On February 19, Cleveland city council member Cornelius P. Watkins convened a press conference at the Habersham County Public Library to formally raise concerns about the programming direction of BabyLand General Hospital, the Underwood Street institution at which, since 1978, Cabbage Patch Kids have been — in the institution's own terminology — "born." Councilman Watkins, in a prepared eleven-minute statement, described what he characterized as "a departure from the institution's original hospitality mission" and called for a formal review by the BabyLand Board of Directors. A representative for BabyLand General declined to comment on the councilman's statement, citing the institution's policy of not engaging with elected officials on programming matters outside the designated community-input process. The Bavarian Brainrot newsroom asked six Cleveland-area residents, photographed in person on the sidewalk outside BabyLand General on Underwood Street between 1:00 and 3:20 p.m. Saturday, what they make of the question.

Dorothy Klink, age 71, retired registered nurse, photographed on the bench directly outside BabyLand General's main entrance, Underwood Street, Saturday at 1:06 p.m.

"I was at this hospital — I understand why people struggle with that word in this context, but I use it the way the institution uses it — I was here when it was still the Babyland Original Space. That was 1982. My daughter was six. She received a Cabbage Patch doll. It was a girl. They named her Violet. My daughter is now 50 and Violet is in a display case in her living room in Gainesville. What I will say about the question of politics is that I come here because this place has never, in my forty-four years of coming here, made me feel that I had chosen the wrong side of anything. It is a place where you watch a plastic doll get handed to a child and the child believes it. That is what this place is. If that has changed, I would be very sorry. I have not, personally, observed it to have changed. But I am also 71 and visit only on Saturdays in February, so my sample size is limited."

Marcus Odom, age 34, middle school PE teacher, photographed near the BabyLand General parking-lot entrance, Saturday at 1:38 p.m.

"I grew up with Cabbage Patch Kids. I had two of them. My parents got them for Christmas 1991 when they were still somewhat hard to find. I am here today because my nephew is visiting from Chattanooga and his mother — my sister — asked me to bring him. I want to be honest with you: I had not followed the Cornelius Watkins press conference before you mentioned it. I don't know enough about what specifically changed to say whether the change is political or whether Councilman Watkins is reacting to something that isn't actually there, which is a thing that also happens in local politics. What I can say is that, inside, it feels the same as it did when I was a kid. The nurses are in the same scrubs. The dolls are still in the same kind of cases. My nephew cried when they handed him his doll, and I think he meant it. That seems like the baseline that matters."

Pamela Yount, age 58, real estate agent, photographed in front of the BabyLand General sign on Underwood Street, Saturday at 2:02 p.m.

"I am going to say something that I think is important, which is that the institution has been here since 1978, and this town has changed in a hundred ways since 1978, and BabyLand has changed with it in some ways and not changed in others. And the question of which changes are 'political' and which are just 'the world has moved on' is not a question with a clean answer. I was at the Cornelius press conference. He is a serious person. His concern is, as I understand it, specific to a new exhibit the hospital opened in January. I have seen the exhibit. I thought it was fine. I thought it was appropriate. I recognize that reasonable people have reasonable disagreements about what 'appropriate' means in a setting like this, and I would not dismiss Cornelius's concern as nothing. I would say only that I am not, personally, devastated by the exhibit, and that the core of what this place does — the birth, the naming, the whole ceremony — that part seems, to me, unchanged."

Walter Grubb, age 66, owner, Grubb's Hardware, Chattahoochee Strasse, Cleveland, photographed across the street from BabyLand General, Saturday at 2:19 p.m.

"My hardware store has been in this family for forty years. I do not follow the BabyLand programming calendar closely. I follow it the way a person follows the news about an institution in their town — you catch what comes across. What I caught, from the Cornelius press conference, was that there is a new exhibit and the exhibit has a viewpoint. My personal opinion about exhibits with viewpoints is that they are fine in museums that are understood to have viewpoints, and they are more complicated in places that are understood to be for children of all backgrounds. BabyLand is a place for children of all backgrounds. That is, historically, the one thing everyone in this town has agreed on about BabyLand. If the exhibit changes that, I would share Cornelius's concern. If it doesn't, I think the press conference may have been premature. I have not seen the exhibit. I will probably go see the exhibit."

Tina Carmichael, age 41, stay-at-home parent, photographed with a stroller outside BabyLand General's side entrance, Saturday at 2:44 p.m.

"I grew up with Cabbage Patch Kids. I loved them. I mean, I truly loved them, the way a child loves a thing that feels alive to them. I brought my daughter today because I wanted her to have what I had, which was the experience of watching a nurse in scrubs tell you that your doll had been born and was waiting for you. She had that experience, and she cried, and it was, honestly, one of the best afternoons I have had in a long time. I heard about Cornelius's press conference from a friend in Gainesville. I came in, and I walked through the whole exhibit he mentioned, and I came out the other side, and I thought: I don't know what the fuss is. I thought the exhibit was tasteful. I thought it fit. But I also understand that I am a particular type of person with a particular set of views, and that another person of equally good faith might have walked through the same exhibit and felt something different. What I will say is that the doll-birth ceremony was, as it always has been, completely outside the exhibit area, and it was exactly as I remembered it."

Horace Simms, age 79, retired, photographed seated on a folding lawn chair he had brought from his vehicle, Underwood Street parking area, Saturday at 3:11 p.m.

"I have been coming to this hospital since it opened. Nineteen seventy-eight. My wife and I drove up from Gainesville that first year because she had read about it in a magazine and she wanted to see it. We came back fourteen times over the years — once for each grandchild, and a few extra times just because we liked to come. My wife passed in 2019. I come now because she would want me to. I do not come to see the exhibits. I come to watch the ceremony. I sit in the back row and I watch the ceremony. I have been watching it for forty-seven years and it has not, in any way that matters to me, changed. The nurse still announces the birth. The child still receives the doll. The doll is still wrapped in the blanket. I am not in a position to speak to anything that happens on the exhibit side. I know the ceremony. The ceremony is the point."

Bavarian Brainrot sought comment from BabyLand General Hospital's public affairs contact on the substance of Councilman Watkins's February 19 press conference. BabyLand's representative declined to respond on the record, noting that "the appropriate forum for community input on programming is our biannual Community Advisory Board meeting, the next of which is scheduled for April 14." Councilman Watkins did not respond to a request for follow-up comment by press time.

— Romi Fitzgerald