A Japanese delegation traveled to Lincoln the other day just to inspect a doll.

They bowed to officials of the University of Nebraska State Museum, who have kept the doll safe in storage on the fifth floor of Nebraska Hall, then gasped when they saw her on a table.

Miss Mie.

She is 32 inches tall. She wears a small painted smile and a pastel kimono, a wide belt, white tabi socks.

“I heard her hair is real hair,” says a women in the delegation, leaning close.

They don white gloves. They lift her kimono to inspect her feet. They lift her umbrella, her passport and her luggage and travel gear — painted in lacquer from the sap of tree. They take photo after photo.

Miss Mie, 81 years old now, was born during a time of worsening relations between the United States and Japan. She was one of 58 Ambassador dolls Japanese schoolchildren sent to American in 1927, after receiving Blue Eyed Dolls from U.S. schoolchildren.

The Japanese gasp when they see a photo of Miss Mie from 1927. She stands on a stage during a farewell party at a Japanese school.

They unfold a long letter from the Japanese children, who write how excited they are for Miss Mie to arrive in America and how they love, Nellie, their Blue Eyed Doll.

The museum holds about 150 such letters from Japanese kids. They translate the kanji on one letter as being from “The America World Children’s Friendship Association.”

Maybe some of those children are still alive. Maybe they can track them down.

There had been a contest of doll makers in Japan. Only the best could represent the country. Each winning doll was named for a location.

The delegation comes from Mie, in south-central Japan. They will pay people from the NU museum to accompany Miss Mie back to Japan next summer. She will stay for a year for restoration and exhibitions.

Though a plaque on this Ambassador doll’s base indicates she is Miss Mie, she isn’t the real one. Her identity is unknown. The dolls and bases became mixed up in 1927 while traveling across the United States for exhibitions.

But these people claim her anyway, and they came all this way for what she symbolizes:

The craftsmanship. Dolls made in that era, they say, were the best ever produced in Japan.

The history. Too many Japanese don’t look back, they say, and only care about what’s new.

And the friendship of children in an ever more dangerous world, represented in this innocent face.

Reach Colleen Kenney at 473-2655 or ckenney@journalstar.com.