FIVE YEARS INTO her NBA Barbie quest, a frustrated Marilyn Harvey stood up in the closing moments of her 2004 family reunion in Alabama. She grabbed the microphone and prepared to issue her loved ones an ultimatum. Out of respect for Harvey, a prep basketball pioneer in Alabama, a longtime nurse and the family matriarch, the raucous room of nearly 100 family members from across the country fell silent. Most of them knew that for years Harvey, a hoops junkie with a force-of-nature personality, had been on a mission to secure the entire NBA Barbie doll collection for her Barbie-obsessed daughter, Candice, who was then 13.
A mother's vow to find a Dallas Mavericks Barbie leads to a worldwide chase
