The YouTube algorithm has been entertaining me with clips from Pawn Stars episodes recently. I have watched episodes about Beatles memorabilia, an amazing vintage plane, and a poker cheat’s tools from the 1920s. The sellers can offer personal and historical context to the objects if they are well-documented or family heirlooms. However, we can only imagine the sights and sounds the item has been privy to over the decades.
During my college years, I had the privilege to live in a historic campus dorm known as “The Dow House.” Students affectionately called it “The Paul House” in a nod to its onetime owners. This two-story Victorian home was a fascinating collection of rooms, many of which were covered in layers of wallpaper. Before my junior year, my family received permission from the college to repaint and redecorate some of the main rooms. During our wallpaper-scraping spree, we discovered a company name and date from 1920 penciled on the wall behind layer No. 3. If only these walls could talk!
Author Rachel Field plays upon the desire for intimate details about an old space well in her Newberry Award-winning book, Hitty: Her First Hundred Years. This beloved children’s book follows a small wooden doll from her creation and beginnings in early-1800s Maine up through her arrival at an antiques store in mid-1900s New York.
Field creates a magical portrayal of the titular doll. Hitty, short for the biblical name “Mehitabel,” has a distinct voice that is amusing, disappointed, and indignant in turn. She weathers many storms, both literally and figuratively, and is held dear by quite a few owners, never passing too much judgment on any and painting the portrait and character of each in interesting terms.
The tale balances a doll-sized view of the world with major historical changes. During her first adventure on a whaling boat, we learn about the mighty trade and dangerous lifestyle surrounding the production of whale oil. Over the decades, she observes the effects of the Civil War, is held by Charles Dickens during one of his U.S. visits, has a poem written about her by John Greenleaf Whittier, hears Adelina Patti sing, has her daguerreotype taken, rides a train, and gets tossed out of an automobile.
While the historical aspects of the story are interesting, what fascinates readers are the twists and turns in Hitty’s life, the winding ways through which she passes from one owner to the next that are highly plausible. Toys are constantly being lost amid cushions, hidden in attics, dropped into the ocean, or mailed to the wrong addresses.
It’s actually these twists and turns that keep the book from becoming a series of vignettes and instead make it one cohesive whole. While Hitty stays with her first owner for a fair amount of time, we quickly learn that this petite doll (or any toy, really) in the hands of a small child is apt to be misplaced, and we are primed to expect her adventures. Each of these, from the whaling disaster to a jaunt in India to a stint in a lost-letters office, are both logical and amusing. Logical, because her path unfolds in a practical way; and amusing, because it pokes gentle fun at human beings and our inability to stay organized and keep track of our belongings. Through it all, while Field includes famous appearances and events, she keeps the focus on Hitty by giving us descriptions of her various outfits over the years (my favorite details) and the quirky locations where only a small doll could fit and in which Hitty often finds herself.
Creative scenes, a witty protagonist, historical information, and much more await the curious reader upon opening this charming book. If you’re lucky enough to find an old copy, revel in the musty smell and think briefly about the countless other hands that have held it and the numbers of eyes that eagerly read those words. Settle back, and prepare to be swept away on a doll-sized tale spanning years and continents.
