The Tom was uniquely American, but the culture of segregation in the United States made its way into English advertising in the grotesque form of the Golliwog. Like Aunt Jemima, this red-lipped gnome and superstar spokescharacter has roots in the minstrelsy. Created by Florence Kate Upton, the Golliwog got its start as the star of a series of books for children—based on a minstrel doll given to Upton as a child—and then gained fame as a sort of black-face answer to the teddy bear. Gollies were hugely popular with kids in Europe at the turn of the century; Nabokov rhapsodizes about his in Speak, Memory.

In 1910, a British jam maker named Robertson's began to feature the Golliwog on its jars and in its ads, a campaign that would last for decades. When the company offered brooches and pins to consumers who sent in proof-of-purchase tokens, Golliwog collecting became a British craze. According to Robertson's, more than 20 million Golly pieces were eventually mailed out.