Some books are just for fun – and Kathleen Ainslie’s charming stories of the adventures of the Dutch peg dolls, Catharine Susan and Maria (“Me”), delighted readers in the first decade of the twentieth century. Peg dolls were jointed wooden figurines sold inexpensively – and “naked” for the new owners to make clothes for. Because they moved at the shoulders, elbows, hips, and knees, they could be arranged into somewhat lifelike positions, and this feature is essential in Ainslie’s lively sketches of dolls running, dancing, traveling, working in the garden, and collapsing in exhaustion.

The books are short – ten to twenty illustrations with brief captions, and they usually just pick out distinctive episodes, rather than exploring a narrative arc. Ainslie (1883-1935) wrote and illustrated more than 20 books published by Castell Brothers Ltd  –  the Catharine Susan books, a number of other books with peg dolls, a handful of works with real children as the main characters, and at least five calendars. Here are some selections from the Catherine Susan books:

In Me and Catharine Susan, we learn she and Maria are twins.

They get in trouble when they are young (Catharine Susan in Hot Water),

And travel when they are older (Catharine Susan and Me Goes Abroad). Sometimes they are courageous,

and sometimes not (Catharine Susan’s Little Holiday),

but they do get on well with others.

In Me and Catharine Susan Earns an Honest [Penny], the sisters try to make a living in various ways, including dressmaking and market gardening.

They enjoy an active social life (Catharine Susan and Me’s Coming Out).

Votes for Catharine Susan and Me is actually an anti-suffrage book. (We forgive them because we know their heads are wooden.)

A final image, from the 1906 Calendar: