Ruth Handler

Ruth Handler
Ruth Marianna Handler (Mosko; November 4, 1916 – April 27, 2002) was an American businesswoman and inventor. She is best known for inventing the Barbie doll in 1959, and being co-founder of toy manufacturer Mattel with her husband Elliot, as well as serving as the company's first president from 1945 to 1975.
The Handlers were forced to resign from Mattel in 1975 after the Securities and Exchange Commission investigated the company for falsifying financial documents.
Early life
Ruth Marianna Mosko was born on November 4, 1916, in Denver, Colorado, to Polish-Jewish immigrants Jacob Moskowicz, a blacksmith, and Ida Moskowicz, née Rubenstein.
She married her high school boyfriend, Elliot Handler, and moved to Los Angeles in 1938, where she found work at Paramount.
Formation of Mattel
Elliot tried his hand at a hobby of furniture making. He decided to make their furniture out of two new types of plastics, Lucite and Plexiglas. Ruth Handler suggested that he start doing this commercially and they began a furniture business. Ruth Handler worked as the sales force for the new business, landing contracts with Douglas Aircraft Company and others.
Origin
Ruth saw the potential for an entrepreneurial endeavor. They went into partnership with Harold "Matt" Matson. They combined Matson's last name with Elliot's first name creating Mattel. According to Elliot, the founders could not fit Ruth's name into the name of the company. During World War II, furniture sales fell so Mattel began to manufacture toy furniture. The success of this business caused Ruth and Elliott to move Mattel fully into toy manufacturing.
Barbie
Ruth watched her daughter Barbara play with paper dolls, and noticed that she often enjoyed giving them adult roles. At the time, most children's toy dolls were representations of infants. Realizing that there could be a gap in the market, she suggested the idea of an adult-bodied doll to her husband Elliot. He was unenthusiastic about the idea, as were Mattel's directors.
During a trip to Europe in 1956 with her children Barbara and Kenneth, Ruth came across a German toy doll called Bild Lilli. The adult-figured doll was exactly what Ruth had in mind, so she purchased three of them. She gave one to her daughter and took the others back to Mattel. The Lilli doll was based on a popular character appearing in a satirical comic strip drawn by Reinhard Beuthin for the newspaper Bild. The Lilli doll was first sold in Germany in 1955, and although it was initially sold to adults, it became popular with children who enjoyed dressing her up in outfits that were available separately.
Upon her return to the United States, Ruth redesigned the doll (with help from local inventor-designer Jack Ryan), and the doll was given a new name, Barbie, after Handler's daughter Barbara. Premiering at the American International Toy Fair in New York City on March 9, 1959, Barbie was an instant success, with Mattel selling 351,000 dolls within a year.
Later, the Handlers and Mattel added a boyfriend for Barbie named Ken, after the Handlers' son, and many other characters in the brand’s lineup.
Later years
Handler was diagnosed with breast cancer in 1970. To combat this, she had a modified radical mastectomy, which was often used at the time to combat the disease. Due to difficulties in finding a good breast prosthesis, Handler decided to make her own. With the help of new business partner Peyton Massey, and under her new company Ruthton Corp., Handler manufactured a more realistic version of a woman's breast, called "Nearly Me". This invention became quite popular, and then-first lady Betty Ford was personally fitted for one.
Following several investigations of producing fraudulent financial reports, Handler resigned from Mattel in 1975. Investigations continued after her resignation, and, in 1978, Handler was charged with fraud and false reporting to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. She pleaded no contest, and was fined $57,000 and sentenced to 2,500 hours of community service. She blamed her illness for making her "unfocused" on her business.
Handler died in California from complications of surgery for colon cancer on April 27, 2002, aged 85. Her husband Elliot died nine years later at the age of 95.
In popular culture
Handler is portrayed by Rhea Perlman in the 2023 film Barbie, where she is depicted in her elder years as a spirit who resides at Mattel headquarters in Los Angeles and helps the protagonist, who is her stereotypical Barbie model (played by Margot Robbie).
References
Further reading
Forman-Brunell, Miriam. "Barbie in" LIFE": The Life of Barbie." Journal of the History of Childhood and Youth 2.3 (2009): 303-311. online
Gerber, Robin. Barbie and Ruth: The Story of the World's Most Famous Doll and the Woman Who Created Her. Harper/Collins, 2008.
Weissman, Kristin Noelle. Barbie: The Icon, the Image, the Ideal: An Analytical Interpretation of the Barbie Doll in Popular Culture (1999).
Wepman, Dennis. "Handler, Ruth" American National Biography (2000) online
External links
1916 births
2002 deaths
20th-century American inventors
American chief executives of manufacturing companies
American people of Polish-Jewish descent
American people convicted of fraud
American retail chief executives
American toy industry businesspeople
American women chief executives
Barbie
Burials at Hillside Memorial Park Cemetery
Businesspeople from Denver
Businesspeople from Los Angeles
Mattel people
Toy inventors
Women inventors
People convicted of making false statements