NERD YOUR ENTHUSIASM (4)

By: Heather Cole
October 11, 2021

One in a series of 25 enthusiastic posts, contributed by 25 HILOBROW friends and regulars, on the topic of (one of) their nerdy obsessions.

AMERICAN GIRL

Somewhere in my parents’ stacks of old photos, there’s a shot of ten-year-old me on one night of Hanukkah in 1992. A burgundy box, two feet long, sits open on my lap, a bit of cream tissue paper peeking out. An expression of shock and rapturous joy is on my face.

I was a shy, imaginative kid, an insatiable reader fascinated by history (did other kids get excited to go to Civil War battlefields or obsess over details of the Salem witch trials)? I created elaborate, hours-long adventures in which I was an orphan immigrating to a new country or fighting injustice (always in a long dress, sometimes on an imaginary prairie).

When the American Girl Collection, a series of books and dolls corresponding to various significant periods of American history, appeared in the late 1980s, I was the perfect mark. The company mailed lush catalogs displaying $82 dolls dressed in period clothing. Detailed, high-quality accessories, each separately priced to make them seem affordable, accompanied each doll. Other girls wanted Barbie Dreamhouses; I wanted a $65 doll-sized pioneer trestle table and a tiny $50 hand-painted pottery set to go with it. My Kirsten doll sat patiently in her red calico school dress while I planned lessons using her miniature primer and practiced cursive on her tiny slate.

Eventually, I reluctantly abandoned playing with dolls in favor of what I viewed as more age-appropriate activities, and Kirsten was relegated to the back of my closet. I didn’t give too much thought to the significance the dolls and books had on my life until recently, when, bored during the pandemic, I downloaded TikTok, and like so many others, quickly found myself sucked in. Somehow, the scarily accurate “For You” page algorithm soon directed me to a curious new world – #AmericanGirlTok, where millions of viewers like and share videos of millennials expressing their love for the brand, critiquing the company’s new directions, and inventing new scenarios for their dolls. I started listening religiously to the American Girls Podcast, in which two historians, also my contemporaries, reread each book series, question choices made, and place the series in conversation with late 20th century popular culture. It’s revelatory to have a community that is both nostalgic for the experience the dolls provided but also critical of its accuracy and message.

And when it was safe to travel again, I visited my parents, and dug out my Kirsten doll and her bag of accessories. I wrapped her up in my suitcase and brought her home, where I changed her outfit and carefully rebraided her hair. I now scour Etsy and eBay for the exact issues of the catalogs I remember receiving. Going through them page by page has become meditative, calling back those feelings of longing and joy, contemplating a quaint and somewhat sanitized version of American history reproduced in exquisite miniature.

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MORE ENTHUSIASM at HILOBROW

NERD YOUR ENTHUSIASM (4)

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