Mad Doll Doctor

I have here a 20″ 327 AM bisque doll. The head is missing its sleep eyes. They haven’t merely come loose, they are gone. The pate and wig are gone as well. I know she had sleep eyes because one side of her eye plaster is still in place. (See picture) Also, these types of dolls usually had sleep eyes.

I have almost twenty pairs of large antique rocker eyes pieces and wouldn’t you know, not one set will fit this head, so I have decided to make a set.

Rocker eyes are put together in a T shape, (see picture)

with the two eyes at the top and a bar and weight in the center, so I begin by building my “T”. I happen to have a box full of old weights, but if I did not I could use a fishing lure weight for smaller eyes, pinched around the piece of wire.

I will be using two old matching German blown glass eyes. I never, NEVER use plastic or acrylic (blasphemy!!) eyes on antique dolls. NEVER, NEVER, NEVER!

I begin by making the rocker shape from wire. Bend the ends of the wire, (the bar at the top of the T) inward, they should point dead center into the dolls eye sockets…(see picture)

This wire is fairly heavy, but not so heavy it is terribly difficult to bend. It is not anywhere near as heavy as say, a lightweight coat hanger, more like the wire in a spiral notebook. I twist my top T piece around the piece with the lead weight.

The wire with the weight should be doubled and twisted together. You can tell how long the wire with the weight should be by looking inside the doll head.

You can usually see where the weight originally hit, in the chin area there will be a square spot where a cork was glued, or, the cork may even still be there as it is with this doll, (see above picture again). You want the wire to be long enough that the weight part contacts the cork.

If there is no cork you will need to glue a piece in before you set the eyes, otherwise the weight will make a very unpleasant clank every time you sit the doll up, and it could even crack the bisque if the weight were too hit too hard. If you wait until after the eyes are set, depending on the thickness of the cork, the eyes may not open fully…just take my word for it and do it first. Just go buy yourself a bottle of wine, the good stuff, no screw top or boxes, remove the cork and set it aside, now drink all of the wine, when you wake up, grab your trusty X-acto knife and cut yourself a small wedge of cork.

The cork in this doll’s head is about a half inch wide and an inch long and approximately a fourth of an inch wide at the thickest part of the wedge. A smaller head would need a much smaller cork. The outline of the old cork should give you a pretty good idea of how big it should be. Glue the cork in place and let it dry.

Next, Part two: setting in the glass eyes.