“Since the beginning of time—since the first little girl ever existed—there have been dolls.” So proclaims Helen Mirren in the opening scene of Greta Gerwig’s summer blockbuster, Barbie. “But the dolls were always and forever baby dolls,” she says—that is, until Barbie came along. “Yes,” Mirren says, “Barbie changed everything.”
Twenty-seven years after Ruth Handler brought that iconic blonde into the world, another woman found herself fed up with baby dolls and Barbies. Pleasant Rowland, a newscaster turned educational product developer, thought girls deserved dolls that nurtured their interests beyond fashion and motherhood. In 1986, she created American Girl: a line of meticulously researched dolls, clothes, accessories, and books inspired by pivotal moments in American history. The brand was a hit. In its first four years, Rowland’s Pleasant Company turned a profit of $30 million.
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