page_title: Kewpie
section_title: German bisque: 1912–1915
hierarchical_section_title: Kewpie / Production / German bisque: 1912–1915
caption_attribution_description: English: The Kewpie dolls on display at the Ralph Foster Museum.
context_page_description: Kewpie is a brand of dolls and figurines that were conceived as comic strip characters by cartoonist Rose O'Neill. The illustrated cartoons, appearing as baby cupid characters, began to gain popularity after the publication of O'Neill's comic strips in 1909, and O'Neill began to illustrate and sell paper doll versions of the Kewpies. The characters were first produced as bisque dolls in Waltershausen, Germany, beginning in 1912, and became extremely popular in the early 20th century.
  The Kewpie dolls were initially made out of bisque exclusively, but composition versions were introduced in the 1920s, and celluloid versions were manufactured in the following decades. In 1949, Effanbee created the first hard plastic versions of the dolls, and soft rubber and vinyl versions were produced by Cameo Co. and Jesco between the 1960s and 1990s.
  The earlier bisque and composition versions of Kewpie dolls are widely sought-after by antique and doll collectors, who especially want those hand-signed by O'Neill. Kewpies should not be confused with the baby-like Billiken figures that debuted in 1908.
context_section_description: As demand for the Kewpie characters increased, Geo. Borgfeldt & Co. in New York contacted O'Neill in 1912 about developing a line of dolls and figurines. O'Neill agreed, and J.D. Kestner, a German toy company located in Waltershausen, set forth to manufacture small bisque dolls of the Kewpies. After the company manufactured the first run of dolls, they sent samples to O'Neill, who disapproved of the design because she felt they "did not look like her characters."
  O'Neill traveled to Germany and had the company destroy the moulds of the dolls, and oversaw the final redesign of them, working with a 17-year-old art student named Joseph Kallus. The dolls were then released in nine different sizes, ranging from 1 to 12 inches (25–305 mm) in height. These early Kewpies wore a heart-shaped decal on their chests, which read "Kewpie, Germany", and some had jointed arms. Many of these original German Kewpies were signed by O'Neill herself, and some were featured in various poses.
  The small dolls became an international hit, and by 1914, O'Neill had become the highest-paid female illustrator in the country, garnering a small fortune from the wild popularity of the dolls. The Kewpie brand soon became a household name, and was used widely in product advertising, including promotion for Jell-O, Colgate, Kellogg's Corn Flakes, and Sears. The Kewpies also appeared as a brand on a multitude of household items and other memorabilia, such as dishware, rattles, soap, pepper shakers, coloring books, poetry collections, and stationery.
  O'Neill also famously used the characters to promote the women's suffrage movement, using the illustrations in slogans and cartoons.
caption: Soldier-themed bisque Kewpies at the Ralph Foster Museum
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