Jan 25, 1999 / FW/ --- A long time ago, someone asked me, "Why do mannequins have mean faces?" I could not answer.

I never really think of them as mean looking. I thought of them as "non-expression."

During the 1930s, smiling mannequins were common. The smile was lost during World War II.

Smiling mannequins became in vogue again during the late 1940s, extending to the early 1950s.

Mannequins reflects the times. With the war over, everyone was hopeful, and mannequins were manufactured with the same expression.

As the 1950s faded, so were the smiling mannequins. There were still some which were manufactured, but they were few and far between.

When Jim Rhine submitted this photo, if I have an idea when the mannequin was manufactured.

It looked too modern to come from the 1930s, but it was definitely manufactured before 1972 because it did not have any nipples. Mannequin nipples did not come into existence until 1972.

Jim Rhine saved "Leia" from the garbage bin by buying her from a store close-out sale in 1982.

Already considered passe in 1982, Leia was not even sent to the refurbisher by the department store to be reused.

So, Leia was sent "to pasture," in mannequin terms, going to storage and eventually sold during a prop sale.

Though no longer a denizen of the store window, Leia continue to smile. Frozen in time, she reminds us of the more hopeful times, the decade she was born!