Chances are Caleb is the first person you’ll meet, should you drop by the Slater family shop on Christopher Street—he’s been manning the register and stocking the shelves for Poppa since he graduated grammar school. What with Poppy’s unexpected death in February, however, Caleb now runs the shop single-handedly. True, business has never been great at the shop, and the worst financial panic since the 1830s doesn’t help matters–but, for reasons only known to him, Caleb insists he’d rather keep the shop open than seek better wages elsewhere.

When he’s not helping customers, you can find Caleb reading the daily box scores for the New York Baseball Giants, or talking sports with his friends at the White Arrow bar and pool hall. He has a tendency to call things as he sees them and is mildly distrustful of Helen and her escapades–traits that (unbeknownst to him) become pivotal to the plot as the story unfolds.

I’m all but certain Caleb began as a knockoff of Calvin from Calvin and Hobbes. His relationship with The 1890s Story though begins in 2013, when he was christened “Caleb” and inserted into the narrative as Halle’s (later Helen’s) twin brother; he worked as a newsboy around town. Later revisions saw him recast as Helen’s older brother, before becoming the middle child (and the family shopkeeper) after Mae and Poppa were added to the family between 2018 and 2020. (As an aside, his current outfit was transferred over to him from a different character in 2018). However, it wasn’t until after research on the New York Baseball Giants that Caleb’s personality and ambitions really came into form. 

In 2021, research into enslavement in northern New Jersey informed my decision to change Caleb and family to a mixed-race background, bringing to light a complicated (if incomplete and unfinished) part of American history not often told in popular 19^th century literature.  

All of Caleb’s baseball knowledge (and his frustrations with his team’s poor play) directly stems from my own obsession with the New York Yankees. Indeed, one of the most satisfying things in fleshing out Caleb’s character has been reading up on the controversies of baseball between 1890 – 1910, and relating them to the current state of the game—making for some fascinating conversations about the ethics of using “science in baseball” (read: analytics) between Caleb and his friends…

Caleb’s doll was created by my aunt for Christmas 2021, replacing his 2015 doll. His current outfit was sewn by me in 2022 (his shirt is from a different doll, from 2016).