US2856731A - Doll with movable eyes - Google Patents

Description

Oct. 21, 1958 B. s. PACHOLOK DOLL WITH MOVABLE EYES Filed Feb. 9, 1956 INVENTOR BOHDAN S. PAC HOLOK ATTORNEY United States Patent C DOLL WITH MOVABLE EYES Bohdan S. Pacholok, Bayonne, N. J., assignor to Margon Corporation, Newark, N. J a corporation of New Jersey Application February 9, 1956, Serial No. 564,531

4 Claims. (Cl. 46-169) This invention relates to dolls, and more particularly to movable or sleeping eyes for the same.

In recent years there has been much use of soft flexible material for doll heads. This in turn has led to individual or independently movable doll eyes of compact configuration, because the eyes have been mounted within separate small protective housings, which in turn have been pushed into sockets formed immediately behind the eye openings.

Nevertheless rigid doll heads are still made, and in such cases the trend is to use hard plastics materials. When hard heads were made of wood pulp, a pair of eyes were mounted on a metal bridge having tangs which were embedded in the material of the head. In an expansion bridge the tangs were forced outwardly into the side walls of the head, but such a bridge is unsuited for a hard plastics head, which may be broken by the outward pressure, instead of the tangs being embedded. A bridge of the hanger type, in which tangs are clamped toward one another on opposite sides of a rearward projection formed internally of the head at the forehead, is better with hard plastics materials, in that there is no force tending to break the head itself, but there still is difiiculty in embedding tangs in the hard plastics material. Moreover, both of these known bridges are designed for use with a spindle or crossrod connecting the two eyes, and carrying a weight arm at the center between the eyes.

The primary object of the present invention is to gen erally improve dolls and doll eyes, and to provide movable doll eyes for heads made of hard plastics materials. A more particular object is to provide a mounting means or so-called bridge for use with individual do-ll eyes of commonly available type. Still another object is to provide such a bridge which is easily mounted within a doll head through its neck opening, by using a solvent or cement, thereby obviating difiiculty which has arisen when attempting to embed metal tangs into a hard plastics material.

To accomplish the foregoing general objects, and other more specific objects which will hereinafter appear, my invention resides in the doll head and eyeset elements, and their relation one to another, as are more particularly described in the following specification. The specification is accompanied by a drawing, in which:

Fig. 1 is a vertical section through the forward part of a doll head at one of the eye openings;

Fig. 2 is a vertical section through the head, taken approximately in the plane of the line 2-2 of Fig. 1;

Fig. 3 is a fragmentary view looking toward the front wall of the head from the rear, without the eyeset;

Fig. 4 is a perspective exploded view showing how the individual eyes are applied to the bridge and the latter applied to the seat of a fixture or mounting tool which may be used when mounting the eyes in the head; Fig. 5 is a partially sectioned elevation of the fixture with a head disposed over the eyes; and

Fig. 6 shows a modification of a detail of the bridge.

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Referring to the drawing, I combine a doll head generally designated H, with an eyeset generally designated E. The head H is molded out of a hard plastics material, and has eye openings 12, and a rearward projection 14 inside the forehead. The eyeset E comprises a bridge B, and two individual doll eyes 16 and 18. Each eye has its own operating weight 26, and has trunnions 22 at the sides thereof. The bridge B comprises a bar 24 with four bearing arms 26, 28, 30 and 32 depending therefrom. Each of the arms has a bearing slot 36 open at the front to receive the trunnions of the eyes, and the front center portion of the bridge has a face 40 (Figs. 2 and 4) which later is secured to the rear surface of the internal projection 14 of the head, as shown in Figs. 1 and 5.

In preferred form the eyes 16 and 18 are preferably molded in one piece out of a plastics material, and in such case each eye as molded is formed with the weight portion 20 and trunnions 22. Similarly the bridge B is preferably a single body of a molded plastics material, and as molded includes the bar 24, and the dependent arms with their bearing slots 36, as well as the face 40. The latter is preferably secured to the back face of projection 14 by the use of a suitable solvent or cement, which may be so quick-acting that there is no appreciable delay when mounting the eyeset in the head.

