The Bobblehead Doll – A Cultural Icon
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Melissa & Doug Brianna - 12" Doll Sale Price: $13.00  |
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This sweet smelling, soft-bodied baby doll is just waiting for a little mommy to love her! With her open and close eyes, and shiny brunette hair, Brianna comes in a removable two-piece outfit with a charming embroidered heart and flower... |
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Manhattan Toy Stella Doll Sale Price: $21.00 |
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Melissa & Doug Jenna - 12" Doll Sale Price: $10.17 |
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This huggable, soft-bodied baby can sit up and suck her thumb or the included pacifier. |
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Melissa & Doug Wooden Family Doll Set Sale Price: $12.49 |
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Multi-generational, colorfully dressed figures are wire-framed, so they can pose in many ways, and make a great addition to any dollhouse. Inspire young imaginations for hours of pretend play! |
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Little Mommy Play All Day Baby Sale Price: $17.77 |
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Fisher Price's Little Mommy Play All Day Baby brings imagination to life. This lively doll reacts to a variety of fun, playful positions and movements such as bouncing, flipping, dancing, and flying, with adorable sounds and phrases... |
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Madame Alexander Baby Cuddles - 14 Inch Sale Price: $24.22 |
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Pretend play utilizes fantasy and imagination to help children learn about the world. As beautiful as they are, Play Alexander dolls are designed for a lifetime of play. This charming collection features dolls with cuddly fabric bodies with vinyl faces, hands and feet... |
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Little Mommy Real Loving Baby Walk & Giggle Doll Sale Price: $34.99 |
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Get ready for interactive playtime with the Fisher Price Little Mommy Real Loving Baby Walk & Giggle Doll. Designed for children age three and older who enjoy playing "mommy," this life-like doll features a repertoire of more than 60 phrases, songs, and sounds... |
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Corolle Les Cheries Doll Camille Ballerina - 13" Doll Sale Price: $30.31 |
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Arabesque, anyone? Les Chiries' Camille Ballerina is recital-ready in a leotard, tutu, tights and pink slippers with ribbon laces. She has an all-vinyl body, moving eyes and long rooted hair that can be worn down or styled up - it can even be shampooed! Blue eyes... |
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Toysmith Doll Care Set Sale Price: $13.40 |
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3 years & up. Everything your little one needs to care for her baby doll. This 29 piece set comes in a reusable zippered case with handle that measures 8" x 6" x 6". Set includes baby necessities such as bottles, diapers, baby wipes, dispenser, bottle warmer, and training potty. |
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Little Mommy Scrub-A-Dub-Dub Doll Sale Price: $15.78 |
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LITTLE MOMMY BABY BATH Doll Splish splash - girls can give their adorable baby doll a bath with her completely submersible body and play accessories. This sweet baby doll comes with a cozy terry hoodie towel and slippers, play bubble bath and bath toy... |
The bobblehead doll is a type of doll with its head (which is often oversized in comparison to its body) connected to its body by a spring, so that tapping the doll will cause the head to wobble. This type of doll is also known as a 'bobbing head doll', 'wobbler', or 'nodder'. These dolls date back to ancient Japan and China, where they were made with flexible bamboo strips instead of springs. Today's dolls are more directly descended from German 'nodders' dating from the late 18th century, which were made from ceramic or bisque, and ranged in height from about 6 to 8 inches. These dolls were popular in America until around 1930, when interest in them started to fade.
Modern bobblehead dolls first appeared in the 1950s, and were initially made of papier-mache, and then from ceramic. Although the ceramic dolls were popular, they were fairly expensive, and were considered mainly collectors' items. Eventually, however, manufacturers started making the dolls from plastic, allowing for a cheaper manufacturing process, which made the dolls more affordable.
Early dolls were made to resemble animals and popular cultural characters, and were often used as advertising icons and automobile accessories (one very popular such doll was that of the dashboard 'hula girl'). Around 1960 Japanese-made papier-mache 'baseball' bobbleheads began to be imported into America. These early pieces were generic figures representing teams and their mascots, rather than individual players. Typically, the dolls for all teams would look the same, except that they would be wearing the uniform for the particular team being depicted. During this time there were a few dolls made up to represent some of the more famous players of the day, but they differed from their respective team dolls only by the uniforms they wore. Unfortunately, few of these papier-mache dolls have survived without some sort of damage (usually cracking or chipping), although those that have survived in good condition are now valuable collectors' items.
In the 1970s, bobbleheads were made of ceramic materials, and became popular for other sports, as well as for popular cultural and cartoon characters. However, by the mid-1970s, interest in the dolls had again died out, and very few new dolls were made for nearly two decades, when they became popular again.
In the 1990s, the dolls began to be made from plastic, which greatly reduced their cost, and facilitated the making of many variations of dolls to represent specific cultural figures and other notable people. After 2000, many different variations of the dolls began to appear, and a number of companies started to offer dolls that could be customized to the buyers' specifications. Modern dolls that represent specific individuals closely resemble those individuals, even including such things as headbands, scars, tattoos, and hair styles.
The greater diversity of the dolls, and their decreased cost, have, once again, made them a very popular item, and have rekindled interest in collecting them. Today bobblehead dolls have become an integral part of our culture. They have truly become one of the world's most recognizable cultural icons.
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