Actually it’s one month, two days, and one hundred and fifty-two years ago as I write this. We apologize for posting our Fourth of July article so late, but a big storm in June zapped our printer (which is also our scanner) and we’ve been on another road trip to New England that we just returned from. Consequently, we are acknowledging the Fourth of July in August.

I picked up this little ribbon at a flea market about a week or two before the Fourth of July this year. I paid about twenty dollars for it, and the picture of it pretty much explains what it is. It is just under seven inches in length.

What gives an antique value is often what it represents. There was a lot going on in and around Philadelphia leading up to the Fourth of July, 1863. Most importantly, Philadelphia and the rest of the United States were right in the middle of the Civil War.

The spring of 1863 had not been a good time for the Union forces. Robert E. Lee and the Army of Northern Virginia had won stunning victories at Fredericksburg and Chancellorsville, Virginia. In June, his forces had entered Pennsylvania with the hopes of bringing the North to the peace table to end the war with a negotiated peace. This would have brought about an independent Confederate States of America.

There was a very real possibility that Harrisburg and Philadelphia would end up under Southern occupation. Philadelphia was shoring up its defenses and there were calls for more militia units to defend Pennsylvania.
Fortunately, as things were looking their darkest, Union forces finally checked Lee’s forces at the Battle of Gettysburg – about 100 miles west of Philadelphia. The three day battle, which took place on July 1,2,3, was not only the bloodiest battle of the war- it was the turning point. Lee’s forces never came that far north again.

As if that weren’t enough, the city of Vicksburg, Mississippi fell to the Union forces under the command of Ulysses S. Grant on the Fourth of July, 1863. This opened up the Mississippi River to Union forces and split the confederacy in two. Vicksburg would not celebrate the Fourth of July again until World War II.

I doubt that the citizens of Philadelphia had been able to absorb all that had happened in just those few days, but there must have been a great sense of relief. When the “Friends of the Union” celebrated the Fourth of July, 1863 in Philadelphia, they were also celebrating the turning point of the war and one of the most important events in American history.

That’s a lot of history in one little ribbon found at a flea market.

The post A Patriotic Ribbon From 1863 Tells the Story of an Important Fourth of July appeared first on The Collector Gene.

The corners of the groom’s mouth are slightly upturned.  Not so the bride’s.

She looks like she might still be a teenager.  He looks nearly old enough to be her father.  The facial expression and body language speak volumes.

No one looks particularly happy here.  The flowers are quite beautiful, though.

Someone must have made a pass at a girl who wore glasses but she doesn’t seem happy about it.

Both bride and groom look desperately like they want the photo session to end.

Hopefully the photographer did not tell the bride to think of her husband-to-be as he snapped the photo.

This petite bride seems to be pondering how she’s going to tell her lanky groom to find another hair stylist.

Stiff and formal but certainly not ecstatically happy.

Standing next to his beautiful bride, the groom appears to stoically accept his fate.

Of course, it’s natural for brides and grooms to be nervous and apprehensive on their wedding day.  Most likely, they are dressed in the most expensive clothes they will ever wear with dozens upon dozens of family members and friends looking on.  It’s an occasion that calls for a certain amount of solemnity and gravity.  No one knows, at this point, what the future holds.

But what about the couples who are celebrating their golden anniversary?  Surely fifty years of working together as a team leads to happiness and gratitude…doesn’t it?

This couple looks slightly happy – or at least bemused – about the fuss generated by their golden anniversary.

In this case, the wife has seemingly enjoyed those five decades of marriage, but the husband is clearly worn out.

It doesn’t get much happier than this.  Could they be any further apart?

The post Happy Is the Bride…Perhaps – Vintage Photos of Unhappy Brides appeared first on The Collector Gene.

I’m not old enough to personally remember Foxy Grandpa, the comic character. In fact, even my parents were born too late to remember his debut on January 7, 1900 in the New York Herald, and his popularity was already waning when my mother was a toddler. Still, even without any knowledge of his comic strips or books or stage production, the minute I first encountered him, I was smitten by the cute little old guy with white hair and a bald head, round glasses, and a spiffy suit and vest.

Foxy Grandpa was the creation of Carl E. Schultze, who was born in Lexington, Kentucky in 1866. Schultze’s childhood nickname was “Bunny,” and he usually signed his cartoons as “Bunny.” He also created a cute white bunny character that often shows up alongside Foxy Grandpa. This pinback button shows the bunny and the two grandsons along with Foxy Grandpa himself.

