The history of the ragdoll began in California, USA in 1963.
Ann Baker was the originator of the breed. Her neighbour had a beautiful white angora-type cat, called Josephine. Josephine was a half-wild cat which roamed freely outdoors all the time and had kittens with different males. One day she was hit by a car and left injured on the road. After a couple of days she was taken to the University animal hospital. She totally recovered from the accident and after this event she started having kittens which were really big and had wonderful temperaments. Ann Baker got very interested in Josephine and her kittens and asked for permission to mate her with a birman-type male and keep the resulting kittens herself. Her wish came true and this is how the ragdoll started developing little by little.

Why call this fascinating breed a ragdoll? Everybody knows that the children´s toy, rag doll is soft, floppy and a pleasure to handle. All of Josephine´s kittens were just like this after her accident.

Ragdolls are ideal indoor cats because they are very calm and deeply devoted to their human companions. One thing that makes ragdolls differ from any other cat breed is their ability to totally relax their muscles when being handled, hence the name ragdoll. Many people say that ragdolls think that they are actually dogs, because they love to retrieve things and you can teach various tricks to them. Ragdolls insist on participating in every single thing you might be doing: cleaning, cooking, taking a shower, going to the toilet, sauna etc. They also have a charming habit of lying exactly in your way, in the very center of your attention.

The disposition of ragdoll is the main factor that charms anybody, they just melt your heart. Ragdolls are extremely social, intelligent and also lazy cats which require a lot of love and attention. Even though they are semi-longhair cats, their coat does not require much work. Usually a weekly grooming is all that is needed because their coat does not mat so easily.

Ragdolls mature very slowly. Just when you thought your ragdoll has grown into his full size, he will surprise you and grow even more. Ragdolls usually reach their full size, coat and coloring at about 3-4 years old. An adult ragdoll female usually weighs between 4-7 kilos and adult male between 5-10 kilos. Ragdoll was featured in the Guinness Book of Records in the early 80´s as the biggest cat in the world.

Ragdoll is a heavily built, muscular cat which has a slightly forward tilted walking style, because the back legs are longer. The head is a broad modified wedge, and the ears are large at base, situated far from each other and tilted forward. Their eyes are always blue, the deeper the better. Their tail is very long and bushy, the paws are big and round and tufted between each toe.

There are 3 different ragdoll patterns: bicolor, colorpoint and mitted. Bicolor must have a white inverted `V´ on the mask, all legs and stomach should be white.

Colorpoint has fully colored legs and mask, no white spots are allowed. Mitted must have a white chin, white mittens on the front legs and white boots on the back legs. There must be a white stripe going along the stomach from the bib to the tail. Mitteds can also have a white stripe on the nose/on the forehead.

Ragdolls come in 4 different traditional colors: seal, blue, chocolate and lilac. The new ragdoll colors are: red, cream and tortie and the new pattern is tabby; also known as lynx. All colors and patterns are recognized with full Championship status in FIFe.