“I get mixed reviews,” says Little Village resident Maggie Chavez, when people see her collection of nearly 200 Raggedy Ann and Andy dolls. Some are amazed at how many she has, but a lot of people just find them “terrifying.” Not Chavez: “I think they’re beautiful.”
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She started her collection five years ago, when she saw a doll in a resale shop. She was struck by its pretty dress and hair, and recalled the Raggedy Ann she played with as a kid back in the 70s.
Raggedy Ann has been around since 1915, when Johnny Gruelle, a children’s book illustrator from Arcola, Illinois, made a rag doll for his daughter Marcella. He began selling dolls and wrote a book called Raggedy Ann Stories, where, like in Toy Story, they came to life after their owner leaves the room. Ann even became the symbol of the antivaccination movement when Marcella died after getting a smallpox shot. Despite the doll’s long history, Chavez hasn’t met any other collectors.
