Ephemera

You are currently browsing the archive for the Ephemera category.

1939-1940 New York World’s Fair Collectibles

July 18, 2011 in Ephemera, Miscellaneous Antiques by admin | No comments

Nembhard N. Culin poster for the 1939 New York World's Fair

Nembhard N. Culin poster for the 1939 New York World's Fair

Building the World of Tomorrow at the New York Fair – A History of  New York’s 1939 Fair, the Trylon & Perisphere, and the astonishing array of  World’s Fair collectibles

War in Europe and the Depression at home didn’t stop New York city fathers from hosting their first full scale World’s Fair. Many saw it as a way to generate income through tourism as with Chicago’s 1933-34 Century of Progress.  The N.Y. Fair, while not a commercial success generated the iconic Trylon & Perisphere and hundreds if not thousands of collectible souvenirs.

1939-40 N.Y. World’s Fair History

In 1935, New York’s city leaders began talking about the possibility of a New York fair for 1939.  This year was an appropriate choice, as it was the 150th anniversary of the inauguration of George Washington at Federal Hall in New York City.  Some leaned towards a historically oriented fair, but ultimately, using Chicago’s Century of Progress as a model, the ’39 fair was themed “Building the World of Tomorrow.”   The design board included  visionaries of modernism  Norman Bel Geddes, Raymond Loewy, Henry Dreyfuss, and Walter Dorwin Teague.  The architecture of the fair continued the use of the streamlined art deco forms that had dominated the Chicago fair five years earlier.

New York Fair in Flushing Meadows

Robert Moses, the commissioner of city parks, sold the board on his choice of site.  Flushing Meadows, 1,216 acres of marshy wasteland the city used as a dump, was referred to in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby as “. . . as valley of ashes. . bound on one side by a small, foul river.”  Moses hoped that the reclaimed land would become the future home of Flushing Meadows Park when the fair was over. Unfortunately for the New York, the 45 million attendees spent considerably less than the $67 million the fair had cost.

Trylon & Perisphere and International Exhibits

The Trylon, a 610 foot tower, and the 180 foot diameter Perisphere became the signature structures of the fair, and may be the most recognizable of all World’s Fair icons.  The empty Trylon was connected via a spiral walkway called the Helicline to the Perisphere, which housed an exhibit called Democracity.

Considering the state of affairs in Europe, a surprisingly large number of nations participated in the 1939 fair. A total of 60 countries and international organizations had a presence in Flushing Meadows.  Conspicuous by its absence was Germany-Adolf Hitler had been offended by detrimental comments made by the Mayor of New York, and was saving his time and money for less wholesome endeavors, as the world would soon see.

Set of 1939 New York World's Fair Canada Dry soda glasses in the original box

Set of 1939 New York World's Fair Canada Dry soda glasses in the original box

1939-1940 World’s Fair Souvenirs

World’s Fairs were tourist destinations, and as such, today’s collectors can choose from a broad range of destination type souvenirs as well as brochures, train schedules, and memorabilia having to do with daily operations of the fair.

For the New York World’s Fair of 1939-1940, souvenirs included ashtrays, coasters, place mats, snow globes, pillow covers, teapots, vases, soda glasses, plates, silver spoons, trays, jigsaw puzzles, salt & peppers, pen knives, thermometers, jewelry boxes, dolls, compacts, match safes, tumblers, tea cups, letter openers, tie clips, and more.  Manufacturers offered their own commemoratives as well, among them Heinz who distributed pickle pins, Planter’s Peanuts producing pin back buttons and special tins, and Kodak offering a special edition camera.  A large majority of these give-aways feature the likeness of the Trylon and Perisphere such as this still bank.

Today’s Prices for 1939-40 World’s Fair Collectibles

Prices are reasonable for almost every kind of fair collectible.  Postcards range from $1-2 each.  A set of five plastic coasters might cost $15-20, and teapots sell for anywhere between $50-80.  A snow globe recently sold on eBay for $58, and a Trylon & Perisphere thermometer in Bakelite brought $35.