Foxy Grandpa is right up there with the earliest of the American comic characters like the Katzenjammer Kids and the Yellow Kid. His stories revolve around those two mischievous grandsons, Chub and Bunt. While they try to trick their grandfather and play jokes on him, he turns the tables on them and foils their plots, often making them look mighty foolish in the process.

Within two years of his debut, Foxy Grandpa was so popular that a Broadway show was created with him as the central character. He was played by actor Joseph Hart. Clearly, the show had a successful run because here is a pinback button that was issued during the show’s second year, which would date it to 1903-04.

This button measures one-and-a-half inches in diameter and was made by the Whitehead & Hoag Company of Newark, NJ. It is in pristine condition and has a wonderful paper label on the back with the following information: Grandpa You’re a Wonder!/ 2nd Year/The Musical Snapshot/”Foxy Grandpa”/Book by R. M. Baker/Music by Jos. Hart.

Joseph Hart went on to play Foxy Grandpa in several Biograph short silent films. A portion of one of those films still exists and here is a link to it:

Between 1900 and 1917, Foxy Grandpa was a staple on the comic pages of several New York newspapers. More than thirty books about him were published by four different publishers during that time. And, like other popular comic characters of the day, toys and games featuring Foxy Grandpa made their way into the market. Fortunately, some survived and made their way into the hands of collectors like us. Here are two of our favorite Foxy Grandpa toys. Both are German candy containers, both have an Easter theme, and both have been in our possession for over 35 years.

The following photo shows a few more Foxy Grandpa collectibles. There’s a small jointed composition figure, a composition bobble-head figure, and a plaster container that might have been used on a desk to hold pencils.

Finally, it’s clear from this object that Foxy Grandpa was a hit with the adults as well as the kids. It’s a well-made porcelain toby mug, and while I suppose a child could have sipped his milk from it, more likely it was meant to be displayed on a knickknack shelf.

During Foxy Grandpa’s heyday, Carl Schultze lived the good life on Park Avenue. While Foxy Grandpa stories continued to be distributed by the Newspaper Feature Syndicate throughout the 1920’s, Schultze faced personal problems and mounting debts. By the 1930’s, he was down on his luck and illustrating school books through the WPA (Works Progress Administration). Sadly, when he died in 1939, the headlines said that he died a pauper.

But for a couple of decades in the early 20th Century, Bunny Schultze made us smile over the antics of an energetic little old man who could outsmart his grandsons. And he helped set the stage for other artists to create memorable, amusing comic characters. Young Walt Disney, growing up in the first decade of the 20th Century, most likely was quite familiar with Foxy Grandpa. Schultze may have had very little left to his name when he died, but hanging on the wall of his one-room apartment was a picture of Mickey and Minnie Mouse with the inscription, “For Carl E. Schultze, in admiration. Walt Disney.”

The post The Coolest Comic Grandfather – Foxy Grandpa & His Fabulous Easter Toys appeared first on The Collector Gene.

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.

The post Vintage PF Flyers – Superpowers for Kids appeared first on The Collector Gene.

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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This tenth anniversary issue of Life magazine shows the first issue with the famous Margaret Bourke White cover.

I’m sure my love affair with Life began when I was about ten years old. Unlike just about every middle class family in America in the 1940’s, 50’s, and 60’s, my family never had a subscription to Life magazine. However, my aunts and uncles did, and they would pass along their outdated copies to us when we came to visit. Indeed, I really looked forward to riding home with several stacks of magazines piled up around me in the back of the car. Life, McCall’s, Ladies Home Journal, and National Geographic were eagerly read by me even when I was still in elementary school. Sometimes I would cut the magazines up and put photos and articles in my scrap book. When I was about 13 or 14, I started making a gigantic collage of famous people’s faces, and most of the clippings came from Life.

Now you know what a weird kid I was and how my addiction to printed matter, especially magazines, began.

Early on, when Jim and I first started going to flea markets and into antique shops over forty years ago, I would be drawn to any old magazines that I saw, and if they were affordable (i.e. cheap), I would usually buy them. With thousands upon thousands of each copy sold during its heyday, old Life magazines were not hard to find. I could usually pick up nice examples from the 1940’s and 50’s, my favorite era because the magazines were bulging with fabulous advertisements and interesting articles, for fifty cents or a dollar. Once, about thirty years ago, I came upon a table at a flea market piled high with the old Life’s for a quarter each, and I bought a couple dozen.

