Rosemary Rock Flowers

Name: Rose Mary Rock Flowers

Made by and When: Mattel, 1971

Material: One-piece vinyl body with a jointed vinyl head and bendable arms and legs

Marks: (Head) HONG KONG / MATTEL INC / ©1970

Height: 6-1/2 inches

Hair, Eyes, Mouth: Black rooted short Afro, black-painted eyes, closed mouth

Clothes/Accessories: Wears red sunglasses and a paisley-print double-knit dress with hot-pink fringed sleeves and a handkerchief hemline. Includes a 33-1/3 rpm record with two songs, and a posing stand designed for placement over a short-spindled record player to allow the doll to “spin and twirl” while the record plays. View the video below the gallery images.

Other: Stock ##1168, Rosemary Rock Flowers is part of an original doll trio; Lilac, Rosemary, and Heather, later joined by other dolls including one male, Doug. Rosemary is the only black/African American doll in the line. Rosemary’s head sculpt looks like a miniature version of Christie, Barbie’s first black friend.

A paper doll book by Whitman, ©1972 features Rosemary, Lilac, Heather, and clothing for the three dolls—see the last gallery image. (With the omission of the “e,” Rosemary’s name is misspelled on the paper doll book cover.)

Gallery

Video

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Published by DeeBeeGee

Doll collector, historian, co-founder of the first e-zine devoted to collecting black dolls; author of black-doll reference books, doll blogs, and doll magazine articles.

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