The motto for “Trivially Speaking” is “EIE” and not from “Farmer in the Dell” (EIEIO). Ours stands for “Educate, Inform, Entertain”. So 2 out of 3 is best. just kidding. We take humor seriously.
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To open my mind to creativity or at least ideas, I often listen to “old” (it’s all in my head) music when looking for a topic. Yesterday, on one of his special CDs of mine—yes, I’m still addicted to that technology—I listened to Perry his Como hit in 1958.
The record reached No. 6 on the Billboard charts and was Perry’s last Top 10 hit in 11 years. By the way, Ray Charles was an uncredited singer as a backup for the cut.
We are talking about “Kewpie dolls” here.
The song was written by Sid Tepper and Roy C. Bennett. They were based on the popular (early last century) Kewpie comic character created by Rose O’Neill (more on Rose later).
This is how Sid and Roy wrote:
“Well, I took my baby to the carnival/ And I heard that barker cry (hey!, hey!/ Come on,” get yourself a Purdy Kewpie doll/ If you All I have to do is ring the bell!./Well I swung the hammer hard/And you should have heard the thunderous applause… (Hurrah!)/Bon rang the bell. (Yeah, yeah!) I said, ‘Give me a doggie or a teddy bear/Or give me a high school banner on the wall / “Because I got a real live Kewpie doll, / and” she’s the cutest of them all.
Perry begins singing about the shooting range, where he attacks all five ducks, but still has the cutest duck, so he declines the toy doll.
On his third trip through the game arcade (pew-video), his date asked for a chance to topple and nail a wooden pyramid of milk bottles.
She then declines the Kewpie doll toy and sings, “I got a real Kewpie doll, and he’s the cutest of them all.”
So for women’s ribs in an era before it manifested, this is a great turning point. And for all we know, she could have been ringing the bell and knocking off the ducks and looking for a better date.
Let’s go back to the premise on which the song was composed.
Rose O’Neill came to New York City from the Midwest to work as a writer and illustrator.
In 1909, she conceptualized Kewpie as a cartoon for comic strips. The idea came about as a dream in which the little men looked like Cupid, named after the Roman god of love.
The comic first appeared in the December 1909 issue of the Ladies’ Home Journal.
Rose described the character as “a sort of round pixie whose idea is to teach people to be cheerful and kind at the same time”. Today is a challenge.
Encouraged by her Kewpie, Rose began illustrating and selling paper doll versions of little boys.
The next step was to develop a line of dolls and figures, and a German toy company tried to do just that. Rose disapproved of the initial run because she felt that “she didn’t look like her character”.
To make sure the released dolls were to her liking, she traveled to Germany. She had the company destroy the molds they made and oversaw the final redesign, after which they released her new dude in nine different sizes.
Each of these has a heart-shaped decal on the chest, and Rose has signed some of them (making them more valuable to future collectors).
Cupies became a worldwide hit.
Within five years, Rose O’Neill was America’s highest-paid female illustrator.
Her Kewpie brand has become a “household name” and has been used in promotions for Colgate (smiling like a Kewpie?), Sears, Kellogg’s Cornflakes and Jell-O.
Rose was a hit when Kewpie appeared on rattles, soaps, pepper shakers, tableware, and stationery (on a hilarious, kind note).
Things went well and Archduke Franz Ferdinand was shot (and in the chest) in Sarajevo.
The Germans decided war was the good answer, and the war to end all wars – just kidding – began.
Germany was not the right place to produce bisque kewpie. They were not designed to be kind and cheerful at the same time to the troops in the trenches.Thus, production was moved to the United States
All of these kewpies included jointed arms (suitable for hugs).
In the mid-1920s, small celluloid Kewpie appeared. These were given out as prizes at carnivals.
We go back to where we started with, “Now that we have a real, living Kewpie doll, she’s the cutest of all Kewpie dolls.” It’s a fun song, perfect for the kinder, more cheerful times.
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