This little chap was known as Bobby Domecon. Nobody seems to know what he's called now.
When the novelist Lisa Grunwald came across this photo on a Cornell University website about the history of home economics, she realised she had a subject for her next book (now published).
Bobby was a 'practice baby', taken from an orphanage and delivered to the domestic economics programme at Cornell - hence his name - so that the well-to-do young ladies there could have a real, live baby on which to practice their mothering skills.
It wasn't just Cornell that did this; other elite colleges used 'practice babies' until the 1960s when someone pointed out that, well, maybe being passed around from student to student wasn't the best possible way for a child to spend his first months.
Emily Anthes has much more.
Perfect for me for a cover on her book.
Posted by: online auctions | August 05, 2011 at 09:58 AM