However, that was nothing compared to what happened about ten years ago. Our county library holds a book sale a few times a year. When I first discovered this, I went crazy and was coming home with two or three boxes full of printed matter after each sale. This is not a good thing when we already have many, many boxes full of books and magazines in the basement. On this particular occasion, I was trying to behave by avoiding the sale, but Ben ended up checking it out. At lunchtime, he reported that they had “tons” of vintage Life magazines for ten cents apiece. Ten cents! Heck, that was the original cover price in the 1930’s and 40’s! The sale closed at 3 pm, so I hopped in the car and headed to the library. My willpower had crumbled.

Ben was right. Almost as soon as I walked in, I saw several piles of Life from the 1940’s and 50’s. Why they hadn’t all sold at that ridiculously low price was beyond my comprehension. Within minutes, my stack was an impressive size – and I’d only spent about $2.00. Then one of the volunteers at the book sale said the fateful words, “We have more magazines in the back if you’re interested.” Of course, I was. So I accompanied her to a large employee office/workroom, and there were about three or four eight-foot long tables just piled with Life magazines. I was stunned. It turned out that it was the entire archive that the library owned, and they had decided to get rid of it. There literally were hundreds of Life magazines from about 1937 to 1999. Obviously, it was not a complete collection. Certain issues had probably been lifted forty or fifty years ago. Others had probably been sold that morning at the book sale. Still and all, there were many, many issues from just about every year of publication.

Again, I dove in and started making a hand-selected pile, probably another $2.00’s worth. Then I couldn’t believe the words coming out of my mouth. “Would you be willing to sell all of them to me for one price?” I asked, knowing full well that if I bought them, Jim was surely going to kill me. In my mind, I thought that any price of $50 or less would be an absolute steal that I couldn’t turn down. Any figure above $50 would have caused me to hesitate and perhaps regain my sanity. Naturally, the woman said, “You can have them all for $50.”

And that’s how I came into possession of our county library’s Life magazine archive.

There was no way I could fit them all into the car on one trip. I took several boxes with me, and over the course of the next month or two, I would make a trip every week or so and pick up another five or ten boxes. Into the basement they went, and in the basement most of them still are.

Quite honestly, I have sold a few. I’ve certainly gotten my money back and then some. I’ve even given a few away as gifts. Life magazines are the perfect birthday or anniversary gift. It’s always fun to see what products were being advertised, what big stories were in the news, what the fashions looked like and what famous person might have been interviewed.

Whenever I go through the “archive” and try to choose a few magazines to get rid of, here’s what happens: First, I’ll see a great cover photo and be attracted to it.

Then I’ll see some ads that are colorful, nostalgic, or fun.

Then, invariably, there’s an interesting article to skim or scan or even read in depth. I swear to you that it’s a rare Life magazine that doesn’t have at least three or four different things going for it. And sometimes that’s what makes it difficult for me to part with some of them. They are like little weekly time capsules. Sometimes they capture an era with which I’m familiar – like the 1960’s or 70’s. More often, though, they bespeak a time that I either never lived through or was too young to remember.

It doesn’t matter. I love Life, and that’s that. I have promised that I will begin parting with them more seriously, and I will keep my promise. But will I always have some Life magazines in my possession? Yes, without a doubt.

The post My Love Affair With LIFE (Magazine) appeared first on The Collector Gene.

Sometime in the early 1960's, two trick or treaters stopped in front of the news-stand to pose for this Halloween snapshot.

What a great photo!  It combines two things I love – old magazines and Halloween.  Anyone over forty will probably admit to going out on Halloween wearing one of those lame, out-of-the-box costumes at least once during their trick-or-treating years.  It was so easy for parents.  I know I had a Minnie Mouse costume, and Jim was Donald Duck more than once. They were made of a silky, synthetic fabric that I believe was flammable.  The plastic masks were held on with thin elastic bands, but at least they were easy to flip up on top of your head for better vision when walking from house to house.

By the early sixties, Hanna-Barbera was on a roll.  Huckleberry Hound was introduced in 1958, and Yogi Bear became a break-out star in 1961.  The older kid on the right has the cool Yogi costume; his/her younger sibling appears to be wearing a more generic clown costume.

