In honour of the solar eclipse today, we're looking at a doll that's very associated with the sun. She's Tuesday Taylor.
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| This is Suntan Tuesday Taylor in her original bathing suit cover up. |
Tuesday Taylor was made by ideal.
She was introduced in 1975.
She was produced until 1978.
This is regular Tuesday.
Other than having bendable arms and legs,Tuesday Taylor was a smaller version of Ideal's earlier doll, 19" Tiffany Taylor doll. The
most defining characteristic of both Tuesday and Tiffany is that they
have scalps that rotate, turning their hair from blonde to brown, and
back again.
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| This allows her to go from this... | | | |
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| ...to this. |
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| Or even this side part, if you don't turn the scalp all the way around. |
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| You can see from these pictures how much silkier regular Tuesday's hair is. The fiber is completely different. |
Mattel eventually stole this feature,but it took them a while. It finally appeared on the Jam N Glam Barbie and friends dolls in 2001,and was called their 'Twist N Turn hair feature'.
Tuesday has jointed elbows that are covered with a layer of rubber skin, jointed wrists,and click bend knees.
Both regular and Suntan Tuesday have rooted eyelashes.
In her three year run there were several different versions of Tuesday made. Beauty Queen Tuesday Taylor had straight legs, no rooted eyelashes,and blonde hair that was not attached to a rotating scalp. Super Model Tuesday Taylor also had painted lashes, and straight legs,and shorter,curly hair. There's a rare version of Tuesday that has a different shade of blonde hair.
In 1977 Ideal introduced Suntan Tuesday Taylor.
There's a slight difference in the colour of regular Tuesday and Suntan Tuesday's vinyl.
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| Suntan Tuesday,on the left, is slightly more 'tanned'. |
Her gimmick was that she 'tanned' in the sun.
Suntan Tuesday came with stickers that could be placed on her body. When the doll was placed in the sun for a few minutes, she 'tanned'. When the stickers were removed the area that had been covered was still the lighter shade.
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| I didn't have any stickers handy, so I laid one of her shoes on her leg and left her in the sun for a few minutes. I could see the slightest of differences, but it doesn't really show up in the photograph very well. |
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Her skin goes back to it's regular colour eventually. I might have had better success with the 'tanning' if we'd actually have had some sun today. It was fairly overcast even before the eclipse,and poured as soon as I finished Tuesday's photo shoot,which took place
after the eclipse. As for the eclipse itself, I was VERY disappointed! It gets darker when we have a storm! It barely got shady, although there was a weird yellowy colour to the shade that we had.
Tuesday's boyfriend Eric,who had been introduced earlier as a suit wearing fellow,and her sister Dodi,were also made in 'Suntan' versions. Suntan Eric came in an orange bathing suit.
Dodi was an update of Pepper's friend Dodi, from the Tammy doll line. You can see the commercial for Suntan Tuesday Taylor and friends
HERE.
Tuesday had a Summer/Winter Vacation House...
...as well as her own Penthouse Apartment.
She had fashions produced for her as well,including a set of Montgomery Wards exclusive outfits. I don't have any actual Tuesday Taylor clothes except her cover up, but these are about the right era. Anybody recognize them?
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| I think this one is a Barbie dress. Anybody? |
There was also an African American doll made. Her name was Taylor Jones. She had the same face as Tuesday, and the same rotating,hair changing scalp. Taylor Jones' hair changed from auburn to black. Taylor Jones is much harder to find than Tuesday.
Jewel's Doll Castle has a great page for reference on Tuesday Taylor and all her friends and outfits. You can go to her page
HERE. I have found another page I want to give you a link to.
THIS PAGE has a lot of great pictures of Tuesday's fashions and structures,plus it gives you a link to usable PDF files of McCall's patterns of clothes for Tuesday and other dolls.
We'll see more of Tuesday's line tomorrow.See you then.