-Article by p4A contributing editor Susan Cramer.

Reference & Further Recommended Reading:

To search the Prices4Antiques antiques reference database for valuation information on hundreds of thousands of antiques and fine art visit our homepage www.prices4antiques.com

Gods & Generals: Civil War Personalities & Collecting

May 17, 2011 in Ephemera by admin | No comments

Ninth plate tintype of an young Confederate soldier with a Bowie knife

Ninth plate tintype of an young Confederate soldier with a Bowie knife

Is it just me or did we once seem to be a much more interesting country? The Civil War is full of amazing personalities and it’s no wonder that cdv (carte de visite) photographs of the key players became some sort of 19th-century version of baseball cards, with people filling albums with the faces of men they’d only read about in papers. There’s Grant, the lifelong soldier, the workhorse of the Civil War (memorialized in this bust) whose perseverance won him the war and the White House, and Lee, the quintessential eloquent Southern gentleman whose devotion to his men made him a living legend and whose letters command large prices, but there are countless others like Joshua Chamberlain, George McClellan, Robert Gould Shaw, Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson, P.G.T. Beauregard, John Hunt Morgan, who are still telling their part of the story through the artifacts in the database.

Of course, there are so many unknowns too, men who have long since been left nameless or faceless by history, but their stories are no less compelling. The unknown Confederate soldier pictured above bravely sports a Bowie knife, while this Bowie knife belonged to a Union man who shot himself while recovering from illness in the hospital. The photographica category of the p4A database is filled not just with the cdvs of well-known officers, but also with the now-unknown rank and file, some facing the camera with good-natured bravado while others seem uncertain and huddle next to friends. Then there are the archives of letters; some, like this one, give great “battle detail,” a key factor in determining value, while others are filled with tender expressions for wives and concerns for the developing character of children. Like literary characters, these men populate my thoughts when I work with these records and never really leave. A few years ago on a cold January day, I was editing a record that included the fate of the Confederate soldier represented; he had died 145 years earlier, almost to the day, freezing to death at the Ohio State Penitentiary, which stood less than 20 miles from where I sat. War leaves ghosts everywhere….

-Hollie Davis, Senior Editor, p4A.com

To search the Prices4Antiques antiques reference database for valuation information on hundreds of thousands of antiques and fine art visit our homepage www.prices4antiques.com

Log Cabins and Cider Barrels: William Henry Harrison Memorabilia

April 19, 2011 in Ephemera, Fine Art by admin | No comments

William Henry Harrison portrait reverse painting on glass

William Henry Harrison portrait reverse painting on glass

Poor William Henry Harrison!  He had already had a very full life – participating in the vicious conflicts in the Northwest Territory before and during the War of 1812, serving as governor of the Indiana Territory, traveling to Columbia as a diplomat.  Aside from an unsuccessful bid for the presidency in 1836, he’d come home to Ohio, where, then in his early 60s, he was contentedly puttering around his farm.  But then the 1840 election came calling and Harrison left behind the contented provincial “log cabin” life he was mocked for during the campaign to win the election.  The campaign was a vigorous one and an early example of political spin: Harrison, born into a Virginia slaveholding family, was depicted by Van Buren as a bumptious backwoods man who wanted to sit around picking his teeth and drinking hard cider.  This failed, fueling instead the image of Harrison as a man of the people while Van Buren came off as an elitist.  The “Log Cabin” campaign resulted in log cabin imagery being plastered on everything, including whole sets of china, and anything that couldn’t easily bear the picture of a log cabin, like this inkwell, could be made in the shape of a cider barrel.

Determined to prove he hadn’t gotten soft in his old age, Harrison (pictured above in this reverse painting on glass) insisted on giving his inaugural address on a raw March day, sans coat or hat, an address that it should be noted took him two hours to read.  That did not, as is commonly thought, make him ill.  What felled him was a cold that cropped up three weeks later.  The busy first days of holding the office did not allow Harrison any rest or even any peace and quiet, and he went downhill quickly, likely not helped by all the castor oil and leeches, dying nine days after falling ill, thirty days after taking office, and 170 years ago on this April 4th.

