How Was the Barbie Doll Invented?

with the Wind. Deprivations brought on by the Second World War had worn down her spirit, except for a determination to be amply provided for a passion. No longer motivated dating, she was simply on a quest for the wealthiest suitor. Lily was, in short, a gold digger, but with mile long legs, a generous bus line, and scant clothing. A

cartoon Lily nonetheless charmed the magazine's largely male readership. Her brassy personality and pin up figure wooed men so effectively that the character was transformed into a doll in nineteen fifty five. The Lily Dolls, which came in seven inch and eleven inch sizes, that's seventeen and twenty seven centimeters weren't marketed to little girls. They were intended for adult men. At that time, girls played with baby dolls and prepubescent

shaped fashion dolls. Lily, on the other hand, depicted a worldly woman with impossibly petite feet in black spike heels supporting a distinct hourglass frame, crimson lips puckered slightly in a flutatious pout, and big, thickly lined eyes that gazeduggestively to the side. With advertising taglines such as whether more or less naked Lily is always discreet, and a wardrobe consisting of neckliges, tiny tops, and tight pants. Lily dolls

were essentially adult novelty toys. People gave them as bachelor gifts, and men drove around with Lily on their dashboards. But when an American woman named Ruth Handler spied a Lily doll in a store while vacationing in Switzerland, she didn't see it as a prurie and novelty. Instead, she thought it would be the perfect toy for her daughter, Barbara. Handler had observed Barbara and her friends playing with paper dolls that depicted teenage girls or adult women, and Handler

that was their way of practicing for adulthood. Yet, aside from these two dimensional paper dolls, no other dolls available in stores portrayed the mature female body. For that reason, she bought two Lily dolls for Barbara during that Switzerland trip in nineteen fifty six and one for herself. By the time Ruth Handler encountered the Lily doll on her vacation in Switzerland, the toy company that she and her

husband had founded, Mattel had started turning a prophet. The United States was in its post World War two economic boom that fueled widespread concus zumorism, and adults weren't the only shoppers who advertisers targeted a Thanks to television and the launch of shows like Howdy Duty in nineteen forty seven and The Mickey Mouse Club in nineteen fifty five, the children were a new market and source of revenue. If youngsters saw a new toy on television, they might

nag their parents into buying it for them. Mattel seized upon this opportunity as a chance to expand their stake in the toy industry. With Lily as her muse. Handler convinced her husband and the all male design team at Mattel to follow her lead in filling the as of yet empty market niche for a more mature female doll. Mattel began crafting Handler's dream doll by nineteen fifty seven.

They kept Lily's general figure, but scrubbed off some of her makeup, relaxed her smile, and used soft vinyl instead of hard plastic to construct her. A fashion designer, Charlotte Johnson was hired to create a tasteful, yet chic wardrobe for Mattel's new doll. This was where Lily's extreme hourglass

shape was a practical aesthetic bonus. Johnson was working with the same types of thick fabrics that were used in human sized garment making, so the doll's unrealistically narrow waist and large bust actually helped the tiny garments look sharp and shapely at scale, the final product standing at eleven

and a half inches that's twenty nine centimeters. The debuted at the nineteen fifty nine New York Toy Fair didn't look drastically different from Lily A. Sporting a black and white striped swimsuit, open toads, toilettos, and gold hoop ear rings. It had Lily's racy curves, but a more demure style. Named in honor of Handler's daughter, Barbara, Mattel called the new doll Barbie. Everyone knows the rest of Barbie's history. She bade scores of friends and became the most popular

toy in history. But Barbie didn't receive a warm welcome at that New York Toy fair, and before she hit the stores, Mattel had to figure out how to sell such a womanly doll to wary mothers. The thought of having a doll with a prominent bust sitting around the home did disturb some mothers. A Barbie's mature body seemed borderline pornographic and potentially damaging to young girl's psyches, an

argument that continues disissle in today's culture. After all, if the original Barbie were person sized, her measurements would be thirty eight eighteen thirty four. In order for Mattel to popularize Barbie, the company had to advertise in a strategic way that would allay concerned mother's fears. Over the course of six months, an advertising expert by the name of Ernest Dieter studied the responses of girls and their mothers

to Barbie. From his extensive research, Dieter concluded that instead of attempting to mitigate Barbie's mature qualities, Mattel should emphasize them. Barbie was well dressed and attractive. Mothers ought to consider her a tool for teaching their daughters about the importance of appearance and femininity, while some women, like my own mom, would later take Barbie to task for imparting such lessons. The advertising tactic worked in the nineteen sixties. Barbie's on

and off boyfriend Ken, hit stores in nineteen sixty one. Ironically, Ken is named for Ruth Handler's son, which makes the real life Barbie and Ken and siblings. The plastic couple would go through a breakup in two thousand and four, but reconciled in twenty eleven. Mattel's first black dolls appeared in the late nineteen sixties, and other skin tones hit the shelves in the eighties. Meanwhile, the basic Barbie underwent a significant makeover in nineteen seventy one with the release

of Malibu Barbie. For the first time, Barbie's eyes looked straight ahead rather than to the side like Lily's. She traded her honey brown locks for Platinum blonde and displayed an open mouthed smile. In the twenty teens, the brand released different body types for Barbie and Ken. Barbie has also moved far beyond her original career ambitions of a

teen fashion model. She's held down more than two hundred and fifty jobs to date, including paleontologist, astronaut McDonald's cashier, firefighter, pro tennis player, game developer, and president during her pink hued reign. Mattel estimates that an average of two Barbie's have been sold every second across the world since the

first official Barbie convention in nineteen eighty. Barbie collecting has remained a robust Niche rare and limited edition dolls, such as the Dolls of the World collectibles can sell for thousands of dollars, and, of course, in twenty twenty three, the Barbie film, directed by Greta Gerwig, made a bit of a splash, becoming the highest grossing film of the year at some one point four billion dollars, not bad for a novelty. Today's episode is based on the article

who invented the Barbie Doll and Why? On How Stuffworks dot Com, written by Kristin Conger. Brain Stuff is production of iHeartRadio in partnership with how stuffworks dot Com and is produced by Tyler Klang. For more podcasts my heart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.