Susan B. Anthony once decried the limited life choices for women of her day, saying that it was their fate to become either a “drudge” if they married poor or a “doll” if they married rich. More than a century after the suffragist leader’s death, she’s joining the ranks of the latter — but for her singular personal achievements.
Toymaker Mattel is adding Anthony to their doll line of other historical female figures, which also includes jazz singer Ella Fitzgerald, tennis pro Billie Jean King, nurse Florence Nightingale, civil rights activist Rosa Parks and astronaut Sally Ride. Decked out in a floor-length black dress with lace at the sleeves and bodice, the Susan B. Anthony Barbie retails for $29.99.
Anthony is among those who helped pave the way for the 19th Amendment to the Constitution that gave women the right to vote in 1920, an event that she did not live to see. Born in 1820, Anthony die in 1906.
Says Mattel on its website: “On November 5, 1872, while protesting and leading the charge for women’s voting rights, Susan B. Anthony made a defiant move. She voted in the presidential election and was arrested at her home in Rochester, N.Y. This bold act, coupled with Susan’s determined spirit, helped pave the way for passage of the 19th Amendment.”
According to multiple accounts, Anthony opted to stay single at a time when unmarried women were scorned. “I never felt I could give up my life of freedom to become a man’s housekeeper,” Anthony told an interviewer late in life.
