Barbie
The original Barbie
came to life
March 9th
-1959.
Or so were told.
She arrived
on the scene
blonde,
brunette,
and bold
as can be.
Not
the likes
of my kind.
Cause none
was made
to look
‘JUST’
like me.
But
I loved, loved, loved
her world
anyhow;
them paper dolls too
‘playin’ alone
was so much fun
when there was ‘nothin’
else
left to do!
She was cheap
as can be.
Her commercial raved
‘ONLY’
$3.00
for a vintage
Barbie
YOU SEE.
1961
‘MEANT THE WORLD TO ME’.
Ken,
AKA
Sean Carson, that
is;
makes his grand
debut
as none other
than
Barbie’s
main squeeze
an’
blue eyed
beau.
Mod also
comes along,
‘wit’
Malibu Barbie
‘sangin’
a new tune
to a different
type
of Barbie song.
Finally,
JUST FOR ME,
The VERY first
African American
Barbie;
came into being.
The year
1968,
and boy
was she ever
so VERY late!!!
She launched
in the 80’s,
nevertheless,
none
really knows her
by name.
Her history,
timeline,
an’ use
of fame
remains a mystery
in
“Christie’s”
guessing game(s).
In 2009,
Farrah Fawcett
an’
Toy Story
attached their names
to Barbs’ brand;
adding ‘bendable’s’
minus
the ‘twistable’
arms, legs
and yes
rubber face and hands!!!
2017,
hard to believe,
but
Barbie’s in her
late 50’s!!!
We drove her car
to the mall,
played in her
carousel kitchen,
lived in her dreamhouse;
yep!
Camper
right outside!!!
O’
sheer bliss.
Sewed her
some clothes,
told her secrets,
that only
she knows.
Barbie knows us well;
as does
Mattel
but she’ll never tell;
a single soul.
Nope
she won’t~~~
even tell
her lil’ sis Skip.
Skipper that is.
Nope
she don’t
even know
who cut her hair
Shhh~~~
But one thing
for sure;
to every lil’
boy and girl
Barbie and Ken’s
memories
of love
are
genuinely
pure.
Dedicated to: “Who wants to play Barbie?”
A B.A.D. poem
Not the ones you think (The Last Supper) -- Catherine Théry
High school sweethearts Elliot Handler and Ruth Mosko married and moved from Denver to Los Angeles in 1938. When he made their furniture out of two new plastics, Lucite and Plexiglas, she suggested forming a plastic furniture business with her in charge of marketing. In 1945 Elliott and Harold Matson combined parts of their names to form Mattel, a picture-frame firm. Using scraps of left-over plastic they produced dollhouse furniture, which proved so popular that they went into toy manufacturing. When Matson sold out to Handler due to poor health, Ruth took over his role. In 1947 the company had its first success, a ukulele called "Uke-A-Doodle." Mattel became the first permanent sponsor of the "Mickey Mouse Club" TV series in 1955.
ReplyDeleteRuth wanted to produce three-dimensional "paper dolls" made out of plastic, with an adult body and a wardrobe of fabric clothing, but Elliott did not think parents would go for such a concept. On a vacation in Switzerland she bought three German dolls called BILD-Lilli, launched in 1955 by O&M Hausser, a maker of plastic toy soldiers and "personality figures" such as Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini; the doll was based on Lilli, a comic-strip character created in 1952 by Reinhard Beuthien for the Hamburg taboid "BILD Zeitung." To fill a blank space, Beuthien drew a baby, but at the editor's insistence he redrew it, keeping the baby's face but adding a ponytail and a curvaceous woman's body. The cartoon's immediate success led to it becoming a daily feature until 1961. (In 1962 he created another cartoon character, "Schwabinchen," for a Bavarian newspaper, but the dolls inspired by her were not successful.) The Lilli strip was adult-oriented, and the doll was originally marketed to adults in bars and tobacco shops, but German toy factories began to make dollhouses, room settings, furniture, and other accessories to her scale. Lilli came as a dressed doll, and additional fashions were sold separately. Lilli became so popular that a German movie starring Ann Smyrner was made about her in 1958. When Ruth returned home with her dolls she reworked its design with engineer Jack Ryan and renamed her Barbie after her daughter. (Barbie's boyfriend Ken was named after Barbara's brother.) The doll debuted at the American International Toy Fair in New York in 1959 and was heavily promoted on "The Mickey Mouse Club." The first Barbie dolls, available with a blonde or brunette topknot ponytail, were manufactured in Japan and wore a handstitched black and white zebra striped swimsuit designed by Charlotte Johnson; marketed as a "Teen-age Fashion Model" with her clothes created by Mattel fashion designer, about 350,000 were sold during the first year of production. In 1961 Louis Marx and Company acquired the licensing rights to BILD-Lilli from O&M Hausser for release in the US as "Miss Seventeen" and sued Mattel for patent infringement; the case was settled out of court two years later. In 1964 Mattel bought all BILD Lillipatents and copyrights for $21,600 and stopped the rival doll's production. Random House published a series of Barbie novels in the 1960s. Over the years she has been portayed as an astronaut, surgeon, Olympic athlete, downhill skier, aerobics instructor, TV news reporter, veterinarian, doctor, army officer, air force pilot, diplomat, rap musician, presidential candidate, baseball player, scuba diver, lifeguard, fire-fighter, engineer, dentist, and other roles. Mattel has sold over a billion Barbie dolls in over 150 countries, which made the firm the world's largest toy maker in terms of revenue. In 1974, a section of Times Square in New York City was renamed Barbie Boulevard for a week. To mark her "50th birthday" in 2009, a Barbie runway show was held in New York as part of the Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week; it showcased fashions contributed by 50 haute couturiers including Diane von Fürstenberg, Vera Wang, Calvin Klein, Bob Mackie, and Christian Louboutin. he Musée des Arts Décoratifs, in the Pavillon de Marsan, the western wing of the Louvre in Paris, held an exhibit in 2016 that featured 700 Barbie dolls over two floors, as well as Barbie-related works by contemporary artists such as Al Carbee and documents (newspapers, photos, video).
ReplyDeleteHow I remember Barbie and Ken and their evolution. The author brings back vivid memories of my yesteryear. She also makes me chuckle as she jars my memory and reminds me that they are now senior citizens.
ReplyDelete