The operation of mounting the eyeset in the head may be facilitated by using a suitable fixture or tool such as that illustrated in Fig. 5, and partially shown in Fig. 4. The fixture here shown comprises a base 42 supporting an arm 44, as by means of posts 46 and 48, reinforced by a strut 50. As here made, the part 50 is integral with the arm 44, but the arm 44 may be supported in any desired fashion. At its upper end it carries a seat 52 (Fig. 4) having raised ends 54 and 56. It may also have a locating pin 58, in which case the bridge is provided with a mating hole 60.

In using the apparatus the center portion of bridge B is first placed on seat 52, with pin 53 received in hole 60, at which time the arms 28 and 30 fit between the inner edges 57 of the projections 54 and 56. The eye 16 is then dropped into position with its trunnions 22 received in bearing slots 36, and similarly the eye 18 is dropped in position. At this time the weight portions 20 hang down alongside the surface 62 of seat 52, and the back edges of the eyes may approach or nearly rest on the raised top surfaces of the parts 54 and 56 of the seat 52. This relationship, shown in Fig. 5, need not be exact, but is sufliciently close to hold the eyes in approximately desired position with the eyes looking upward.

Heads made of hard material are customarily made in front and back halves which are subsequently secured the diameter of the neck opening the head may nevertheless he slipped over the bridge by moving it at an angle over one end of the bridge first, and then turning the head to come around the other end. This operation may be facilitated by locating the seat 52 unsymmetrically or oifset from the arm 44, and that is preferably done, as is shown in Fig. 4. The eyeset is then similarly offset, and the head is slipped over the longer end first.

Before slipping the head over the eyeset some solvent or cement is applied to the surface 40. After the head has been placed in position with the eyes located properly in the eye openings it is pressed downward momentarily at the forehead, thus securing the part 14 of the doll to the surface 40 of the bridge. The head, and

to angularly position the head, for the seat 52 (unlike the bridge 8') is much smaller than the diameter of the neck opening.

As so far described the bearing slots 36 are fully open toward the front. Such an arrangement is entirely feasible, for when the head is upright the trunnions rest on the bottom of the bearings, as shown in Fig. 1, and when the head is in sleeping position the trunnions rest on the closed ends of the bearing slots, as shown in Fig. 5. Escape of the trunnions from the slots is prevented because the eye openings of the head confine the eye members at the front.

Nevertheless, if desired, the bearing slots may be slightly undercut to receive the trunnions with a snap engagement, and to thereafter retain the same, although they are freely rotatable in the bearings. Such an arrangement is shown in Fig. 6, in which the bearing slot 66 of bridge arm 68 is slightly narrowed or undercut, as shown at 70. This is true of all four bearings. This construction is of advantage in the event that the eye manufacturer wishes to ship, or the doll manufacturer wishes to receive, eyesets in assembled relation, instead of three separate parts for each eyeset.

The bridge of the present invention may be used with eyes made in a variety of ways. The essential requirements are that the eyes be individual eyes, with each eye having its own trunnions and operating weight. When, as here illustrated, the eyes have lashes '76, that fact may be taken advantage of by using the lash as a motion limiting stop.

The preferred form of eye here illustrated is next described in greater detail. The complete eye is preferably molded of a single body of transparent plastics material. The material, although transparent, is preferably tinted, typically brown for a brown eye, and blue for a blue eye. The eye as molded has the weight portion 20 projecting rearwardly from the lower part thereof, and the trunnions 22 at the sides thereof. An annular portion '72 is roughened at the back, to reflect light in simulation of an iris, and a circular portion 74 within the annular portion 72 is smooth at the back, to transmit light in simulation of a pupil. Thus the iris will look blue or brown, but the pupil will look black because the head is enclosed, and therefore is black on the inside. This construction is in accordance with U. S. Patent No. 2,657,- 500, issued November 3, 1953, to Hans W. Samolewitz, and entitled Transparent Doll Eye. The eye surrounding the iris portion 74 is colored white below the lash 76, while the part above the lash 76 is flesh colored in simulation of an eyelid.

The front of the eye is generally hemispherical, but may be cut away at the bottom, forward of the trunnions 22, as indicated at 78. This has the advantage of making the weight portion 20 more effective, as is described in a copending application of Robert I. Prupis, Serial No. 487,096, filed February 9, 1955, now Patent No. 2,796,- 487, and entitled Movable Doll Eye. It helps counteract the fact that the plastics material may be low in specific gravity, and the further fact that the top of the weight portion is preferably channeled or trough-shaped to permit a mold core to reach the iris 72 at the back of the eye when molding the same.

