Doll-A-Day 2019 #199: Matty Mattel and Sister Belle

  My neck is a little sore today,but not too bad. It almost hurts more from my stretched neck muscles,(from having my head laid back so far while they did the biopsy,),than the needle punctures The bruise isn't as bad as last time either.

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  Today's dolls are a cute little girl and boy.

He's Matty Mattel.

And she's Sister Belle.

Matty was Mattel's advertising mascot from 1955 to the early 70's.

From 1961 to 1963 Matty and Belle hosted a Sunday morning cartoon show called "Matty's Funday Funnies". The show included cartoons of Casper the Friendly Ghost and Beany and Cecil,all of which were also produced as dolls by Mattel. (You can see my post on Casper HERE.and my post on Beany HERE. And of course, in between the cartoons kids saw commercials for Mattel products.The Matty and Belle dolls appeared in 1961.

They measure about 17 inches tall,but of course, they can't stand unsupported. Both Matty and Sister Belle use the same head sculpt as...GULP!...Casper the Ghost!

"You never know what we'll say next." Well, we kind of do, because you only have certain sayings.(Ok,so you don't know what order they'll be in.)

 I've said it before, but Casper is kind of like the ghost of Matty Mattel! (You can see my post on Casper HERE.)
Matty and Sister Belle are talking dolls.
  

Her box REALLY wanted you to know that.

The box front manages to mention talking FOUR separate times!

The reason Mattel was so keen to push the talking aspect was because Casper,Matty,and Belle were their first talking dolls after the wildly successful Chatty Cathy,who had debuted the year before. You can watch a commercial for all three dolls HERE. All three dolls said 11 phrases, and were all voiced by legendary voice actress June Foray. June was also the original voice of Chatty Cathy,as well as a multitude of cartoon characters like Cindy Lou Who, Frosty the Snowman's Karen, George of the Jungle's Ursula, Mulan's Grandma Fa, Bullwinkle's friend Rocky the Squirrel,Tweety Bird's owner Granny, and Bugs Bunny's occasional nemesis Witch Hazel. June Foray passed away in 2017, just a few months short of her 100th birthday.
Matty and Belle are operated by pull strings on their necks.

It's really just the bottom of their hard plastic heads. The heads contain their talking mechanism.

 

They have firmly stuffed cloth bodies.

Matty's original owner decided her was Super Matty.

Matty is a little rough. He's also missing his red and white striped shirt,because my son really wanted Matty. I let him keep Matty and while he had him he changed Matty's clothes. The shirt has never reappeared, but these are his original shorts.

They have faint little stripes.

His shoes aren't removable.

He originally had a crown too. It kind of looked a Jughead style pork pie hat,but it was supposed to be a crown.The top of the crown resembled the jagged edges of the Mattel logo he appeared on.
  I got Sister Belle when Emma worked at Goodwill. She called me one evening while she was at work to let me know Belle had been put out for sale. I popped over and bought her. (Belle that is, not Emma.)

Belle has a red cloth body and a removable apron,with real pockets.

Her shoes aren't removable either.
 

 They also don't really unbutton at the sides. One of them has just come unsewn.
Matty was resurrected in 1979,when he began appearing on Mattel product packaging,calling attention to the product hotline number. Later he was used for a site called Mattycollector.com,which sold action figures for adult collectors. That version of Matty was grown and looked a bit grouchy and threatening.

Belle never reappeared.

    Those are today's dolls. I hope you'll come back tomorrow for more.