By A. Glenn Mandeville
The Ideal Toy Company was ready for another hit when it released the Toni doll. In the 1930s, the company manufactured not only the mega-hit Shirley Temple doll, but also the popular Deanna Durbin dolls and Judy Garland dolls in both child- and teen-star versions. Ideal was at the forefront of licensing, which today is the way to do business. It also advertised on television and sponsored many children’s shows, mainly in the New York viewing area.
By the late 1940s, manufacturing was about to enter a new phase as hard plastic evolved as the way to make virtually indestructible dolls. Ideal’s aim for its new plastic doll was to figure out a way to make a doll wig that could be washed and curled.
Ideal started by calling on sculptor Bernard Lipfert, well-known among doll manufacturers as the designer of almost every favorite doll. Lipfert delivered a perfect little-girl doll that could withstand hours of play.
Before the wig problem could be tackled, Ideal needed to obtain a license from the Gillette Company, which had just purchased The Toni Company — the Toni name had become synonymous with home permanents thanks to its wildly successful “Which twin has the Toni?” ad campaign. The association made the Toni name perfect for a doll designed for hair styling.
The mohair wigs used on most dolls in the late 1940s couldn’t withstand the rigors of repeated combing and curling. The Toni doll concept required the development of a new fiber, so Ideal went to the Du Pont Corporation to see what it could do with the concept. At first Du Pont hesitated to spend time on developing a doll’s wig, but researchers soon became intrigued with the project. After many hurdles, one of the best doll wigs, made of nylon exclusively for Ideal, adorned one of the most beautiful dolls manufactured to date.
Ideal was ready to put the Toni doll to the test. Several thousand orders had been placed. The doll would be dressed mainly in little-girl cotton dresses, most with an organdy pinafore. However, following the practice common to every other toy company, Ideal used up whatever was on hand for clothing.
It’s been reported that some early Toni dolls wore fashions made from leftover Shirley Temple doll dresses. An astute collector has spotted Deanna Durbin fabric used in several Toni fashions. But these aren’t the only rare and unusual dresses. All the dresses shown here are tagged with the Ideal Toni label and all are in mint condition. The company didn’t assign names or stock numbers to Toni dresses, so the Ideal label is important in identifying the fashions. We present them here for your enjoyment and to help collectors determine whether a dress they may have is a Toni fashion.
The final chapter in the story of rare Tony fashions is that only the strung dolls made from 1949 to 1954 have many fashion variations. Ideal issued Toni as a walker in a few fashions. None of the dresses from the entire Toni line were ever sold separately. Since there were no fashion booklets for any of the Toni dolls, collectors must rely on the tag. Since many children cut off the tag, collectors must look closely at the seams for remnant stitches.
In Toni, Ideal made one of the most-loved dolls in history, with a name that collectors fondly remember. These rare and hard-to-find fashions highlight the quality and craftsmanship of a great toy manufacturer.
A. Glenn Mandeville is the author of numerous books on dolls and doll collecting and writes his Curious Collector column for each issue of DOLLS magazine.
