A couple of weeks ago, we went to an antique show in Maryland that is a favorite of ours, and for me the coolest thing there was the metal Disney sign. It was for sale from one of my favorite dealers at the show. He told me that he purchased the sign at a California flea market in about 1970, when he was living there. I suspect that it probably didn’t cost him much at the time. I wouldn’t be surprised if the person he had purchased it from picked it out of the trash. That is how it made it to the East Coast. I did a little research and found that Walt Disney Productions moved to their Burbank studios in 1940, so the sign cannot be older than that – or newer than 1970, the date it was purchased by the dealer. The clue to the actual age of the sign is with the cute little character decals all over it. The decals could have been added later but I doubt it. I think it was Disney’s way of adding a little magic to everything they did, including this mundane sign. There are characters that you don’t see much anymore such as the tortoise from The Tortoise and the Hare (1934) or Hiawatha (1937). The newest characters that I see are Uncle Scrooge and Bongo, the bear who appeared in Fun and Fancy Free. Both date to 1947.

Based on all of this, I think the sign dates to about 1950 – give or take a couple of years. If that is the case, Walt Disney Productions would have been working on such projects as Cinderella, Alice in Wonderland, and Peter Pan. This sign may have stood guard when Davy Crockett was being filmed and when Disneyland was in the planning stages. It is also when the great man himself – Walt Disney- was still in charge of his kingdom. There is no shortage of vintage Disney items out there, but I suspect it will be a long time before I see another one of these. Leave it to Disney to find a way to say “Go Away” and make you feel happy about it.

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I make no secret that I am on an endless quest to recapture my childhood. Was childhood really better in the 1950’s and 1960’s than it was (or is) for later generations? Most of us who were alive at that time would say yes. Most of you who were unfortunate enough to be born later would probably disagree. Of course, you would be wrong, but there’s not a lot you can do about it.

Besides playing with all our “Made in USA” toys, we had a lot of time to go outside and “run around”. Parents weren’t quite so worried that every waking minute of childhood be taken up with some organized activity designed to make you outstanding enough to get into an Ivy League school. Since we also didn’t have video games to keep us quiet, we were encouraged to go outside and entertain ourselves.

This well-worn pair of PF Flyers has been preserved for over half a century.

Anyway, running around is actually the point of this article. Running around in PF Flyers that is! Brand loyalty meant something in those days, and when it came to “sneakers,” you were most likely a “Keds” or “PF Flyers” kid. I was definitely in the latter category.

PF Flyers were manufactured by the tire company B. F. Goodrich and first introduced in 1937. PF stood for “Posture Foundation” which meant there was a wedge inside the shoe that more evenly distributed your weight. The promise was that you could “run faster and jump higher” with a pair of “PF’s” strapped to your feet. I totally believed this to be true! Putting on a new pair of PFs felt like you were walking on a cloud, and running as fast as you could to test out your new superpowers was part of the routine. Unfortunately, one of the more negative realities of growing up in the 1950’s and ‘60’s is that dog poop seemed to be everywhere. Once, while racing down the street, I managed to find a fresh pile with my brand new sneakers. What a mess!

I found this vintage and well-worn pair of boy’s sneakers at a flea market last year. Why they got saved is anyone’s guess. They are marked Hood PF Flyers. I found out that BF Goodrich purchased Hood Rubber Company in 1929 and the Hood named was used until the late 1950’s on some PF Flyers. I also found a reference indicating that the Hood name was used in 1962. I think it’s safe to say these sneakers date from the late 1950’s to the early 1960’s.

Of all the things I have collected, I think these old sneakers represent the essence of boyhood in the middle of the twentieth century as well as anything. After all, no matter how humble your upbringing, just about everyone had a pair of worn out sneakers at some point in their youth.

PF Flyers sponsored The Mickey Mouse Club, and here’s a cool cardboard counter-top display piece from the 1950’s.

Here’s another PF Flyers cardboard advertising display for another, lesser-known Disney show called Adventure Time.

Based on the girl’s hair style as well as the style of shoe, this cardboard Keds advertising display piece probably dates to the 1920’s or 30’s.

This large pin-back button shows “Leave It to Beaver” star Jerry Mathers promoting Keds, the main competition for PF Flyers.

PF Flyers are once again available thanks to the company New Balance. At least there’s less dog poop to worry about these days.

