Kewpie and Margie Had the Same Dad
Question: My 75-year-old mother still has one of her childhood dolls. It is a 10-inch girl doll with a composition head and jointed wooden body. The red label on her chest reads: “Margie, Des. & Copyright by Jos. Kallus.” Can you tell us who Joseph Kallus is and what the doll is worth?
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Answer: Joseph L. Kallus collaborated with illustrator Rose O’Neill to create the famous Kewpie doll based on O’Neill’s drawings. In 1922, Kallus founded the Cameo Doll Co. in Port Allegheny, Pa. By the late 1920s, Cameo had started making dolls like your mother’s using elastic-strung wooden segments. The Margie doll was made in 1929. It is valued at $225.
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Q I recently inherited a Queen Anne-style dining room set from my grandparents. It includes a table, six chairs, a china cabinet and a buffet. I know my grandmother reupholstered the chairs with her needlepoint. The rest of the furniture is original and in excellent condition. The metal tags inside the drawers read, “Landstrom Furniture 1879 Rockford, Ill.” Is that the year the furniture was made?
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AYour furniture was made in the late 1920s. The Landstrom Furniture Corp. reproduced several styles popular in America in the mid-18th century, including Queen Anne, Sheraton and Chippendale. The company used solid wood and wood veneers. The decorations on the furniture were pressed, not carved. The 1879 date in the trademark may refer to the year the company was founded. Your table is worth about $1,000, your buffet and cabinet $500 each, and your chairs $75 each.
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Q My dull-beige vase is marked “Redlands Pottery.” It has been in our family for several generations, but we still don’t know anything about it.
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A The Redlands Art Pottery worked in Redlands, Calif., from about 1902 to about 1909. It was started by Wesley H. Trippett. Many of the pieces were not glazed.
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