| Alice Doherty | |
| Birth Name: | Alice Elizabeth Doherty |
| Birth Date: | 14 March 1887 |
| Birth Place: | Minneapolis, Minnesota, U.S. |
| Death Place: | Dallas, Texas, U.S. |
| Other Names: | "The Minnesota Woolly Girl" |
Alice Elizabeth Doherty (March 14, 1887 – June 13, 1933) was an American woman born with the condition hypertrichosis lanuginosa.[1] [2] [3] [4]
Doherty was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota, with approximately two-inch long blonde hair all over her body. None of her relatives are known to have had a similar condition. She had blue eyes. Doherty had hypertrichosis lanuginosa.[2] Although this condition is very rare, other individuals were known for their similar appearances: Fedor Jeftichew ("Jo-Jo the Dog-faced Man"), Stephan Bibrowski ("Lionel the Lion-faced Man"), Jesús "Chuy" Aceves ("Wolfman"), and Annie Jones ("the bearded woman"). Hypertrichosis has many different variations, including differences in causation.
She was exhibited by her parents as a sideshow attraction from as early as the age of two. Later she was presented commercially by her mother and Professor Weller's One-Man Band throughout the Midwestern United States. She was consistently shown as a standalone exhibit in store front exhibitions. By the time she was five years old, her hair grew to about, eventually increasing to about by the time she was a teenager. Doherty was never interested in entertainment, but continued to perform to support her family, anxiously awaiting retirement.
She retired from the entertainment business in 1915 and died of bronchial pneumonia in Dallas, Texas, on June 13, 1933, aged 46.[5]