Click here for Barbie facts. It was Ruth Handler , the co-founder of Matel, who invented Barbie. Handler, who named the doll after her daughter, starts her day Tuesday by ringing the opening bell at the New York Stock Exchange. The doll was an instant hit, with 350,000 sold the first year. Today, the dolls are bought worldwide at a rate of two every second.
Collectors snap up special editions as soon as they hit the shelves.
Barbie will even be featured on a stamp, part of the U.S. Postal Service's commemoration of 20th-century landmarks. But while she's still on top, Barbie sales have been sliding. With her humanly impossible measurements, high-heeled feet and life of constant glamour, Barbie took some flak from critics who said she encouraged unrealistic expectations of young women. The company took those complaints to heart, scaling back her curves and giving her a more athletic physique. Her boosters say that will keep her going into the millennium.