Sunday in New York

No this wasn't a category in the Competition, but it describes my day today--capped by a stroll to Central Park and the Bethesda Fountain. Earlier, I stopped by the Green Flea on West 77th, and was delighted to hear from dealer Geno Sartori that paper doll collectors from the convention had stopped by.

Here's what I found on Geno's table today:






And then Geno handed me a few extras for free, because he said he wouldn't know how to price them. For some people they're just a bunch of damaged scraps, but for me they are a treasure. Thank you, Geno! And I hope you weren't kidding about joining us in Las Vegas next year.

Susan Lee

From Garth Lax:

"Susan Lee, a beautiful cut McLaughlin entered
by Elaine Price. It took a 2nd Place Ribbon in the McLaughlin
Cut Paper Doll category."

The Bride

From Garth Lax:

"The Bride from the McLaughlin Bridal Party
series. The lovely double-sided doll and costumes won 1st Place
for Diana Lax in the McLaughlin Cut Paper Doll category."

Susie Simple

From Garth Lax:

"Susie Simple, a rare uncut McLaughlin,
that won 1st Place for Elaine Price in the McLaughlin uncut
category."

An Exceptional Die-Cut

From Garth Lax:
"An exceptional piece of single-item scrap
(ie, die-cut), showing German children playing music with
piano, dog, and doll. The piece is exquisite, and won a
Blue Ribbon for Samy Odin in the Die-Cut, Individual Piece
Category."

Clarabel, 1917

UPDATE/CORRECTION:
Jean Sullivan writes that this was her entry in Advertising Paper Dolls,
1900-1950, and it received Honorable Mention.

French Opera Theater

Garth Lax has just e-mailed several photos from the Competition. I'll be posting them here along with his comments.

First up: Bonnie Hanson's French Opera Theater.

From Garth:

"It's unusual when a Paper Toy takes a major award at a
Paper Doll Convention. but this theater is an exceptional
paper toy and, as such, won a Popular Special Award
as well as a Blue Ribbon.

"It's 3-dimensional, of course, and the paper figures on the
stage are moved about by means of the the attached wands
that extend through the wings out to the sides of the theater."

Dior's New Look

Thanks to Pat Corte Rooney for providing so many images for this blog.

Shown here: her entry for the Dress-a-Doll, featuring the "Bar" suit by Christian Dior, 1947.

Bonnie Hanson

Bonnie Hanson of Carver, Mass., was a big winner at the Competition.

Bonnie had last attended a paper doll convention in Atlanta, I believe. She called me when she saw the announcement of the convention in one of the antique weeklies (we sent press releases out to several). She had fond memories of her last convention, but somehow, she fell out of the convention loop. We're glad she's back in!

I know Garth will send along his comments to fill us in on Bonnie's wins; they'll be posted in the comments section, so be sure to click on the comments link right below this post.

Bonnie also displayed her handcrafted Shirley Temple tribute.

Fluffy Ruffles

Thanks to Jean Sullivan for bringing this newspaper Fluffy Ruffles to the competition--and was kind enough to mail me a color copy as well. This paper doll appeared in the Dec. 29, 1907 New York Herald. She is quite different from the Fluffy Ruffles that was produced and sold separately in her own envelope:


Clearly, the work of two different artists!

Thank you again Jean, for bringing this wonderful find to our attention.

Convention Competition

Here are some images from the competition, taken by Pat Corte Rooney. If anyone has more photos, do e-mail to me and I'll post them here.

Garth Lax did an outstanding job in arranging this portion of the convention. And Garth, if you have a minute, let me know more info on these items, and the winners of each category.

UPDATE: Click on the comments link below to see Garth's response.

A Freebie Table Find

Carol Sullivan

Thanks to Nancy Goldstein who took these pictures at Carol Sullivan's workshop on newspaper supplement paper toys. Carol has a phenomenal collection, and we saw some rare treasures.

Jane Powell and Dick Moore

Jane Powell, Dick Moore and Tom Tierney.

Deanna Williams put together a program with biographies and filmography of the stars. Marilyn Henry displayed a Jane Powell paper doll she created as a teenager--this star has been a muse for Marilyn, and we were lucky to have her distribute a special souvenir, too. Artists Tom Tierney and Gregg Nystrom also gave Powell original paper dolls they created.

Ralph Hodgdon workshop

Thanks once again to Pat Corte Rooney for many of the photos I am posting here. Pat took these at the Painting with Ralph workshop.

