Be Still My Heart! FIVE Izannah Walker Dolls

 Withington's will be auctioning 

FIVE Izannah Walker dolls in October! 

Who could decide which one to buy?
Oh my! 

An Izannah with a Mona Lisa Smile Sold at Withington's

It was fun to see the Izannah Walker doll at Withington's doll auction in person, in addition to a Maggie Bessie doll, a Wellington doll and a bevy of adorable Martha Chase dolls. Here are some additional images of the Izannah Walker doll from Withington's auction. All of the dolls looked better in person than in images. Something about modern cameras accentuates texture which was lesser in person. This doll had a beautiful Mona Lisa type smile. This doll also had some breaks in the arms which were ladder stitched, and some missing cloth in th lower legs and feet so that stuffing was exposed. 

After some spirited bidding it narrowed to two phone bidders slowly advancing to $15,800 hammer price. Add to that a premium of 14-17% depending on method of payment. She does have a wonderful face! 

Withington's to Offer Izannah Walker Doll at Auction 6/16/22

Withington's has a number of cloth dolls which will be offered at their June auction, including this 16.5" Izannah Walker Doll. Also being offered are a Maggie Bessie doll and a Martha Wellington doll. 

Edited to add: This doll sold with a hammer price of $15,800. Add to that a 14-17% premium depending on method of payment. 

Hopestill Izannah Walker Reproduction Dolls Will Be Available Soon

In the past when people have made dolls taken from molds of Izannah Walker dolls I've written abou tit here. It's only right that I do that for my own work. I (Dixie Redmond) have been working on pressed cloth dolls taken from a mold of my antique Izannah Walker doll named Hope. These dolls will make up the Hopestill clan. 

I will be offering Hopestill dolls for purchase after they are completed, so if you are interested, follow along at my art blog Northdixie Designs 

If you want to be in the know about when Hopestill dolls are ready to find new homes, please follow this page. Even better, when you click on the follow button, you can have a choice to include this page in your "see first" options, that way you will not miss an update. 

I will be posting to my email list, on my Facebook business page, and here on my blog, when one of my Hopestill doll clan is ready. 

Kathy Duncan's Research: Advertisements of Miss Walker Dolls With 1881 Prices!

Good things come to those who wait! 

The internet is a constantly changing place, with information being uploaded all the time. Remember microfiche and the dizzy feeling you got looking at those? Many of those old newspaper archives have been digitized and are available online. 

Kathy Duncan has done some outstanding research and posted wonderful new information she found regarding Izannah Walker's doll sales. To find an advertisement with the price of an Izannah Walker doll is quite a discovery! This information is posted on her blog, Flimsiest and Frippery in a post entitled "Miss Izannah Walker's Celebrated Cloth Dolls", 

Kathy reveals that E. W. Billings acted as Izannah's agent in wholesaling her dolls. Click here to read her exciting post. There is a LOT more information about Izannah, E. W. Billings, and how this information suggests that perhaps Izannah's business was a larger operation than past information has provided. 

Ads describing a "Miss Walker" dolls in the Evening Bulletin of Rhode Island are shown below: 

This 1874 ad reads: 

The Everlasting Cloth Doll.

Tho Proprietor would inform

the trade that be is now pre-

pared to sell at wholesale

MISS WALKER'S

CELEBRATED CLOTH DOLLs

For which he has been agent for so many years

Please send your orders for the Holidays. Those

Who've left their orders at the store to be filled,

Will please call and make their selections at 

99 Westminster St., Butler Exchange. 

___ ___ ____ E. W. Billings 

Below ad from Thursday 15 Dec 1881, p. 1

WELCOME, SANTA CLAUS. - The fabled Kris

Kringle is pictured as bearing upon his back an

Enormous pack, filled with toys and playthings

For children of all ages and conditions, and every 

Year he stops at the store of E. W. Billings, in 

Butler Exchange, and purchases a large supply of

toys and fancy goods, including dolls of all sizes 

and peculiarities. He will lay in a stock of Miss

Walker's cloth dolls this season, their chief merit 

consisting in their ability to stand rough usage 

and abandonment serenely. 

Below is the ad from 1881 on p. 3. 

Listed by E. G. Billings

This ad reads: 

SANTA CLAUS

HEADQUARTERS

E. G. BILLINGS

Butler Exchange. 

Fancy

Goods, 

Toys, 

Dolls 

---

Games and Novelties

---

WHOLESALE AND RETAIL

At lower prices than elsewhere.

