Another word for extraordinary is exceptional and this Bradford woman was often looked upon as somewhat exceptional — and eccentric.
It wasn’t her lifestyle, but her idiosyncratic hobby of creating tiny people made of peanuts that alternately amused and amazed people not only in Bradford, but nationwide. Her name was Daisy Welch.
Born in Potter County in 1899, her family moved to Bradford where her father worked on area oil leases. Her mother was a housewife. A talented girl, she wrote poetry, illustrated cards, and played several musical instruments, including the violin, guitar, harmonica, and accordion and graduated from Bradford High School in 1917. She later attended Clarion Normal School and taught for a brief time in the Bradford township schools but her teaching career was cut short when she contracted polio in the early 1930s.
Often confined to a wheelchair in the early days of her illness, she was given a bag of peanuts one day by a visitor. Christmas time was approaching, and she decided to create a “peanut family” for her now widowed mother. Friends and neighbors were so charmed by the tiny legume family that she soon received orders for more, and was written up in the Williamsport Grit newspaper. Before long, her creations were shown and sold nationwide.
And not just peanut people — she also created peanut dogs, cats, chickens, and frogs. “Peanut frogs sell in Atlantic City almost faster than I can keep up with the orders,” she said with a laugh.
The workmanship needed to create these tiny people was remarkable. Legs, arms, and shoes were carved from wooden matchsticks, various colors of rope were made into blonde, brunette or red hair; clothes, hats and uniforms were fashioned from small scraps of material. A peanut grandmother sits knitting with yarn while a peanut cat plays nearby; a peanut grandfather reads a newspaper while in a rocking chair, an entire peanut orchestra played the piano, bass, guitar and violin. Peanut children go off to school carrying school books and mothers carry peanut babies.
Daisy exhibited several of her peanut families at the New York World’s Fair Hobby Hall in 1939 — and won a blue ribbon! Her dolls were displayed at the Atlanta Historical Society, the Children’s Museum of Brooklyn and at the State Museum in Springfield, Ill. In June 1943 she entered 50 of her creations including the peanut orchestra, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, soldiers, sailors, a WAAC (it was during World War II after all), and peanut dolls representing various nationalities such as Dutch, Italian, and Chinese in the National Doll Show in New York City.
By 1943, she estimated that she had made over 1,000 dolls.
An article in the December 1944 edition of Popular Science titled “Curious Little Dolls Made of Peanuts and Scraps of Cloth” gave instructions on how to make your own peanut person.
“Be sure to select a peanut of the general shape desired in the finished doll,” Daisy advised. “Draw in the features with India ink, then paint eyes, mouth and coloring with water colors. Crepe paper or bits of cloth form the clothes, and unraveled soft rope is glued on for hair. Carve the feet from wood and drill small holes so they can be glued on legs.”
In 1953 she was featured on the cover of Hobby Exchange magazine. In 1976 she sent several peanut dolls to Jimmy Carter, a peanut farmer himself from Georgia who was running for president. Daisy received a nice thank you letter from his wife, Rosalyn Carter, who “expressed enthusiasm over the figurines.”
In later life, she also composed several songs and wrote poetry.
Not completely relying on the income from her dolls, she also invested in real estate and owned an apartment house on South Kendall Avenue. Recovered from polio, she did not drive, but could often be seen about town, riding on a blue bicycle. She never married, and died Nov. 5, 1979. She was 80 years old.
The patience, creativity, and determination to overcome a crippling disease and forge a life is truly extraordinary.