What I Saw at the Convention

n the right hand side of this page, you'll see links to photo sharing pages by Tracy Williams and Sylvia Kleindinst. I'll add more links as they come in.

Our Emcee

David Wolfe did an outstanding job as master of ceremonies at the convention--he provided us with a fabulous souvenir AND some great video clips of Mary Martin and Ethel Merman from their famous 1953 TV special.

The link below will take you to youtube.com and a snippet of what we saw at the Saturday banquet. What you can't hear is what filled the banquet hall that evening: an impromptu sing-a-long, only missing Gene Maiden's clear, strong voice as in conventions past. (He is doing much better, and is already helping Deanna Williams plan next year's convention in Las Vegas.)

Mary Martin and Ethel Merman

I'd heard of the famous Martin-Merman special, but never saw it before--so thank you, David!

Something new to me was David's video flashback at Thursday's banquet: Mary Martin's hilarious history of fashion, using only the long black sheath she wore and a handful of props (unfortunately not available on youtube)--and that video was just a prelude to David's slide show taking us behind the scenes of Fashion Week in NYC. It was a fun peek at what goes on when the runways go up in Bryant Park!

More Raffle Items

The two large paper dolls (more like sturdy cardboard) stood guard outside the Raffle Room.

Raffle Blanket

Kis Eg took this photo of the wonderful paper doll blanket in our Raffle Room. Who donated it? And most importantly, who won it? Let me know!

UPDATE: Garth Lax says it was donated by Diana Lax and won by Pat Rooney.

Another group photo

From left: Letty Schwarz, Patricia Motley, Debra Van Dyke, Marsha King, Elaine Price, Louise Leek, Diana and Garth Lax.

Kis and Frede

Frede, Gregg Nystrom and Kis Eg.

Kis sent the photo and a message to post here:

"Hello Linda and all the nice people we meet in New Jersey.

We are back safe in Denmark and are going to write the letters for our Paper Doll letter, as we promised the girls over here. We had a safe flight home even as we were a little late from Newark airport, of course the weather made small troubles on the flight, not very much. We still have a lot of jetlag, but we are back on our duties. We want to say thanks to all of you for your sweetness, we loved it. Both of us: Frede and I. We hope to see some of you here in Denmark on April the 5th of 2009. Hope to hear back from you.

Sure, we will come back, but I am not sure of the Vegas meeting next year, of course we have to go to Australia for a wedding party at my cousin's daughter.

We had a great time at your place this August! I send you a picture, you are welcome to put it on the blog along with this mail.

Take care all of you. With kind regards and love from Denmark: Frede and Kis"

Samy Odin and La Poupee Modele

Samy Odin presented an excellent exhibit of La Poupee Modele paper dolls during our opening reception. Samy is the director of the Musee de la Poupee in Paris.

His father, Guido, had accompanied him to the Cleveland convention in 2003, but was not feeling well this time around. We hope he is feeling better, and perhaps we'll see them both next year in Las Vegas.

www.museedelapoupeeparis.com/index.html

Dress-A-Doll

Sylvia Kleindinst was the lucky winner of the Dress-A-Doll designs.

Thanks to Brenda Sneathen Mattox for creating the doll, and to Louise Leek for creating the display for all the entries.

And of course, thanks to all of you who submitted designs!

New Jersey Historical Society

Calling all photographers! I need your photos of the Anna Lindner exhibit at the NJ Historical Society.

A selection of Anna Lindner's handmade paper dolls were brought out just for us--they were exquisite watercolors of dolls with two-sided clothing. Curator Tim Decker gave me a copy of his notes, so as soon as I have pictures, I will add his narrative to the blog as well.

Many of you approached Decker and Linda Epps, president of the society who addressed our group, about reproductions of the Lindner collection. An excellent idea, and one I will reiterate in my own thank you note to the society.

Meanwhile, I hope many of you will write to the society as well, and perhaps add a small contribution. Like many small cultural institutions, the society depends on donations to keep going. They also have an online auction scheduled for Sept. 1 as part of their fundraising effort--and no, I do not think they are auctioning off any Lindner paper dolls!

New Jersey Historical Society
52 Park Place
Newark, NJ 07102
www.jerseyhistory.org/index.htm

FIT Tour

The visit to the Fashion Institute of Technology's museum in Manhattan went well by all accounts. Here are two photos from Pat Corte Rooney:

From left: Valerie Fahey, Ron Fong, Marion Creamer, Karl Beason and Paula Sherrick examine textiles during the tour.

A fabulous dress from the FIT collection, no doubt. If you have anymore information on this dress, do let me know.