Tuesday, January 14, 2020

More About Hanna

A circa 1950s Hanna Fuhrer doll

This is Hanna, first seen and described in a blog post published on January 16, 2017.  As a refresher, Hanna was the first doll to be added to my collection in 2017.  This circa 1950s doll was made on the style of Sasha Morganthaler studio dolls.  She has a papier-mache-type mask face and brown cloth body.  She is very well made.  Her eBay seller described her wig as being made from an animal's hide.  Because the hair sheds, I made a cap for Hanna.  I named the doll after the Swiss artist who made her (the artist's signature and city are signed underneath the doll's shoes, Hanna Fuhrer, Zรผrich).

Other than her knit cap, which I made, Hanna is all original.

In October 2019, I received a message through my author page on Facebook that provided additional information about this doll.  The person who contacted me gave me permission to share the additional information in an update to my blog post about Hanna.  Instead of updating and adding length to the original post, I have created this separate post.  The initial message and the correspondence that followed are copied below:

"Hello Debbie, My name is Tim xxxxx and I’m sending this message regarding your doll by Hanna Fuhrer. She came from my ex-wife’s grandmother from Rottweil, Germany. She lived in Zurich after the war for a few years where she acquired the doll. She told my ex-wife that it was a very special doll but nobody in her family can remember why. We contacted a few doll specialists both in Germany and Switzerland and only received one reply from Zurich. This was more than 15 years ago and I don’t remember who they were but they mentioned Sasha Morgenthaler studio as a possible origin. We brought the doll to Denver from Rottweil in 2001 and sold her along with many other items probably in 2014.

I do hope you have better luck in finding out who Hanna Fuhrer is. Kind regards, Tim

I replied:
Thank you so much, Tim, for this additional information on my wonderful doll.  If you do not mind, for documentation purposes, I'd like to share what you've shared on my blog.  How in the world did you find me?

Tim replied:  I somehow stumbled upon your blog with the photos of her, I’m an antiques dealer and was just cruising the internet looking at doll sites and such because I recently came across some dolls from my mother's estate in Boston. Such a small world this internet has made! You are more than welcome to share any and all info. I have shared with you. I wrote my ex about this and she was delighted that you ended up with her, couldn’t have been a better place! Her grandmothers family name was Bilger, I’ve emailed my ex again for her first name, it may take a week or so for a response, she doesn’t have internet where she lives but goes to the city once a week or so.

I replied:
Thank you so much, Tim, for this additional information and for allowing me to include it on Hanna's blog post (I named the doll, Hanna).  The Internet has closed in our degrees of separation.   (I wrote more, but it wasn't related to Hanna... just some info to help Tim ID dolls from his mother's estate.)
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It is indeed a very small world here on the Internet.  More pictures of Hanna can be seen in the  original blog post about her:  https://blackdollcollecting.blogspot.com/2017/01/first-doll-to-arrive-in-2017.html 

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1 comment:

  1. Thank you, Linda! She is very intriguing. It is remarkable that Tim was able to find me. I appreciate the time he took to share the additional information about Hanna.

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