Steffi Love XL Family

Steffi Love XL Family is a family of four dolls—Photograph courtesy of Stacy Bailey-Ndiaye of articulated pov on Instagram.

Until last week, I was still looking for the Steffi Love XL family that is sold at Ollie's, possibly at Roses, and other stores that carry dolls by Simba. Ollie's is not within my driving range and there isn't a Roses here.

Stacy Bailey-Ndiaye deboxed her dolls and granted permission for me to share this photograph.

Too few dolls that represent the nuclear Black family are manufactured. When they are made, fewer quantities often exist than the readily available white counterparts. Another factor that contributes to the scarcity is that black versions are not stocked in all stores that sell the white version, or the black dolls sell out first because of demand or low quantities. <Sigh>

A fellow collector offered to check her North Carolina Roses store where the XL family was not available, but the following two Steffi Love dolls were. She purchased these for me. Thank you, again, RJ.

This basic Steffi Love boxed doll has a brown curly Afro, painted-brown eyes, and a closed mouth with pale pink lip color. She wears a sleeveless purple and white striped dress and purple crossbody bag.

A close-up of the basic doll's face better illustrates her curly-textured hair, light-brown complexion, and facial features.

Steffi Love Sunshine Twins includes the 11-1/2-inch Steffi Love doll, two twins dressed in dark or light pink rompers, and a pink baby carriage. Also included are feeding accessories for the twins.

The Steffi Love doll in the twins' set has the same hair color and hairstyle as the basic and XL Family dolls. The twins are bald.

On Ollie's website, their store locator revealed two stores near my brother's residence. He lives in the next major city away from me. After agreeing to go to either store for me, he asked me to first call to see if either store had the black XL family in stock. 

A cell phone photo taken at Ollie's shows one black Steffi Love XL Family and two white versions.

After calling the stores, I shared with my brother that the store closer to him only had the white family in stock. The other store had both versions but only one black XL family. Because they would not hold it at the counter for me at my request*, my brother literally stopped what he was doing and rushed to the store. While there, he texted me the above cell phone photo to make sure this was the one I wanted. The Steffi in this set has straight brown hair. I wanted the one with a curly Afro, but because I now have two other Steffi Loves with an Afro hairstyle, the straight-haired doll fulfills my desire for the black XL Family. (The daughter in the set I'll receive also has straight hair. The daughter's hair is loosely curled in the other black XL Family set.)

I told my brother not to make a special trip to bring me the doll. ("I'm not," he said.) He'll bring it the next time he comes to my city, and I will update this post with better pictures. 

*The Ollie's associate I spoke with said they could not hold items at the register because they are a deep discount store where items are sold on a first-come, first-served basis, which I understood. Thank goodness for brothers/family who understand your passion and will help you on your doll searches when asked.

Related Posts

Steffi Love Dentist

Vintage Thrift Store Steffi Love

©Black Doll Collecting/dbg

There are countless items to collect and write about. Black dolls chose me.

__________

Thank you for reading. Comments that are not spam are appreciated. Spam comments will not be published, so don't waste your time. To contact me directly regarding dolls or any of my posts, please use the contact form on the right of the home page, which is visible in "web view." A link to web viewing should be visible at the bottom of this page.

If you're not already a subscriber, visit, "like" and follow the Black Doll Collecting Facebook page or bookmark the Black Doll Collecting home page and visit on Tuesdays and Thursdays when typically new posts are published.

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Black Dolls in Ebony Magazine's 40th Anniversary Issue

Ebony magazine November 1985, 40th-anniversary edition

In November 1985, Ebony magazine published its 40th-anniversary magazine that features highlights from the 1945 through 1984 publications. The covers of these editions appear on the front cover and on the inside of the front cover.

Known for featuring dolls and toys in their November issues, "Black Toys: They've come a long way since 1945," is one of the last articles in this November 1985 issue. The article on black dolls is the reason I purchased this issue several years ago. 

Scans from Google of the three-page article and two separate ads are included below. (If necessary, click to enlarge or stretch the images to enlarge.)

This full-page ad for Olmec's original super hero action figure, Sun-Man, precedes the first page of the "Black Toys" article.

