American Girl turns 40. How the brand inspired real careers - not just playtime

The first time I discovered the word journalist was in an American Girl book. I was in elementary school when I fell in love with Kit Kittredge, a doll with my same short blond hair and love of writing.

I didn't own the Kit doll, but I devoured her books. Like Kit, I wanted to make a difference in my community by telling stories. I spent my summers with other girls my age at a (very unauthorized) "American Girl camp" that my neighbor ran. I tried Victory Garden turnips like Molly, a World War II character. We cooked Jiffy Pop like Julie from the 1970s, and washed our laundry by hand like pioneer-era Kirsten. The books made me hungrier to learn than any public school history class.

I'm not alone. Mary Mahoney, a historian and podcaster, also explains her career trajectory via American Girl. Learning with "a girl at the center of it," helped history feel like more than just text for her – it was accessible and human. It was a bridge for Mahoney to talk to her grandmother, who lived through WWII. And it influenced her to study American history in graduate school, where she and another peer created the "Dolls of Our Lives" podcast and book.

"A lot of people in PhD programs talk about what influenced them to be a historian and often reach for references that sound somewhat esoteric. And the reality for us was it was American Girl," Mahoney says.

While the dolls were the main consumer peg, American Girl stories have been companions and history teachers alike for four decades. The brand, now old enough to have a multigenerational appeal, has begun courting its grown-up fans. Some are sharing the dolls with their children. Others take their nostalgia by meme or American Girl store bachelorette party. And a new book for adults by Fiona Davis, "Samantha: The Next Chapter," will publish this fall.

Holding hands with history through American Girls

American Girl was the brainchild of Pleasant Rowland, an educator, publisher and former reporter, who was inspired after visiting colonial Williamsburg. The idea was to reflect girlhood through different periods of American history, showing the changes and similarities in books and their accompanying dolls and historically accurate outfits.

In 1986, American Girl debuted its first three dolls: Kirsten, a Swedish immigrant living in Minnesota in 1854, Progressive-era Samantha Parkington and Molly, who represented World War II America. By 1993, American Girl had added the Colonial-era Felicity and Addy, who escaped slavery during the Civil War.

Mattel bought Pleasant Company for $700 million in 1998, when the company was making around $300 million a year, The New York Times reported at the time. At its peak about a decade ago, American Girl pulled in over $600 million in annual sales, according to CNBC. After years of declining sales, American Girl dolls are seeing a resurgence. Now, Mattel reports five quarters of consecutive sales growth for American Girl, even as Barbie and Polly Pocket sales slow.

From the beginning, American Girls kept books at the forefront.

"When I say, for example, Samantha Parkington, you probably think of the doll, right? That's what you picture, but I often say that what you're remembering is the feeling of her world," says Kat Cartwright, the historian responsible for accuracy in American Girl characters. "When people think of American Girl as just dolls, I'm like, no, no, no. They are characters with these really rich worlds that help girls today understand the past and also see themselves as actors who can be taken seriously and can make change in the world today."

The original books are no light affair, either. Kirsten's best friend dies of cholera within the first few chapters. She accidentally burns her family's house down. Kit lives in poverty. Josefina, growing up on a New Mexico ranch in the 1820s, is coping with her mother's death. And Addy, perhaps the most brutal American Girl story, is enslaved. Her family is separated when her dad and brother are sold to another plantation.

Jessie Gaynor, an author and LitHub editor, remembers one impactful scene in the tobacco field when an overseer forced Addy to eat a worm.

"Obviously that's certainly not the worst thing that happened to an enslaved person," Gaynor says. "But at least for me as a kid who liked books, that was a really helpful way to learn about some of the more horrific historical facts of the country through these stories."

Gaynor, who grew up in Illinois, also credits the books for teaching her about the 19th and early 20th century Swedish emigration in her region. "All the history I learned in my youth came from the American Girl doll books," she wrote in a 2019 LitHub essay.

"I just remember doing a lot of ancient history and also honestly learning about a lot of men and what the men did in these historical times," Gaynor says. "Learning about what the girls my age were doing did make history feel more immediate and interesting to me."

Cartwright, American Girl's historian, also went into her field because she loved learning from the dolls. This "dream job" now has her searching through archival girls' diaries, old letters, census records and antiques to make sure new characters and books are historically accurate, even the modern-day Girls of the Year.

Once her research is complete, her task is to make the stories "girl-sized" and accessible for young customers.

In telling history, who gets to be an ‘American Girl'?

Advisory boards became an important part of that research process beginning with Addy. Now, there are advisory boards for both historical dolls and Girl of the Year, Cartwright says. For Nanea, a Hawaiian girl in the 1940s, the company consulted a Pearl Harbor witness. Kaya, the first Native American doll, was advised by the Niimíipuu people. For this year's Girl of the Year, Raquel, they consulted a Latina girlhood expert, Cartwright says.

But in decades past, not every girl saw themselves in American Girl growing up. The brand has seen its fair share of criticism in regards to doll diversity.

When Mahoney reread the books as an adult, she and her co-host reckoned with their complicated adoration. Critical podcast episodes often received backlash, especially one about Felicity wanting to free an abused horse at the same time she was eating meals cooked by Rose, a character referred to as enslaved.

"I'm not negating what these books and the brand mean to me and the positive things that I feel about them, but I think it's part of what being a fan means to me is holding something you love to account in addition to being an admirer of it, which is, not for nothing, also similar to what it means to be a citizen, to feel patriotic," Mahoney says. "(Fans) couldn't sit with any nuance in that conversation."

The company itself has revised some earlier material deemed offensive. Their new anniversary book, "The Making of American Girl," explains a decision to rerelease "Kirsten Learns a Lesson" to change its portrayal of Indigenous characters.

"When Kirsten was first being developed, the editorial team and research staff recognized that they didn't have the knowledge to present Singing Bird's Dakota culture and background in depth," it reads. "The revised version includes Singing Bird's name in her own language, as well as a glossary of Dakota words. It was important in the early days of Pleasant Company, to regularly evolve how the company presents American history and the experiences of all American girls."

Jamie Cygielman, the global head of dolls at Mattel, which owns American Girl, says the brand is committed to representing an array of American girlhoods. New diverse historical dolls include Nanea; Melody, an aspiring singer in the 1960s grappling with racism; and Claudie, who lives through the Harlem Renaissance.

"We're always looking at other moments that we can lean into and tell a unique perspective on that time period," Cygielman says. "Hopefully, as we like to say, the story will either be a window or a mirror for a young girl who's reading it. It'll either be a mirror where she can see herself in her own culture or she may see a window onto a world that she wasn't as familiar with, but through that she can learn and potentially through that understanding, develop empathy or understanding for other people."

Clare Mulroy is USA TODAY's Books Reporter, where she covers buzzy releases, chats with authors and dives into the culture of reading. Find her on Instagram, subscribe to our weekly Books newsletter or tell her what you're reading at cmulroy@usatoday.com.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: American Girl turns 40. How the brand inspired real careers - not just playtime

Reporting by Clare Mulroy, USA TODAY / USA TODAY

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This story was originally published July 3, 2026 at 3:05 AM.