If you had a really cool, really rich, toy-loving grandmother, her attic might look something like the one-room toy exhibit, “Our World in Miniature: Trains, Dollhouse and Other Miniatures.” Of course, the History Museum is probably better lit.
I began walking around the History Museum’s look at last century’s toys feeling pretty young. Upon entering, it became apparent that the majority of what was on display was from an era at least few decades gone, making it seem as though the ’80s happened just last spring. Staring into a display case at Mattel items from the 60s you might hear from the elderly couple standing next to you reminisce, “A ‘Poor Pitiful Pearl Doll,’ remember that?” “Yeah and my brother Pete had a Tonka like that.”
According to the Missouri Historical Society, “During our time of economic and political uncertainty, this exhibit explores and celebrates the innocence and comfort of toys.” Personally, I think the whole overplayed “wake of 9/11″ story is just an excuse. Come on, they’re toys: we didn’t need a reason to play with them, they don’t need a reason to display them.
The exhibit is made up of pieces from mainly three collectors. Of her 270 doll collection, Rosie Davis-Jones donated all types and makes of dolls from the mid-twentieth century forward. In her death, toy collector Clara Drefs left MHS three large dolls’ houses with furnishings and numerous pieces of miniature scale doll furniture. The late C.C. Johnson Spink is responsible for the majority of the Lionel trains in the show.
In addition to dolls and trains, there are various odds and ends from our childhoods and the childhoods of our parents such as the bucket of little green soldiers and the Fisher Price Zoo Scene.
Toys reflect a lot about a culture. In generations past, young lads found pleasure in vrooming plastic trucks back and forth along the floor or off the backs of couches if they wanted to get off-road. Now they are hardly satisfied until they ram a tank through a couple of police cars on their Playstation IIs. The idea of playing with the 1901 one-room log cabin is inconceivable to a little girl whose room is cluttered with the all the luxuries Barbie needs to make her anatomically impossible existence more bearable. The violent and materialistic America we all love and support is obvious in the crap covering our youngsters’ floors.
Not that our generation is alone in being flawed. An 1890 Empire Style dollhouse includes dolls that look as boring and rigid as the people must have felt. The Humpty Dumpty Circus, an amazing one-ring arena about the size of a bicycle wheel, includes among its contents of animals, clowns, and buckets “1 hobo, [and] 1 negro dude” for your circusing pleasure. Apparently an idle shiftless wandering workman, ranking scarcely above the tramp, and a representation of an oppressed race were great fun in the early 1900s.
To be fair, there is a certain serenity to the majority of the exhibit that is completely absent walking down aisle 2 at Kay-bee Toys. It is nice to imagine a young girl getting lost in the pleasures of the three-foot-tall three-story 1870 dollhouse that truly does belong in a museum for its craftsmanship. The numerous models of warplanes on display seem almost peaceful. Coming across what must be the complete collection of Thomas the Tank Engine stories and a Corduroy Bear book was also tickling.
In the end, I wanted more. The exhibit could have been larger. It takes about a half an hour to circle the whole room and by that time you are so caught up in the simplicity of childhood that you do not want to leave and come home to Statistics homework. My other complaint is more serious: the exhibit displays Operation, by and large the most annoying game ever to be invented. I saw it and was immediately reminded of the frustration of steadying my hand in order to grab that damn wishbone without getting that ear-wrenching “aaannnntt” from touching the red-nosed bastard’s metal skin. Who wants to remember that? As far as I am concerned, every one of them should be thrown in a big trashcan and burned.
“Our World in Miniature: Trains, Dollhouses and Other Miniatures” will be at the Missouri History Museum at the intersection of Lindell and DeBalivere through from now until January 21st. The museum is open 7 days a week from 10am to 6pm (8pm on Tuesday). Admission is free.

Popularity: 1% [?]

 Print This Post

This entry was posted on Tuesday, October 29th, 2002 at 12:00 pm and is filed under Cadenza. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.