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Barbie and Ruth: The Story of the World's Most Famous Doll and the Woman Who Created Her |  | Author: Robin Gerber
Publisher: HarperBusiness
Category: Book
List Price: $24.99
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Seller: horizonbb
Rating:  23 reviews
Sales Rank: 479931
Media: Hardcover
Pages: 288
Number Of Items: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.7
Dimensions (in): 9.1 x 6.3 x 1.3
ISBN: 0061341312
Dewey Decimal Number: 338.76887221092
EAN: 9780061341311
ASIN: 0061341312
Publication Date: February 1, 2009
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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| • | ISBN13: 9780061341311 | | • | Condition: NEW | | • | Notes: Brand New from Publisher. No Remainder Mark. |
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Product Description
The tragic and redeeming story of how one visionary woman built the biggest toy company in the world and created a global icon. Barbie and Ruth is the entwined story of two exceptional women. There's Barbie: the diminutive yet arrestingly voluptuous doll unveiled at the 1959 Toy Fair who became the treasure of 90 percent of American girls and their counterparts in 150 countries. She went on to compete as an Olympic athlete, serve as an air force pilot, work as a boutique owner, run as a presidential candidate, and ignite a cultural firestorm. And then there's Ruth Handler, Barbie's creator: the tenth child of Polish Jewish immigrants, a passionately competitive and creative business pioneer, and a mother and wife who wanted it all. After a business scandal that forced Ruth out of Mattel, the company she founded, she drew on her experience as a breast cancer survivor to start a business that changed women's lives. She was ultimately honored as a pioneer, humanitarian, and masterful entrepreneur. Based on original research, extensive interviews, and previously unavailable material, Barbie and Ruth tells the fascinating story of how two women forever changed American business and culture.
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| Customer Reviews:
Showing reviews 1-5 of 23
 More aptly titled "RUTH and Barbie" February 28, 2010
JayDee (Virginia)
Robin Gerber's biography of Ruth Handler is well researched, thoughtful, insightful and obviously written out of a genuine curiosity. With all this in mind, why did this biography leave me feeling a bit slighted? I think the answer lies in the title, which implies a dual biography that simply doesn't exist. Part of the problem obviously exists with the marketing of the book. The cover clearly shows preferential treatment of Barbie. Look at the sweeping title and font of "Barbie" and then the rather diminiuative "Ruth" below "Barbie" and the title. Truth be told, there is really very little about Barbie doll that most folks haven't already heard about decades ago. Her humble beginnings are not revelatory here. By the end of the book, you know very little about Barbie but a lot more about her "mother".
The reader is treated to not only a chronological biography of her inventor but also an emotional history as well. Under Gerber's pen, Ruth Handler becomes someone more than just a name once linked to scandal. Gerber portrays the tough as nails Handler also as a vulnerable and at times insecure woman. There is little sentimentality here. Gerber doesn't try to make Handler out as a saint--as perhaps many of her admirers do to a fault. This is perhaps one of the real achievements of this book. Love her or hate her, the Ruth Handler legacy will always lie within glint of the child's eye when dreaming with her invention.
 It'a a Barbie world November 16, 2009
Mary G. Longorio (Eagle Mountain, UT)
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
One of the selling points for the Barbie doll and all her accessories is the perfectness of her life. Barbie and Ruth reveals the extremely messy back-story of the creation of Barbie and her maker Ruth Handler. The idea for Barbie came from the European doll Bild-Lili whose origins came from the sex toy industry. Starting with Ruth's unusual upbringing, she was the only child of ten not raised by her mother, Robin Gerber reveals a woman with seemingly unlimited drive. Marrying her husband Elliot despite her mother's objections, Ruth was driven to succeed. When she conceived of the Barbie doll, she didn't allow anyone to stand in her way. Soon the most popular toy and the cornerstone of a toy conglomerate, Barbie was a valuable prize. Ruth faced being tossed from the company she essentially founded, she also faced separation from her second family. In a compassionate but unflinching book, Gerber not only reveals the story behind the doll, but the woman who was ahead of her time, the businesswoman who focused on the job and the family at home who was lost in the shuffle.
 An excellnt Biography of Ruth handler July 17, 2009
Edward J. Hahn (Portland, OR, United States)
2 out of 3 found this review helpful
I was surprised at how interesting and well-written this book about Ruth Handler, the founder of Mattel Toy Company and the creator of the Barbie doll was. Having read and reviewed the disappointing, "Toy Monster", I was afraid this was going to be the polar opposite, nothing more than an adoring eulogy to an exceptional woman.
It is far more than that and far more even-handed than is usual in these types of biographies. Plus the writing is first-rate. It reads like a novel and as the friend who gave me his copy said' "I couldn't put it down." Personally, I read it while traveling in one day.
The book covers her entire life, warts and all, and uses her relationship to Barbie, the ubiquitous fashion doll, as a way of showing what drove Ruth Handler and what, in some ways, defined her. As the leader of Mattel, she put in motion actions that totally changed the toy business, forever. As a woman she broke down walls so that others wouldn't have to.
The books sub-title is a little mis-leading in that the book is not about Barbie but about Ruth Handler. Other than that, it is a fascinating story and one I can recommend to anyone interested in the struggles of women for equality in the business world, in the toy business generally, in the development of the world's largest selling toy: Barbie, and in the very human story of a driven successful, failed and eventually redeemed, almost bigger than life person, Ruth Handler.
 Is there anything to like about Ruth and her husband? June 18, 2009
Avid Reader (Omaha, NE)
0 out of 2 found this review helpful
While millions of Jews were dying in the gas chambers, Ruth's husband avoids military service with lies he is in the "war effort" as he produces gift items. Ruth makes promises of partnership and then reneges, undercuts her own sales force, and alienates her children. Did these two have any moral compass at all?
Not just Barbie, Ken & Hot Wheels... This is Ruth's amazing journey! May 19, 2009
CJ (Wisconsin)
2 out of 3 found this review helpful
This book is so wonderfully written it deserves an award!
It is extremely well researched and extremely well written.
This is much more than just about two dolls named Barbie & Ken or Hot Wheels. It is Ruth's story.
I felt like I really got to know the real Ruth Handler, her family and her Mattel family. Just fascinating!
A great book for anyone in the business world or
for anyone starting up their own business.
You can learn quite alot about business from Barbie's creator... the good things and ugly things.
Many ups & downs... but in the
end you just can't help but cheer for them and smile.
I feel Ruth herself would have approved of this book.
I loved this book from page one until the last.
A great read... enjoyable!
Showing reviews 1-5 of 23
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