Of course, what really makes this photo for me are all of the magazines on display behind the kids.  It looks like Fidel Castro is on the cover of the “Look” magazine.  This could very well be from Halloween 1962, in which case the Cuban Missile Crisis had, literally, just ended.  The kids, however, probably don’t care.  They just want to load up on those nice, full-size candy bars that everyone got back then – and avoid the apples at all cost!

The post Happy Halloween! A Nostalgic Snapshot of a 1960’s Yogi Bear Trick or Treater appeared first on The Collector Gene.

It seems fitting that cats are associated with Halloween. We especially think of witches and their black cats. Often thought to be “familiars” to witches or malevolent assistants who could assist in the witch’s magic spells, being a black cat in Medieval Europe could lead to the loss of all nine lives in a hurry. The Pilgrims in early America weren’t too fond of them either. Owning a black cat in Salem, Massachusetts in the late 1600’s didn’t help if you wanted to avoid going to the witch trials.

Of course both witches and cats can be scary at times and both can be diabolical in their own ways. Why is it that a cat can enter a room full of people and always give the greatest affection to the person who hates cats the most? Coincidence? I think not. Why will the cat then go to the center of the room and start licking their butt in full view of everyone and look up with that “you gotta a problem with this” look. Attitude – cats are full of it.

These soft, cuddly creatures that we give unlimited access to our homes also happen to be carnivorous killing machines with sharp talons and fangs. My father used to say that if they were bigger than us they would eat us. I don’t doubt it for a second! Yet, I am a cat person. We share our home with two of them and I grew up with cats. They can show real affection on their own terms. They know where the litter box is and they are also self- cleaning. They can be a little annoying when they are hungry which is just about any time they aren’t sleeping, but who among us doesn’t enjoy eating and sleeping?

I’m just glad we’re bigger than they are.

Please enjoy these pictures of some of our cat Halloween decorations. Most are German and made in the early twentieth century. Our cats have sniffed them and approve!

A combination of candy containers, flat cardboard decorations, a Steiff black cat, celuloid roly poly, and ceramic cat.

Some more elaborate black cat candy containers (and a red cat).

Embossed cardboard fighting cats with moon.

This lovely lady wouldn’t fit on the scanner, but the main goal is for you to see her beautiful black cat friend in all of his glory.

Let’s be honest, cats don’t like to smile.  This is a more realistic interpretation of a typical cat expression.

Cardboard black cat door hanger.

Don’t try this at home with a real cat.

The post Halloween Cats appeared first on The Collector Gene.

My apologies on the flash flare. This thing wasn’t easy to photograph!

It probably isn’t much of a secret that circuses would sometimes exaggerate in their advertising. A case in point is the subject of this article. Were the Giraffe-Neck Women from Burma really the “Greatest Educational Discovery of the Century”? I doubt it.

Were their necks really THAT long? I doubt that too.

Nevertheless this circa 1930 Ringling Brothers poster has great imagery and if I were a kid back then I would be pestering my parents to drag me to the circus ASAP!

Sometimes you have something so long that you start to take it for granted. This poster has been in our collection since 1975 when we purchased it at an antique show in Atlantic City. A dealer was selling off the contents of the “Merle Evans Circus Museum”. We purchased this and several other circus posters for five dollars each. This was by far the best one, so we had a frame specially made for it and it has been hanging on the wall in various locations ever since. Merle Evans, by the way was the band director of the Ringling Brothers circus for many years.

I haven’t checked values recently but I think it was a really good investment.

I wish I had bought more.

The post Giraffe-Neck Women from Burma Circus Poster appeared first on The Collector Gene.

This photo was a recent addition to my collection.  How can anyone view it without smiling at least a little?

These men, who look to be about sixty years old – give or take a few years, are obviously good buddies.  They  visited a photography studio in Atlantic City and commemorated their vacation with this photo.

Are the bathing suits studio props or their own suits?  I guess we’ll never know, but I’m sure, based on other photos and postcard views of the era, that this is, indeed, what men in the early part of the 20th century would wear to the beach.  Made of itchy wool that clung to the body when wet and took forever to dry out, those early bathing suits seem like torture devices to us.  But in an era when even the wealthiest person sweated in the heat and humidity of summer without benefit of air conditioning, a trip to the beach and a dip in the cool waves of the ocean was a welcome respite.  And as silly as those suits look to us today, I’m sure they felt comfortable when compared to the long sleeve shirts, stiff collars, and long wool slacks that every man wore no matter how hot it was.

How do I know for sure that this was taken in 1911?  Here’s what it says on the back of the card:

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