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As an artist it is always my goal to own original art work from people I admire.  Of course, original art tends to get very expensive.  The two pieces I am showcasing today were relatively inexpensive, probably because they are unsigned, but their provenance is what I liked most.  They are a fascinating snippet of Disney history that a lot of people don’t know about, and kind of go against the family friendly, squeaky clean, Disney image.  This post is a little bit NSFW (Not Safe For Work since we don’t tend to post this kind of stuff on The Collector Gene).  You have been warned.  Don’t blame me if your boss catches you reading this nerdy article (Bet you never thought you would read Disney and NSFW in the same sentence!).

Disney animators worked long hours every day tirelessly animating those classic films of your childhood.  Sometimes those guys needed a break, and what did they do?  They drew pictures for fun.  It’s what working artists do.  They create art for someone else all day, and then in their time off they create art for themselves.  The Disney animators were known to draw caricatures of each other fairly regularly.  They would slip them under each other’s office doors to egg each other on, or comment on the events of a day.  These caricatures are highly sought after by Disney collectors, especially if they come from Disney’s Nine Old Men, his top group of animators from the 30’s- the 60’s.

I do not own one of these caricatures (though I happily would), but what I own is another fun tradition from the studios in the 40’s and 50’s.  Pinup drawings.  We all know the classic pinup girl paintings from the 40’s and 50’s.  Varga girls and Bette Page are well known today.  Well, the young men working at Disney Studios were just as fascinated by these paintings as any other red blooded heterosexual male of the time, but when they just drew them it happened to be with a Disney twist.

This one ain’t too naughty.  Well, on today’s standards it ain’t so bad.

Here’s the NSFW picture.  Again, not too bad on today’s standards but pretty racy for the time.

Okay okay.  Insert cartoon wolf howling and stomping his foot on the floor with his tongue hanging out.  Firstly, you might notice the holes in the edge of the paper.  These lovely ladies were drawn on perforated animation paper.  That’s the paper the guys at Disney had laying around.  These are beautiful quick sketches by a Disney artist who was happy enough with his work to add a little water color as well which makes them that much more beautiful and dynamic.  They have a ton of energy and life to them, where you can almost see their movement as they strike their permanent pose.  Clearly this artist was well versed in pinup imagery.

Unfortunately my Disney pinups are unsigned.  There is reference in the book “Disney Animation: The Illusion of Life” by Frank Thomas and Ollie Johnston (two of Disney’s Nine Old Men) that references artist Fred Moore drawing pinups in studio, but looking at his work I don’t think these are his.

I have seen a signed Ollie Johnston pinup on eBay once before, so we know more than one artist was drawing these pictures.  In fact the eyes on both of my drawings remind me of the eyes on the Centaurettes in Fantasia, which were animated by Frank Thomas and Ollie Johnston, so it is possible one of them could have done these.  This is probably wishful thinking on my part, but I’ll tell myself it’s a possibility.  I can only attribute the works at this point, but it is fun to think an important animator could have worked on them.

I find these fictional portraits to be very beautiful and well executed.  Frankly, I see most pin up drawings and paintings that way.  I also love that they represent a seedier side to the Disney animator.  Yes, Disney animation is family friendly and made for “children of all ages”, but I don’t think the goal of the artists was ever to make things perfect and squeaky clean.  I think they were artists trying to create the best possible quality of work that was possible at the time they were working.  The family friendly nature of things was more for marketing to make the money to create such elaborate and beautiful animation.  I think just like most young men of their day, they enjoyed thinking about naked women as much as the next guy.  Remember, Playboy didn’t come out until the 50’s, and these drawing seem to predate dirty magazines.  What’s an artistic lad to do but to draw naked women for himself?  It was a simpler time.  No one associates Disney with gratuitous sex, which makes these pieces of Disney history all the more interesting to me.  They are proof that these guys were human and had normal human flaws and needs just like you and me.  I guess when you stare at pictures of cutesy animals all day, you gotta do something to bring yourself back to reality.

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But the thing that just about any kid wanted more than anything else was the hat. We all wanted a coonskin cap with a genuine raccoon tail hanging out the back. After all, that’s what set Davy apart from everyone else. I got mine that Christmas of 1955 and it was the genuine one that came in the box with Fess Parker’s picture on it. The box called it the “Official Davy Crockett Indian Fighter Hat”.

Inside the box was a hat made of real animal fur. Let’s just say that 1955 was not a good year to be a raccoon. The term “Indian Fighter” would not survive our current wave of “political correctness” either. My original hat disappeared years ago – probably thrown out after my head got too big for it and the fad had come and gone. Fortunately about three years ago I was able to purchase another one from its original owner, a man who apparently never wrecked any of his toys.

