The one toy Princess Diana wouldn’t let the princes play with
It’s been nearly 20 years since the tragic death of Princess Diana but her memory lives on in the minds of countless people who have been personally touched by the charm and warmth of the People’s Princess.
Melbourne artist and anthropologist Murray Walker still remembers Princess Di’s visit to Melbourne for Victoria’s 150th anniversary celebrations in 1985.
Murray was an exhibition curator at the Great Exhibition of Victoria at the time and guided Princess Diana and Prince Charles through the vast collection of memorabilia.
He still remembers her passing remarks about raising two young sons when the party stopped at the children’s section, where a group of golliwog toys were on display.
Murray remembers the princess saying that despite the fact she grew up with these toys, she wouldn’t allow the princes, Prince William, 3, and Prince Harry, 1, to play with them.
“She got one of the gollies in her arms and she said, ‘I’m not allowed to have gollies in the family nursery’,” Murray told the Herald Sun.
“She said they had a committee or an adviser or something, and said, ‘it’s seen to be racist to have gollies’.”
Murray also recalls Diana speaking about the difficulties of being a parent as a royal.
“She was comparing the freedom and happiness she had as a child to the very rigorous policing, if you like, of her own nursery,” he says.
“I was touched with her dilemma, of having children and how (it was) unlike the loved environment she grew up in.
“It’s one of those memories I’ve never been able to let go of.”