Raggedy Ann Dolls

When I was in seventh grade I met a classmate that is my best friend to this day. Seventh grade is the time when the public elementary school and the parochial schools combine classes as the public junior high building. I had been in public elementary school and this other girl had been in the parochial school. In our home room classroom we happened to sit next to each other because we were both late in finding the classroom and they were the only two seats left. Of course they were in front of the room. We were given ten minutes at the end of the class period to visit with our classmates. Little did I know that thirty five years later this girl would still be my best friend.

We were inseparable from that first period of seventh grade through the remainder of high school and through college. We spent so much time together that our parents became good friends because they were constantly running us back and forth between each other’s home. My friend’s mom had the neatest job. She made raggedy Ann dolls. The dolls were everywhere in the friend’s house. Her mom had made raggedy ann dolls for my friend and her sister when they were young girls.

A mother of another girl saw them and asked her to make her daughters raggedy ann dolls. Soon she was making raggedy andy also and her business was under way. She hand sewed the dolls and their clothing. She made them in a variety of sizes depending upon what the people ordered. When we were in ninth grade she made us raggedy Ann costumes for Halloween. They were great. We had a dance that years at school and everyone agreed that we had the best costumes of anyone.

This was close to the time when cabbage patch dolls first came on the market and people were buying them out as fast as they hit the stores. My friend’s mother was contacted to see if she could make one of these dolls. The grandmother was frantic because she promised her granddaughter one of the dolls, yet they were completely sold out in the area and the back order time was over three months. My friend’s mom said she would attempt to make one. It turned out great. Soon she was getting more orders for them than the raggedy ann dolls. Through the years she kept up with the trends and continued to work out of their home sewing different toys.