep? All of
them. We’ll manage, and we’ll have that
museum.
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SUNDAY AUCTION: November 22