1st Page of the Article

The opening paragraph of the article reads:

In 1945, the only little girls who had Black dolls were those lucky enough to have mothers, grandmothers or aunts who could sew and make rag dolls. It was almost impossible to go into a store in the U.S. and buy a Black doll. The result was that Black girls had to content themselves with hugging and cuddling blonde dolls.

The captions for the photos on the first page of the article read: 

1) Today's Black girls can cuddle up to dolls that resemble them like the Sugar-n-Spice doll (above, l.), Huggy Bean (middle), Potpurri (foreground) and Little Tina (lying down).

2) "Sun-Man" series by Olmec Corp. (right) includes flexible heroic action figures designed specifically for the Black child.

2nd Page

The caption for the dolls on the second page of the article reads as follows:

Twins Keith and Keisha (left) are among the 30 Black dolls produced by the Keisha Doll Co. Keisha (foreground) sports a corn row hairstyle. Keith (rear) has an Afro.*

*The doll described as Keith in the caption above is actually a fashion doll by Tanline.

3rd Page

An embedded ad for Golden Ribbon Plaything's Huggy Bean and her pal Oni-Bean is on the final page of the article. 

Shown below is an ad for boy and girl Kotton Kandy Kid dolls. This ad appears several pages before the "Black Toys" article in this issue of Ebony. 

In 1985, Kotton Kandy Kid dolls could be ordered for $15 each plus shipping.

In addition to Black dolls, the "Black Toys" article discusses ride-on toys, board games, action figures, and other dolls and toys new to the market in 1985. Toys designed specifically for Black children and those who desired to purchase diverse playthings for their children were the focus of this article, which ends with the following statement.

Unlike Black children of 40 years ago, today's Black children needn't settle for dolls and games that ignore their heritage. 

 

Related Reading

Ashanti Keisha Joins Cleopatra Keisha

Huggy Bean Doll Company

©Black Doll Collecting/dbg

There are countless items to collect and write about. Black dolls chose me.

__________

Thank you for reading. Comments that are not spam are appreciated. Spam comments will not be published, so don't waste your time. To contact me directly regarding dolls or any of my posts, please use the contact form on the right of the home page, which is visible in "web view." A link to web viewing should be visible at the bottom of this page.

If you're not already a subscriber, visit, "like" and follow the Black Doll Collecting Facebook page or bookmark the Black Doll Collecting home page and visit on Tuesdays and Thursdays when typically new posts are published.

Check out what I am selling here. 
Check out my eBay listings here.
Please follow my sister blog Ebony-Essence of Dolls in Black.
*New*Visit/Follow DeeBeeGee's Virtual Black Doll Museum
Donate here to support this blog. Thank you!

A Child's Doll, Gifted Twice

The former childhood doll of Ellen Gordon was a c. 1965 Christmas gift from Ellen's sister.

Meet Elle. She is a 14-inch handmade cloth doll that was the former childhood doll of Ellen Gordon. Ellen sent me the following message through Facebook Messenger, which outlines the doll's history and how "Elle" (the doll's new name) became part of my personal collection. With Ellen's permission, I am allowed to share the pertinent parts of our messages.

Hi, Debbie! Been enjoying your posts for a couple of years now. Quick question - would you have any interest in a handmade doll made c. 1965? My sister sewed it for me when I was little. She's not a sophisticated and detailed beauty, like many of the beautiful dolls you post, but I think she has her own charm.

And she's reflective of an exciting and (sadly) unjustifiably optimistic time in history when we thought things were changing rapidly and irreversibly. Black dolls were really not available then, and one Christmas my sister decided to address that shortage with her gift to me.

…I am downsizing to move, and feel it's time to let go of my dolls - LOL! She was much loved, and I'd be thrilled if she could find a home with someone who would enjoy having her.

(Of course, I accepted the offer, but I informed Ellen that I would need to redress the doll before installing it in DeeBeeGee’s Virtual Black Doll Museum.) In hindsight, redressing the doll was not really necessary because of the sentiment the doll holds, but that has been done, and I enjoyed every second of thought that went into completing the redressing task.

