An Artist Ahead of Her Time

You probably don’t know the name Rose O’Neill, but chances are good that you know something she created. Only not necessarily what merits her mention in a blog about New York City firsts.

Rose O’Neill was the first woman to have a comic strip published in the United States. She was just twenty-two years old in 1896 when Truth magazine published her comic. The next year, she became the first woman artist on the staff of the popular humor magazine Puck.

O’Neill’s illustrations graced the pages of many magazines enjoyed by women in the early twentieth century. In December 1909, Ladies’ Home Journal introduced her comic featuring child-like, cherubic characters that she called Kewpies. Readers loved them, and O’Neill saw an opportunity to grow her creation from two-dimensional to three-dimensional figures. In 1913, bisque Kewpie dolls began to roll out of a German factory. The one below is an early Kewpie, signed on the soles of its feet by Rose O’Neill herself. According to the Library of Congress, Kewpie dolls were the first novelty toys with worldwide distribution.

In her personal life, O’Neill also was ahead of her time. She was twice married and twice divorced. She marched for women’s suffrage, and her Kewpies often appeared on posters advocating for women’s right to vote. In addition to her whimsical illustrations, she created serious art and also was a novelist.