Why are EW’s called ‘Gollies’

Back in the fifties and sixties a popular pastime amongst the population in the UK was collecting the paper golliwogs inside each jar of Robinson’s Jams. When you had collected ten of these paper golliwogs you wrote off to Robinson’s head office enclosing your ten paper golliwogs and back would come an enamelled golliwog badge of your choice. This of course you would proudly pin on your school blazer. The more paper golliwogs you collected allowed you a choice of either a silver or for even more saving, the ultimate, a gold golliwog.

When the RN first formed the EW branch from the ranks of the communications branch in the early sixties, promotion could be fairly rapid. This caused much angst among the communication fraternity and it was reckoned that each promotion was because the recipient had saved enough paper golliwogs and had written off to Robinson’s for the next highest badge.

The golly also became a British household image through the jams and marmalades of James Robertson & Sons. From about 1910 Robertson’s, the company trade name, began to use the golly as the company’s motif. According to Robertson’s folklore, the company adopted the golly as its brand image after James Robertson’s son saw children in the United States playing with a black rag doll. Robertson’s have been credited with changing the name ‘Golliwogg’ to ‘Golly’ through its advertising slogan ‘Golly it’s Good!’.

Golly Figurines, Robertson & Sons, about 1960

In 1928 the company began to produce enamel badges of their products for customers to collect. The ‘Golly Golfer’ was the first badge offered in exchange for tokens, a system that continued until the beginning of the 21st century. The intimate relationship between the motif and the manufacturer was cemented through the placing of the product’s name on the waistcoat of the golly. During World War Two, as part of the war effort, Robertson’s ceased production of the badges in response to the government need for metal conservation. In addition to the badges, the culture of collecting in this method extended to include such items as pencils, teacloths, knitting patterns, cutlery and aprons. By 1992, 20 million gollies had been distributed by the company.
Robertson’s continued to use the golly on its products despite the protests being made in Britain and the USA against the use of such caricature images of black people. This action was part of the black consciousness and civil rights movements that swept across the world from the 1950s onwards. In the 1980s an anti-golly campaign was launched by the Camden Committee for Community Relations and was supported by the Greater London Council. These ran alongside the National Committee on Racism in Children’s Books, which started a campaign to ban the Golliwogg as a symbol and toy. The essence of the petitions against Robertson’s was that the golly image was an affront to black people. Robertson’s response to this criticism was that: ‘The Golly is part of our national tradition. An attack on it is an attack on part of British culture’ (In Jan Nederveen Pieterse, White on Black). They believed that the golly was simply a ‘loveable’ nursery character that symbolised warmth and had no connection with black people. Yet the company had forgotten that the origin of the golly was a toy that was itself called a ‘nigger doll’ – a racist term today.
As a footnote: The use of “Golly” was first recorded in 1795 as a euphemism for “God” amongst the religious, who were not allowed to blaspheme.

Whow!  All that just to find out why EW’s are called ‘Gollies’