Doll:Alice

In the early 20th century, toy makers introduced dolls based on characters from history and popular children's books as a way to promote reading and gender-neutral doll play. Martha Chase began making her story character dolls in 1905 when she offered several figures from Lewis Carroll's "Alice in Wonderland" based on illustrations done for the book by Sir John Tenniel. The Chase set owned by The Strong includes Alice, the Mad Hatter, the Dutchess, the Frog Footman, and Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum. The niece of a Chase employee donated the set to the museum.