As with many old toys from my youth, the box was almost as good as the toy. In the case of the Davy Crockett hat, it was the only way to tell it was the real deal. I remember that my Davy Crockett hat had a round cardboard picture of Fess Parker attached to it which I suspect was detached from my current example years ago to make it look more realistic. The man I bought it from, however, claims that it never had anything attached to it.

Disney would go on to make two more episodes for the Davy Crockett series and edit four of the five episodes into two feature length movies (in 1955 and 1956) but the fad had run its course.
Soon Disney would give us “Zorro.” The sign of the “Z” could soon be found everywhere.

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Well, what I collect involves a lot of characters from the 1980s and 1990s, and to cash in on the holiday spirit, many of these characters appeared in various Christmas specials or comics or whatever. From He-Man to the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, there were a fair number of idols from my childhood who donned their gay Christmas apparel for the sake of my amusement.

It wasn’t until a few years ago when I rented my first house that I had enough space to really go crazy with my own Christmas decorations. A wreath and two three-foot-tall Christmas trees filled with ornaments just weren’t going to cut it though. I needed something BIG, a standout piece that said it was time to celebrate the holidays while also celebrating my everyday nostalgic existence.

I made that find at a flea market that fall for a whopping $10.

Walking in a science fiction wonderland…

This large cardboard display stands about four feet tall and a little over feet wide if it’s folded out flat. It’s a winter wonderland populated with some of Disney’s classic characters, from Mickey and Goofy and Chip and Dale to Tron and V.I.N.C.E.N.T. from Black Hole. Wait…what?

These days, Disney is laying claim to all sorts of hot properties, including the entire Star Wars and Marvel universes. Back in the early 1980s, though, the Mouse House only dipped its toes into nerdy properties after the blockbuster success of Star Wars. Tron was only a moderate success, while The Black Hole barely turned a profit on its $20 million budget, the most expensive movie made by Disney at that point in time. These two properties weren’t profitable or popular enough to continue pursuing, but they had enough of a cult following to be remembered fondly.

The back of this display says Walt Disney Home Video, so my guess is that this is one part of a massive store display to promote Disney home videos in the early 1980s. Tron was first released on home video in 1983, so I think this is from around that time. If Tron and V.I.N.C.E.N.T. were not on display, I don’t think I could date it that specifically, although the other Disney characters are very reminiscent of how they looked in the 1980s.

Obviously, my main reason for buying the display was those two center characters. I usually place this in my living room around the holidays, and for some of my friends, it’s the first decoration they see in my house.

Since then, I’ve added many more items to my “pop culture Christmas” collection, but this was always the starting point, and I am thrilled that what was once a disposable store display has become a holiday tradition for me.

The post Have a Very Disney Christmas with Mickey, Goofy, Tron, and V.I.N.C.E.N.T. appeared first on The Collector Gene.

The devil is in the details as they say and the closer I looked at the details of this piece, the more excited I was starting to become.  I asked the dealer the price and was pleased to hear that it was only $20.  I also asked the dealer if he had any idea where it came from and all he could tell me is that it came out of a house sale in North Jersey – not much help there.

What I noticed that I thought was unusual, among other things, was that it was in an asymmetrical frame.  Now if you think about it – making an asymmetrical frame is not the easiest thing to do. Whoever did it would have to be a pretty good carpenter.  I also noticed that the background was painted using an airbrush along with hand painted details.  That’s not the easiest thing to do and certainly not typical of a mass produced decoration.  The most obvious part, of course, is Donald Duck himself and his furry friends, who are getting Donald all tangled up.  This was all hand done and carefully cut out perfectly in every detail.  It is also beautifully painted by what I suspect was animation paint.  Donald is mounted about a half inch in front of the background giving the piece a three dimensional effect.  Also, every Disney piece I have ever seen is marked with a copyright – and this is not.

Here is a close up of some of the figures.  Notice the incredible jigsaw work around the dog leash and small detailed areas.  Also, notice the airbrushed background.  The paint on the figures has extremely fine detail, and the paint job has next to no brush strokes.

The back of the piece has no markings to speak of, which is very unusual for a Disney piece.

There is sloppy paint and ink on the back of the piece, which suggests that this piece was never meant to be sold to the public and that this piece was in no way mass produced.  It truly is a mystery piece.

