Izannah Walker

Izannah F. Walker was born on September 28, 1817. She was the youngest of three girls born to Gilbert and Sarah Walker of 198 High Street in Bristol. When she was just 7 years old, Izannah and her sisters were orphaned and went to live with her mother’s sister Jane and her husband in Somerset, Massachusetts. Izannah left Somerset and eventually settled in Central Falls, where she founded a cloth doll manufacturing cottage industry. Izannah was the first American woman to be granted a patent for doll making. Although the patent was not granted until 1873, it is believed that she was making dolls as early as 1848. She was listed as a “dollmaker” in the 1865 Rhode Island census. In her patent, Izannah claimed, “My doll is inexpensive, easily kept clean, and not apt to injure a young child which may fall upon it…It will preserve its appearance for a long time.”

Izannah gave her dolls, ranging in height from 14-26 inches, cloth bodies and rigid heads made from cloth, stuffing, and glues that were pressed into an iron mold and hardened. She added cloth ears, realistic-looking hands with separate thumbs, and even sewed joints at the elbows and knees. Izannah hand-painted each doll with oil paints, adding facial features, hair, and sometimes, even boots. Her design made for durable dolls that resisted cracking and peeling and that held up well to the wear and tear from being loved and played with by their young owners.

While remembered best as a doll maker, Izannah also made doll furniture, repaired household gadgets, and designed a parlor heater. She died on February 15, 1888 and was buried with her parents in the Palmer Street Cemetery, in Somerset.

Biography and image provided by Rei Battcher, Bristol Historical & Preservation Society