The lash 76 may be a hair lash inserted through a slit, but more simply is molded integrally with the eye out of the same plastics material. In such case it is colored black or dark brown. The lash may be made of a separate soft plastics material, typically a vinyl resin, and in such case may be molded integrally with a weight which is separate from the hemispherical eye itself, but which is added to the eye when the lash is passed through the lash slit. Such a construction is shown in copending application of Albert Bashover, Serial No. 563,923, filed February 7, 1956, and titled Doll Eye.

The plastics material used for the eye may be a styrene or cellulose acetate butyrate plastics material, and, of course, should be a materialobtainable in transparent form, when made as here described.

The head may be molded of cellulose acetate or cellulose acetate butyrate. The bridge may be molded of the same plastics, or of styrene. The solvent used to secure the bridge to the head may be methyl ethyl ketone, or acetone.

It is believed that the construction and memod of use of my improvement in doll eyes, as well as the advantages thereof, will be apparent from the foregoing detailed description. It will also be apparent that while I have shown and described my invention in a preferred form, changes may be made in the structure shown, without departing from the scope of the invention, as sought to be defined in the following claims. In the claims there is reference to the provision of four bearing arms with four bearings to receive the trunnions of the two eyes, but this is not intended to exclude a bridge in which the middle two arms are connected, thus making only three arms with four bearings. The wide middle arm would in such case function as two arms.

I claim:

1. A doll eyeset, comprising a bridge and a pair of individually movable unconnected doll eyes, each eye having its own operating weight and a pair of trunnions at the opposite sides thereof, said bridge including four depending bearing arms with each of the latter having a bearing slot open at the front, each companion pair of bearing arms at the'bearing slots thereof being adapted to receive the trunnions of an eye for pivotally mounting the latter to said bridge, the front of said bridge having a face portion adapted for securement to a mating part of a doll head for mounting said eyes in the head in properly oriented relation.

2. A doll eyeset, comprising a bridge and a pair of individually movable unconnected doll eyes, each eye having its own operating weight and a pair of trunnions at the opposite sides thereof, said bridge including four depending bearing arms with each of the latter having a bearing slot open at the front, each companion pair of bearing arms at the bearing slots thereof being adapted to receive the trunnions of an eye for pivotally mounting the latter to said bridge, the front of said bridge having a face portion adapted for securement to a mating part of a doll head for mounting said eyes in the head in properly oriented relation, each eye being a single body of molded plastics material having its weight and trunnions integrally molded therewith, and said bridge being a single body of molded plastics material with said face portion thereof being centrally located along the bridge.

3. In combination, a doll head and a doll eyeset, said doll head being molded out of hard plastics material and having eye openlngs and a rearward projection inside the forehead, said eyeset comprising a bridge and a pair of individually movable unconnected doll eyes, each eye having its own operating weight and a pair of trunnions at the opposite sides thereof, said bridge including four depending bearing arms with each of the latter having a bearing slot open at the front, each companion pair of bearing arms at the bearing slots thereof mounting the trunnions of an eye for pivotally mounting the latter to said bridge, the front of said bridge having a face portion which is secured to the rear surface of said internal projection of the head for mountingsaid eyes in the head in properly oriented relation.

4. In combination, a doll head and a doll eyeset, said doll head being molded out of hard plastics material and having eye openings and a rearward projection inside the forehead, said eyeset comprising a bridge and a pair of individually movable unconnected doll eyes, each eye having its own operating weight and a pair of trunnions at the opposite sides thereof, said bridge including four depending bearing arms with each of the latter having a bearing slot open at the front, each companion pair of bearing arms at the bearing slots thereof mounting the trunnions of an eye for pivotally mounting the latter to said bridge, each eye being a single body of molded plastics material having its weight and trunnions integrally molded therewith, and said bridge being a single body of molded plastics material, the front center of said bridge having a face portion which is cemented to the rear surface of said internal projection of the head for mounting said eyes in the head in properly oriented relation.

References Cited in the file of this patent UNITED STATES PATENTS Denivelle Mar. 28, 1916 Pudlin Feb. 10, 1920 Litomy Mar. 15, 1932 Grubman Apr. 30, 1935 Kusold July 1, 1952 Brudney July 10, 1956

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