My Reply:

Hi Ellen. Thank you for letting me know you've enjoyed my posts. I love the background story about the doll your sister so lovingly made for you. I would love to accept her, even though I am also in the process of downsizing. If I accept her for the museum, I'd have to dress her. If you don't mind my doing that, let me know. Did you name her?

Ellen’s reply:

OH, I'm so glad! It means a lot to me that she will have a good home, and others can enjoy her.

Good luck with your downsizing - it's a TON of work…

As to this doll's back story… when I was a child I thought (I suppose like all children) that most families were like mine. Later I realized how wrong I was.

I have to laugh a little at how stereotypical we were in some ways of mid-century liberal progressive Jewish families, but I am very grateful to my parents for ensuring we were raised with an awareness of a larger world.

My parents were both products of the radical Eastern European Jewish of the '20s and '30s. They were extremely vested in the anti-war movement, the civil rights movement, the protest against atomic testing (and the resulting Strontium 90 in cow's milk), etc. I attended my first march against the Viet Nam war in my stroller. I remember helping my mother make protest signs for other actions when I was about 4 or 5…

Anyway, I guess my fondness for this doll relates to her connection with an optimistic and energizing time, when it seemed that tremendous progress was being made (and indeed it was), and radical social transformation was just around the corner (sadly, it wasn't).

Plus she's very sweet - I think my sister (about 13 or 14 at the time) did a really good job embroidering her face!

I'd be thrilled to have you dress her properly - I have no idea where her clothes vanished to. She will arrive in the panties (I think also handmade by my sister for her) and vintage doll sweater and socks (not original to her) that she has lived in for the past 55 years.

And, sadly, as I sit here and look at the line up of my beloved childhood toys - about a dozen dolls and bears I've kept all these years - it disturbs me that I cannot remember ANY of their names. That seems odd to me, but maybe not. Each of them had an imagined personality, a soul, to me, and I remember those, which I suppose are more important than their names.

Am I a crazy old lady? Perhaps! But I'm delighted for this doll to have a new home!

Just let me know where to send her, and I'll ship early next week. Thank you SO much! And thank you for the important (and fun!) work you have done in assembling such a wealth of historic dolls and information on them.

Elle's Redressing

After Elle arrived, redressing ensued, was completed, and photographs were taken for this blog post and for DeeBeeGee’s Virtual Black Doll Museum. 

Elle was redressed in a floral-print pink dress and white lacey ankle socks. I added two pink ribbons to her hair.  She insisted on keeping on her handmade red silk panties, which I gladly permitted.

This close-up of Elle's lovely embroidered face illustrates her continued happy disposition.

There was no question that Elle would continue wearing the vintage pink sweater. The charming sweater is the reason the pink dress was chosen for her.

Elle's redressing was completed with the addition of white patent leather shoes.

I am thrilled to have Elle in my collection and as a permanent installation in DeeBeeGee’s Virtual Black Doll Museum even though as Ellen wrote, “She's not a sophisticated and detailed beauty, like many of the beautiful dolls you post, but I think she has her own charm.” I concur wholeheartedly.  

Thank you again, Ellen, for your willingness to part with Elle and for choosing me as her new human. She is truly a special gift that represents the important roles childhood dolls play as comforters, companions, confidantes, and secret keepers for the humans (young and old) who own them.

After 6 a.m. CST on 11/3/23, view/read Elle’s museum installation here.

 

©Black Doll Collecting/dbg

There are countless items to collect and write about. Black dolls chose me.

__________

Thank you for reading. Comments that are not spam are appreciated. Spam comments will not be published, so don't waste your time. To contact me directly regarding dolls or any of my posts, please use the contact form on the right of the home page, which is visible in "web view." A link to web viewing should be visible at the bottom of this page.

If you're not already a subscriber, visit, "like" and follow the Black Doll Collecting Facebook page or bookmark the Black Doll Collecting home page and visit on Tuesdays and Thursdays when typically new posts are published.

Check out what I am selling here. 
Check out my eBay listings here.
Please follow my sister blog Ebony-Essence of Dolls in Black.
*New*Visit/Follow DeeBeeGee's Virtual Black Doll Museum
Donate here to support this blog. Thank you!