We all have our preferences, presuppositions, and favorites; the subjects, outlooks, and topics that we gravitate to again and again. That’s why I love randomness. It’s a tool I use frequently to challenge my own inherent biases in my work here at The Strong. I know that if I just follow my interests, my work will too often flow in the same channels. So sometimes I use a random number generator to call up a random artifact from our collection […]
Search by Category
I Hate Mondays: Exploring the Garfield Franchise
It’s 1995. I’m 4 years old, in my pajamas, planted in front of my television. In the VCR is a VHS tape with a recording of the 1987 A Garfield Christmas special. A Garfield stuffed animal (also in his pajamas) is within reach. Cut to a Sunday morning with my grandmother. At the kitchen table, she sits with her instant coffee reading the “funnies.” Populating the newspaper page are the likes of Cathy, Dilbert, Peanuts and, of course, Garfield. It’s […]
Continue Reading about I Hate Mondays: Exploring the Garfield Franchise
Collecting “Peanuts” Playthings
In the fall of 1950, Charles Schultz’s first Peanuts comic strip ran in the daily newspapers. The comic centered on the disenchanted figure of Charlie Brown and a cast of characters with realistic faults and deep observations about daily life. Schultz introduced Charlie Brown’s dog, Snoopy, in the third comic strip. Snoopy first won my heart during a meet and greet at Knott’s Berry Farm in California. I was four years old. Now, a few decades later, I understand how […]
Would You Like a Toy with That?
What’s the Big Deal About Fast Food Toys?
As an oldest child with a busy lifestyle, a calendar full of homework, dance classes, theatre rehearsals, voice lessons, Girl Scouts, choir, and sometimes Model UN or Math League, convenience and time efficiency were key in my childhood. My 25-minute commute to dance made me a frequent flyer at the McDonald’s that allowed me sufficient time to finish my food before we reached the studio. My meal of choice never wavered: a hamburger […]
Women’s History Month: Celebrating Five Women in Toys and Dolls
The Education Task Force of Sonoma County Commission on the Status of Women held a “Women’s History Week” celebration to correspond with International Women’s Day in 1978. The movement spread and, in 1987, Congress passed Public Law 100-9, which designated March as Women’s National History Month. Despite these initiatives, I have no memory of special celebrations or lessons on women’s contributions to history while growing up in public schools in the 1980s and 1990s. In a note to her readers, […]
Continue Reading about Women’s History Month: Celebrating Five Women in Toys and Dolls
Problems with Plastic Toys
By: Alexander Parry, 2025 Strong Research Fellow
In December 2021, TIME journalist Emily Barone published an editorial about the conflict between her and her children over plastic toys. Barone explained her misgivings about the sea of “eco-terrible plastic junk” available to kids and wondered how to reconcile her environmentalism with the shelf appeal of colorful, heavily-advertised, and often battery-powered toys. These cheap and flimsy items, Barone observed, were nearly impossible to recycle, contributing to air and water pollution and to the […]
Green with Envy
What are your thoughts about amphibians? Maybe that segment of the animal world hasn’t crossed your mind recently, but I’ve been noticing a surprising number of frogs around The Strong museum’s collection. Frogs have been cropping up in children’s stories for centuries now, from “The Frog Prince,” a German fairy tale collected by the Brothers Grimm and published in 1812 to more recent books, such as Arnold Lobel’s story Frog and Toad Are Friends (1970), which offers readers a couple […]
Slime Oozes into the National Toy Hall of Fame
I experience many emotions when my young kids ask to make slime. I usually greet their requests with enthusiasm before quickly dissolving into panic as I watch the glue, shaving cream, glitter, and bingsu beads stick to various surfaces around the room. Slime is an extension of an established chemical process. When sodium tetraborate (borax) combines with guar gum or polymers, it turns into a gelatinous substance that can be stretched, squeezed, broken apart, and molded back together. When the […]
Continue Reading about Slime Oozes into the National Toy Hall of Fame
Piled-up Poufs, Backcombing, and Crimping: Barbie’s Hair
With thanks to a generous museum donor, Robin H. Wyatt, I was able to join more than 850 collectors who came together at the 2025 National Barbie Doll Collectors Convention held in Louisville, Kentucky. The theme for the event was ICON Barbie: A Fashion Original. While at the convention, I presented on The Strong’s Barbie collection. My presentation highlighted Barbie dolls from the 1960s through the 1990s who reflect the criteria of National Toy Hall of Fame inductees: icon-status, longevity, […]
Continue Reading about Piled-up Poufs, Backcombing, and Crimping: Barbie’s Hair
