In this week’s episode, David visits the American Girl store in Los Angeles, attempting to learn what is so American about the American Girl doll. There he meets Alyson Campbell, the Senior Events and Marketing Coordinator at American Girl - who explains how the store works. He then gets Jamie Cygielman on the line, senior vice president and GM for American Girl. He discovers the doll is the invention of Pleasant T. Rowland - an American educator, writer, and philanthropist. She spent some time as a TV news reporter - anchoring KGO-TV in San Francisco from 68 to 71. By the mid 80s, Pleasant had saved over a million dollars from selling the textbooks she’d written for students - and started American Girl, hoping to teach kids about American history through the medium of 18 inch dolls. With all this in mind - David heads up to the restaurant to dine with his own American Girl doll, meeting both kids and adults who are fans.

LINKS:

Flightless Bird Live in Seattle Feb 8: https://www.stgpresents.org/events/flightless-bird/

Flightless Bird on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@flightlessbirdpodcast

Flightless Bird merch: https://www.webworm.store/merch/flightless-bird

Contact Rob and David: [email protected]