bowes doll and carriage display at heritage

Heritage Farm Museum Adds New Doll Exhibit

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On September 11, the Heritage Farm Museum and Village in Harveytown, WV, held a grand opening for the Bowes Doll & Carriage Collection.

“This collection reminds us that not everyone lived in log cabins,” says Heritage Farm founder Mike Perry, “and that we had entrepreneurs who risked everything they had to open country stores, grist mills, sawmills, ferries, lumber and coal businesses, and railroads. Their homes and clothes and toys reflected that enterprise.”

Grounds of the Heritage Farm Museum and Village.
Grounds of the Heritage Farm Museum and Village.

The Bowes Doll & Carriage Collection has been three years in the making and is located above the compound’s children’s museum. It houses dozens of dolls, handmade or collected by Connie Bowes of Charleston, presented in a range of period costumes and displays. The exhibits, with themes that range from family life to outdoor activities, also feature many antique baby and doll carriages that have been restored by Connie and her husband Don Bowes.

“We initially started to collect dolls,” says Don Bowes.

“I think of the clothes that mother made, and dresses that maybe I had as a little girl that my grandparents made—grandmother made a crochet dress for me, or mother embroidered a dress—I frequently think of that and try to recreate that,” says Connie.

“I have run into people in this day and age, many ladies, who’ve never owned a doll. The family didn’t have the income to support the luxury of dolls and carriages way back. That’s another reason why people today love the dolls so much. The older women love the dolls. They did not have them and they cherish them for what they were.

“Most of the dolls initially going in the carriages were dolls that I made. Then I got into a few antique dolls and occasionally an artist doll. So what we will now have is a collection of a variety of types of dolls.

“It’s the expression on the little faces! There are so many kinds of dolls: there are little play dolls, and there are beautiful porcelain ladies; whatever appeals to you if you’re interested in collecting.

final doll setting for Heritage Farm doll exhibit

“It became more fascinating as I went on. When I entered my first doll for international competition and won a ribbon for Best of Category, I thought ‘I want a carriage for that doll!’ So on the way home from New York I said to Don, ‘Could we please stop at antique stores and find a carriage?’

“Carriages fascinate me,” says Don, “because they are so unique, there is so much ingenious work in them. And then the artistry that goes into weaving the baskets and things. I guess my engineering background makes me say ‘Gee, this is really kind of a clever thing to have. These things change over time, and there are eras in our history — politically, socially — and the carriages changed with that.

“They didn’t start making doll carriages until about 1890. They did it with leftover materials, and the people who sold wicker rattan started to make a few for their kids. By about 1900 that really took off.

“Mike and Henriella Perry came up to visit us about 4 years ago. He approached us and said, ‘Look: what are you going to do with all those dolls and carriages?’ Anyway, he said, ‘I’d like to expand.’ So we said, ‘Ok, we can do that, we can put in a few dolls and carriages.’ We sat down at a table and drew out in the dust a design of what we might do, and decided to locate in the building that we’re now using. We started in with a basic design, and started building.”

“We hope people in the future will truly look forward to seeing them, viewing them, and enjoying the handwork, the restoration of the carriages and the collection of the dolls at the Heritage Farm Museum,” says Connie.

What's in the Doll and Carriage Museum?

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