Agency for MISS WALKER'S

CLOTH DOLLS; reduced price

$3.75

Also, for DOLLS' DRESSES

And CLOAKS, which are now, 

beautiful and cheap. 

Again, be sure to visit Kathy's blog. Click here to read her exciting post which has a LOT of information in it.

Sweetbriar to Auction Three Izannah Walker Dolls in First Half of 2022

Going forward, posting about Izannah Walker dolls to be auctioned is dependent on people contacting me to let me know when dolls will be auctioned, or my seeing them in online postings. I used to be able to search the internet, but life doesn't allow for that as much now. Visit Sweetbriar to view their auctions. 

This doll, lot number 44, was auctioned February 5th. The ending price was $9800 plus 10% o 13%, depending on the method of payment by the buyer. 

This doll, lot number 44, was auctioned February 5th, 2022.
The ending price was $9800 plus 10% o 13%,
depending on the method of payment by the buyer. 

On April 9, 2022, Sweetbriar will offer two Izannah Walker dolls at auction. The first doll is 17" tall and wears a copy of an original costume. To me, this Izannah has a folk-y feel to her. 

The second doll to be auctioned on April 9th is a large Izannah Walker doll measuring 25" tall. 

It would be fun to be able to see the two dolls to be auctioned on April 9th side by side! 

RESULTS From April 9th auction: 

The 17” doll  sold for $9800 plus 10% or 13%, depending on form of payment. 

The 25” doll sold for $11,100 plus 10% or 13%, depending on form of payment. 

Izannah Walker Doll on EBay

An Izannah Walker doll has been listed on EBay, listed at $14,500. The doll is 16" tall. I love seeing Izannah Walker dolls in any condition, and this will be a fun auction to watch. I would love to see this doll in person, and see the condition of the doll's body. 

Happy Birthday to Izannah!

Izannah's birthday is September 25th, but I'm going to host this celebratory sale from now until the end of the month. My Izannah Walker Doll Pattern is on sale for 50% off through September 30th to honor Izannah Walker's birthday. So if you have been waiting to buy this pattern, now is the time. Hop on over to Etsy while it's on your mind! I made the doll in the photo below using my pattern.  

Dixie Redmond's Izannah Walker Doll Pattern 

I am proud of the many artists who started their doll-making journey with this pattern and the many dolls made all over the world using this pattern. It is STILL fun to see the wonderful creations people make. 

Three Years of Comments! Oh My!

 I'm not sure what happened, but I went in to do a check on settings on this blog and found three years of comments which needing moderating. I was starting to get some very spammy comments on this blog, so I set it up to moderate all comments.  Oh my! 

So if your comment was stuck in moderation mode, I apologize. You are good people with interesting things to say. 🌟 

Izannah Walker Doll to be Sold at Theriault's May 15th

On Saturday, May 15, 2021 at 11:00 AM  Eastern Time, this wonderful Izannah Walker doll will be auctioned as lot #64 in the "And The the Page Turns" Marquis auction with an opening bid of $11,000. 

The description of the doll is as follows: 

20" (51 cm.) Cloth doll with pressed and oil-painted complexion and facial features, center-parted hair with two shaded ringlet curls in front of each stitch-shaped ear, and then forming into ringlet curls that tumble onto her nape, outlined brown eyes, lightly stroked brows, rounded nose, closed mouth, firmly stuffed body with stitch jointing at shoulders, elbows, hips and knees, defined applied thumbs, oil-painted hands and lower legs, antique costume and undergarments. Condition: original painted finish is well-preserved with slight typical craquelure, nose rub, finish on hands worn. Comments: circa 1865, Izannah Walker, the Pawtucket, Rhode Island, doll creator who obtained a patent for her dolls in 1873, but likely had been making them previously for some time. Her patent described her purpose was to create a doll that is "easily kept clean and not apt to injure a young child which may fall upon it. It will preserve its appearance for a long time." Value Points: the rarest style of coiffure for this model with artistically-painted shaded ringlet curls, seldom found larger size.

Susey Seeks a Sister by Lila Singsen

 Dixie's note: 

While looking for some other information about Izannah Walker in Your Dolls and Mine by Janet Pagter Johl, I found an article written by Lila Horton Singsen laid into my extra copy of the book. I believe this copy came from a box lot of books I bought at Withington's at a 2010 auction. It was in October 2010 when the Velma "Dolly" Driscoll collection was sold. 

The article had been ripped out of an issue of the now defunct print version of Antiques Journal. So I don't know what year this one page article was published, and couldn't find anything online. The article is page 38. Born in 1888, Lila Singsen passed away on November 5, 1963. So we know it was published before then. Perhaps someone in the doll collecting community knows. 

