The Crolly doll
My Crolly doll! Mary was her name. Santa Claus had received my letter, I was six years old. I wrote:
Please bring me my Crolly doll, Mary! You know her.
As I grew older, my parents would retell the story of the journey they went through at that time, to find a Crolly doll with pink hair.
As a last resort, my father brought me into Clery’s in O’Connell Street, Dublin, a shop I would later work in. There were shelves and shelves of boxed dolls.
Kneeling down, my father asked, “Can you see her?”
I looked around and I shook my head, No!
The assistant very kindly knelt down. “How do you know she is not here?”
I whispered, “She has pink hair.”
She told my father that should would put a blonde haired doll away. “Get your wife to wash the doll’s hair with red food colouring.”
My mother washed red food colouring into Mary’s hair until I was nine years old. I was number five of seven surviving children.