Once Upon a Christmas: Memories of Victorian Toys and Decorations

Memories of Victorian Toys and Decorations

It is very early on the morning of December 25, just before the turn of the century. The children of the house have awakened to the delightful aromas of Christmas, including the fragrance of freshly cut evergreens. Within minutes they are downstairs, standing before a Christmas tree sparkling with the light of many small candles clipped to its branches. Theirs is, in the custom of the late Victorian years, a "gaudy tree," laden with what Charles Dickens once described as "everything, and more." There are strings of popcorn and berries, lace cornucopias filled with marzipan and nuts, silk flags, paper chains, gingerbread cookies and gilded apples and pine cones. On the higher branches are colored blown-glass ornaments, fragile bulbs as light as air, strung with crimped wire. Some resemble hot air balloons; others suggest sailboats with tiny Santa Clauses tucked inside. Below are bits of printed paper and tinsel (made by the children themselves), wax angels with spunglass wings, and "Dresdens," intricate three-dimensional figures of embossed cardboard named for the area of Germany where they were made. High above all, presiding in splendor over the tree, is an angel with a delicate china head and foil wings that reflect the dancing light of the candles below. The tree is dazzling, but it holds the children's attention for only a few moments-until they see what lies beneath its branches. There is an ark, hand-carved and painted by German craftsmen, with more than a hundred wooden animals waiting in pairs to join Noah and his family inside. (The ark, a "Sunday toy," will be used to illustrate Bible lessons.) Near it, for the boys, is a box of Richter's building blocks, red German-made Santas (OPPOSITE PAGE) are mostly of Victorian vintage, except for the long-bearded fellow at center, who dates from the 1930s. The largest, a 17-inch Kris Kringle, is plaster over papier-mâché, with a fur beard. The white-robed figure carrying a goose-feather tree is Father Christmas, ca. 1890-1910. Only the kitchen plate display rack has been added to the German dollhouse (BELOW); even the wallpaper and floors are original. House and furnishings were made between 1860 and 1890. TOYS FROM THE COLLECTION OF BONNIE MCCREARY

A little wooden cart behind a cloth horse (TOP), a pull-toy on tin wheels, delighted a child about 1910. The circus figures on these two pages were produced between 1903 and 1920 by the A. Schoenbut Company, part of the Philadelphia firm's renowned "Humpty Dumpty Circus." Most are carved, painted wood; the horse's rider has a bisque bead.

and blue pieces of stone that have been cut into odd shapes and sizes, the smallest no larger than a cube of sugar. For the girls, there is an ornate dollhouse complete with tiny pieces of furniture; and for the little ones, a "velocipede," a fine wooden horse equipped with three wheels, a mount that will be much loved and much abused by its new owners.

But the most wonderful surprise of all stands gracefully to one side, placed carefully out of the way of the wax that drips from the candles on the tree. She is from France. Through vivid blue eyes, she stares languidly at the children as they draw near. Her hair is long and blond, and her features, finely formed Of bisque, look as flawless and soft as the petals of a white rose. Her body is not that of a child but of a woman. It is made of soft leather, and her fingers bend to hold her hairbrush, her parasol, or the leash of her pet dog. Her accessory trunk, which sits just under the branches of the Christmas tree, is full of silk and satin gowns, petticoats, corsets, jewelry, hairbrushes with ivory backs, purses, fans, lace handkerchiefs-whatever a Victorian lady might require.

The children will play with the "fashion doll" under the scrutiny of their mother, and the aristocratic beauty will be cared for as few toys are. She will spend each night tucked carefully away on a shelf or in her case, leaving to the rag dolls her very distant cousins the duty of passing the hours under a crazy quilt, clutched in the arms of a sleeping little girl.

Sadly, most of the toys and ornaments that graced that longago Christmas morning have disappeared, only a few to be rediscovered in museums and private collections. Over the years, the blue-eyed doll probably has lost her original clothes, her leather shoes, and the earrings for her pierced ears. But if she is very lucky, she has found new gowns in the home of someone like Bonnie McCreary, whose house is a tribute to Victoriana. McCreary has spent the last 15 years acquiring period furniture and dishes. Five years ago, when she moved to Scottsdale from Omaha, Nebraska, she began collecting Victorian toys and ornaments. "I had never seen these wonderful things before," she says. "You look at them, and you cannot help but fall in love with them." During the last year, McCreary has furnished, piece by piece, a Victorian dollhouse. Among its antique accoutrements: brass chandeliers and sconces, a sterling silver tea set, embroidered linen towels, a tin stove (with a mouse hiding beneath it), a tiny bread rack, lace curtains, a ring of old-fashioned keys dangling from a minuscule nail in the kitchen doorframe, and a tray full whose house is a tribute to Victoriana. McCreary has spent the last 15 years acquiring period furniture and dishes. Five years ago, when she moved to Scottsdale from Omaha, Nebraska, she began collecting Victorian toys and ornaments. "I had never seen these wonderful things before," she says. "You look at them, and you cannot help but fall in love with them." During the last year, McCreary has furnished, piece by piece, a Victorian dollhouse. Among its antique accoutrements: brass chandeliers and sconces, a sterling silver tea set, embroidered linen towels, a tin stove (with a mouse hiding beneath it), a tiny bread rack, lace curtains, a ring of old-fashioned keys dangling from a minuscule nail in the kitchen doorframe, and a tray full of tiny knives, forks, and spoons.

Near the dollhouse, McCreary keeps a collection of papier-mâché Santa Clauses with ruddy faces and fur beards, as well as a German "feather tree,' made of goose feathers dyed green and wrapped around wire limbs. Feather trees, imported for Christmas during the late years of the 19th century, look forlorn until ornaments are hung from their branches.

"It makes all the difference," says Sandy Kralovetz, a collector of Christmas antiques. Kralovetz hopes to display one of her own feather trees with period ornaments this holiday season at the Rosson House, a restored Victorian home in downtown Phoenix.

Christmas trees and glass ornaments soared in popularity during the Victorian years, only then becoming an American tradition. Blown-glass decorations first were brought in from Germany during the 1870s. In the fall of 1880, an importer offered such ornaments to a young dime-store merchant named F. W. Woolworth, who disdainfully agreed to purchase $25 worth. They sold out in two days. Within a decade Woolworth was ordering-and selling-some 200,000 blown-glass ornaments each year.

Today, such antiques bring back warm memories of holiday seasons long ago, when children awoke on Christmas morning to the sight of a fir tree aglow with candlelight.

"The old ornaments and toys help us imagine the people who owned them, what they did with them, where they kept them," says Mary Doley of Scottsdale, who collects dolls and their accessories. "It's very rare that you'll find a doll with its original trunk and clothing, but if you do, you'll usually come upon something that tells you about its original owner.

"I found a pair of miniature doll gloves once, and tucked inside one of them was a yellowed piece of paper. Written on it was a little girl's name, the name of the uncle who gave the doll to her, and the date. I could picture the day, the whole scene. And that's the real fun of it."