While her article is not about Izannah Walker dolls per se, it is about dolls said to be made by Reuben Bates in the same manner. Included here is a scan of the original page of Lila Singsen's article, as well as a transcription. As a dollmaker, I found that they made a doll from Reuben's mold very interesting. 

There is so much we do not know about why Izannah Walker dolls and the dolls made from the Bates mold are so similar. There is so much we do not know about the relationship between Izannah and Reuben as people as well. There are many scenarios we can put forth about their connection. It's fun to think about. Perhaps as people sort through the papers of long past ancestors more information will come to the surface. 

Susey Seeks a Sister

By Lila Horton Singsen 

Photograph by Frank G. Thurston 

As I think most all collectors will agree, one of the fascinations of our hobby is trying to solve the mysteries surrounding some of our old dolls. Though I have followed many clues, the case of my Susey Bates is baffling. Not that I do not know her origin, because I do know where, approximately when and by whom she was made, but the mystery lies in the fact that up to now we have been unable to locate another like her, although many have been brought or sent me for comparison. 

For those not familiar with Susey’s history as related briefly in Janet Johl’s “Your Dolls and Mine“, I will say that in most respect she is very similar to the Izannah Walker doll, much loved by us in New England, perhaps because of they are having been created here in Rhode Island in great numbers between the late 1840s and 70s.

I acquired Susey from a member of the Bates family, together with a very heavy iron mold from which her face was formed. Also I have the paper pattern from which the body was cut, (The old thin paper full of pin-pricks made by the slender pins of the period), and a sewed-up cloth body pattern put together with machine stitching.

According to old Providence Directories we find that during the 1850s, Reuben Harlow Neal Bates was a Pattern Maker employed by the Barstow Stove Company. He had nine children, the last born in 1856, and it has been suggested that he may have made the dolls only for his family and the children of his friends. However, this seems rather illogical since, in nearby Central Falls, Izannah Walker was producing the same type of doll probably very cheaply, and while they had no claim to beauty they were certainly more attractive than the Bates doll, whose left eye is definitely higher than the right, giving her face a one-sided look. At first I thought this effect might’ve been from the fault of the artist painting Suzy‘s features, but the mold proves otherwise.

This winter, a collector friend, Mrs. Margaret Elvin, and I decided to do a little experimenting to see what sort of a face we could produce with the old mold. We lined the hollow part with a paste-saturated buckram covering this with several layers of narrow strips of paper toweling, then pressed the other half of the mold into the wet mass allowing a couple of weeks for thorough drying. We had no mold for the back of the head but we formed one of sorts from a heavy aluminum foil, repeating the process used for the face.

When both were dry and firm we seamed the two parts together as in the original, then formed a neck and shoulders of heavy cotton cloth to which we attached the head. The hole was then stuffed with cotton batting (reinforced with a wooden dowel, as are all this type of doll.) Overall we stretched and pasted old white stocking material, painted it and the unbeautiful result may be seen in the accompanying illustration. Done by our method we both agreed that the time consumed as well as the result would hardly warrant the producing of this type of doll commercially, but we had fun doing it.

Until recently I thought there was another distinguishing feature of the Bates style, namely that the eyes are painted blue. I had never seen a Walker with anything but brown eyes. But just lately a friend offered me a doll which had just emerged from storage – – the old family doll. “It wouldn’t by any chance have blue eyes with it?”  I asked. The reply was that it had. “At last we have found a sister for Susey,” I thought. But alas no. When she appeared, she was, beyond a doubt, a blue-eyed Walker. It would be interesting to know if there were others so painted, scattered about the country.

In an effort to get to the bottom of this mystery, another possibility has occurred to me. Might it be that Izannah engaged Reuben to produce a mold for her. Being a departure from his regular business, did he, perhaps, come up with this one sided face which she would, of course, have refused to except. And did he then being a thrifty New Englander, undertake to do a little experimenting for himself, as my friend and I have just done, rather than throw away the initial mold he had put his time and skill into making? And did I Zana, commending his thrift, give him a pattern of the body she was putting on her own dolls? It does seem to be identical, even to the blue cambric covering. And did he, then produce a few dollars, just for his own children and for for those of the neighbors?

Probably we shall never know. Unless some of the readers of this article take a look at their Walker dolls, recognize the clues given and find they have a Bates, then we must conclude that the poor little Susey must resign herself to being without a relative in the world. On the other hand, perhaps there is a certain distinction in being a one-and-only.