So what have I found?  Well I still don’t know exactly.  What I think I have found was something created in house at Walt Disney Studios to be used as a wall decoration possibly at the Walt Disney Studios or somewhere else with strong Disney connections.  It could have simply hung on the wall in an office or hallway or possibly been some sort of decoration at Disneyland.  The artwork also reminds me of cover art on the Donald Duck comics of the era.  Some connection there perhaps – who knows?

Whatever it is, it is one of the coolest Disney pieces I have ever found.

I would be thrilled to hear from our readers if they have any ideas about this Disney mystery.

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A giant, new, 10,000 square foot building with no personality whatsoever, it didn’t look like the kind of place where any antique bargain could be found.  However, as we know from experience, an antique hunter can never tell where a great find will surface, so in we went.  Many of the 120 dealers inside dealt with the kind of antiques and collectibles we like – toys, advertising, political items, paper things, holiday decorations, etc.  For the most part, they knew their prices, too.  However, every dealer offered a minimum of a ten percent discount, and many were offering twenty percent off, so that made the prices much more appealing.

We walked out with three items that we were quite happy about:  a Roosevelt-Truman bumper sticker from 1944, a plastic patriotic WWII pin with an eagle, a shield, and the word “Son” on it, and a large, approximately five-inch tall bisque long-billed Donald Duck figurine.

Jim learned early on in his political items collecting that Truman pieces are relatively rare, especially among 20^th century candidates.  He had joked before the trip that he hoped to find a Truman piece in Missouri.  Lo and behold, there was the Roosevelt-Truman bumper sticker.  The price of $30 may seem steep, but it’s the first one Jim has ever seen.  After all, bumper stickers aren’t the type of thing usually saved for posterity.  A nice, large Truman button for $30 would have been better, but collectors know to take what they can get.

For the past several years, both Jim and I have been looking for affordable WWII home front collectibles.  As the “Greatest Generation” passes on, the younger generations are becoming more fascinated by this dramatic period in history and more appreciative of what their parents and grandparents went through and accomplished.

I don’t know how many women actually wore the patriotic jewelry from the 1940’s that I see at flea markets and in antique shops, but it’s very interesting and colorful.  I thought that this pin made of early plastic and accented with sparkling jewels was a good buy at $12.  Obviously, it was intended to be worn by a mother whose son was in the service.

The most expensive item we bought was the bisque long-billed Donald Duck.  This jaunty guy stands relatively tall at about five inches.  His paint is excellent (Many of these bisque figurines have severely faded paint.) and he’s marked “Walt Disney” and “Made in Japan.”  Donald Duck had a long bill for only a few years.  He started out that way in 1934, but it was already shrinking by 1937, so it’s pretty easy to date these figurines.  We especially liked this Donald because we don’t ever remember seeing one this size playing a violin.  He cost $58.  That may seem expensive, but we’ve seen comparable pieces for more than $100 on numerous occasions.

Lesson to be learned from our experience at W. D. Pickers:  Don’t overlook large, interstate antique malls.  There may not be as many bargains as can be found at a flea market, but good quality items at affordable prices are not that unusual.

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If you are like me, your first thought at reading the company name “Randotti” is that it is an Italian company.  It seriously sounds like an Italian name to me.  The company was actually created, however, by the Smith’s.  That is, Randy and Dotti Smith to be exact (Get it? Randy and Dotti … Randotti.  It makes sense).  I could regurgitate the history of the Randotti Company, but the best way to learn about Randy Smith is to read his biography here on a website created by Randy’s son that is dedicated to the Smith family legacy.

The story of this small company is amazing to me.  They made a sustainable business out of creating souvenirs for Disneyland, and Disneyland only (later Disney World as well).  It just goes to show how successful Disneyland was.  Randotti skulls come in several different sizes, and some are even a little bit more specific to rides in the parks.  For example, there is a skull with an eye patch made for Pirates of the Caribbean.  The company also produced tikis, statuary, and tomb stones for The Haunted Mansion.  When I first learned about Randotti skulls, I thought that they didn’t start selling them in the parks until the creation of Pirates of the Caribbean and The Haunted Mansion, but they began selling souvenirs in the parks in 1956, just one year into Disneyland’s existence.  The earliest Randotti products are marked only with an “rj”, but the late 60’s skulls forward are very clearly marked and dated.

I think these skulls are beautifully sculpted and cast, and I can understand why they were so popular as souvenirs, and why they are still highly sought after today. I have to admit, though, I can’t imagine carrying one of these around the park with me all day.  The skull I have is just shy of being life sized, and is cast in solid plaster.  I actually weighed it, and it’s about five pounds.   I know that isn’t that much, but still, it goes to show that people liked these things so much that they would slightly inconvenience themselves by carrying a five-pound weight around Disneyland all day in order to own one.

One of the coolest features about Randotti skulls is that they glow in the dark, and the glow feature works as well today as it did in 1974 when my skull was created.  I can only imagine how cool it must have looked to see an entire display of these guys in a souvenir stand at Disneyland at night.

Randotti products are highly sought after today by Disney theme park collectors, especially with collectors of Pirates of the Caribbean and The Haunted Mansion.  They may not be based on any specific characters or attractions at Disneyland, but for those who visited the parks between 1956 and, I believe, sometime in the ‘80’s, they were a very memorable staple of the souvenir stands in Adventureland, New Orleans Square, and in the Main Street Magic Shop.  Randotti souvenirs are a rare example of Disney theme park merchandise created by an outside source that are just as highly prized as many of the official Disney products of their day.

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The 1970’s was a strange decade for Disney.  Walt himself had passed away in 1966, and the company struggled to regain its footing after he was gone.  Not everything Disney did in the ‘70’s was bad, but the quality just wasn’t quite what it had been in previous decades.  Because of these struggles, I think Walt Disney Productions failed to market its 1970’s features half as well as it had marketed movies in the past.  A prime example of this was 1971’s Bedknobs and Broomsticks.  It was a major motion picture with a decent cast of colorful characters, and yet only one toy was ever made for the film.  That toy was the Bedknobs and Broomsticks Action Bed.

This toy was made by Horsman in 1972, and was based on the magic bed in Bedknobs and Broomsticks.  I don’t know if Horsman ever planned to make dolls of any of the other characters from the movie, but by not making anything else they really limited the play value of this toy.  The bed is battery powered.  When you switch it on, it rolls across the floor, and when it bumps into things, it switches direction and keeps going.  A bed alone would have been super lame, so they did produce a single doll that came with it, a doll of Angela Lansbury’s character in the movie, Mrs. Price.

I know what you are thinking. That doll looks exactly like Angela Lansbury!  No?  Well, it was the ‘70’s, and toy companies really didn’t care if they made their toys look exactly like the person they were representing.  I guess kids had more imagination back them and didn’t need their doll to look exactly like Angela Lansbury.  Personally, I think the fact that it really looks nothing like Angela Lansbury adds to the charm and wackiness of the toy.  At least they got the outfit sort of right so you have some idea who this doll is supposed to be.

My example, which my brother gave me for Christmas a few years ago, came with a messed up box.  I still have some panels from the box, but my example is basically a loose, but unplayed-with example.  Still, it is a very rare toy, so I’ll take what I can get.  Honestly, I wanted a loose example anyway, so it all worked out.  The box is all plastic except for a cardboard base for the bed to sit on, so it is very fragile.  Boxed examples do come up every now and again though because I believe this toy was a slow seller, and a lot of the existing examples are old store stock or simply never got played with.  You know, it’s the type of toy a grandparent or weird aunt who doesn’t know what you are really into gives you, and you politely thank them and then shove the toy in a closet and forget about it.

Let’s face it, not every kid in 1972 was jonesing for an Angela Lansbury action figure, and with no other characters from the movie to choose from, I think this toy was pretty much a flop.  However, it is a fascinating little piece of history from the time when the Disney Company was going through its awkward post-Walt Disney phase.  Honestly, Bedknobs and Broomsticks is not a bad movie.  It is better than a lot of the live action movies Disney had produced in decades prior to the 1970’s.  Unfortunately, it exists in the time period between The Jungle Book and The Little Mermaid though, so it doesn’t really get the attention it deserves.

Today this toy appeals to Disney fans as well as collectors of TV and movie dolls and battery-op toys, so it is fairly desirable.  It also appeals to people with cheeky senses of humor who giggle at the thought of Angel Lansbury on her “action bed”.  Even though I enjoy Disneyana, I would be lying if I said that my sense of humor didn’t factor in to why I wanted this toy.

The Bedknobs and Broomsticks Action Bed is a prime example of “What were they thinking?” marketing.  Only making a toy of one character from a movie with a large ensemble cast – what were they thinking?  Choosing Angela Lansbury instead of the relatable-to-children kid characters from the movie –  what were they thinking?  Making a toy of a mature woman on a vibrating action bed – seriously, what were they thinking?!?  The Bedknobs and Broomsticks Action Bed certainly is a special unicorn galloping through the vast field of Disney collectibles.

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