This was the first time the country had lost a president in office and regardless of political affiliation, Americans seemed to take the death hard.  The funeral was quite an affair and Harrison was commemorated everywhere, even on schoolgirl samplers like this one.  This unique situation continues to impact the marketplace today.  Because of Harrison’s short time in office, there are few documents signed by him as president, and autograph collectors will often pay 10-20 times more for a signature from his presidency than one of the many signatures from the years before!

-Hollie Davis, Senior Editor, p4A.com

A Refreshing Collection: Coca-Cola Advertising

March 24, 2011 in Advertising, Ephemera by admin | No comments

1907 Coca-Cola pocket mirror, woman raising glass, from the painting by Wolf & Company

1907 Coca-Cola pocket mirror, woman raising glass, from the painting by Wolf & Company

So many historic events have strange beginnings and truth truly is stranger than fiction. Who would have believed that a drug-addicted Confederate soldier would create an elixir that would turn a generation into low-level cokeheads, help popularize the modern image of Santa Claus, and line the pockets of celebrities from Anita Bryant to 50 Cent? Seriously, I couldn’t make this stuff up!

John Pemberton, a wounded Civil War vet and trained pharmacist, was looking to supplant his morphine addiction when he started dabbling with the byproducts of the coca plant. After a reformulation to eliminate alcohol but not the coca, in 1886, 125 years ago in April, Pemberton created a concoction of coca extract and kola nuts to create Coca-Cola.

And the marketing machine kicked into gear almost immediately. (So did the cocaine, which wasn’t removed until 1903, but helped make the drink immensely popular. Even today, Coca-Cola includes a cocaine-free coca leaf extract.) From the very beginning, Coca-Cola has appeared in that familiar script, as it does on this early clock. While early advertising objects from Coca-Cola bring some of the biggest prices, the company had so many successful marketing campaigns that there’s a great deal available for a collector to choose from today. There are all sorts of giveaways with the Coca-Cola “It girl” of the moment (like the one pictured above on a pocket mirror) and fun things like Tarzan’s Tarzan and Jane (Johnny Weissmuller and Maureen O’Sullivan) enjoying a nice cold Coke. And Coke’s ad campaigns reflect the changing times; ads like this one take advantage of the company’s trend of advertising with beautiful young women to place a World War II female machinist front and center, while later signs reveal early efforts to target an African-American audience. With that iconic, cheerful red and the distinctive script, Coca-Cola advertising can refresh just about any collection!

-Hollie Davis, Senior Editor, p4A.com

To search the Prices4Antiques antiques reference database for valuation information on hundreds of thousands of antiques and fine art visit our homepage www.prices4antiques.com

American Super Heroes Museum Collection Sold by Antique Helper Auctions

March 7, 2011 in Ephemera by admin | No comments

George Reeves style Superman costume

George Reeves style Superman costume

George Reeves Superman black & white costume

George Reeves style Superman black & white costume

The entire collection of the defunct American Super Heroes Museum was sold by Antique Helper Auctions on January 22, 2011, at the auction company’s facilities in Indianapolis.

The museum operated in Indianapolis from March to December 2007. When the museum defaulted on its lease, the landlord sued. The judgment in favor of the plaintiff allowed the landlord to recover funds through the sale of the museum’s holdings.

Those items comprised the lifetime superheroes collection of Dane K. Nash of Fishers, Indiana. Superman was at the heart of the collection, with some notable Batman items also once on view, as well as memorabilia representing a variety of other characters.

The best of the Superman material consisted of various costumes. Although the museum had represented those items as original set-used material, Antique Helper offered no guarantees on anything in the sale.

The catalog noted, “Antique Helper, Inc. makes no claim of authenticity. No warranty is made as to any printed claims of authenticity regarding memorabilia. Any statement or record of guarantee of authenticity, with or without provenance, previously made in regard to any item in this auction is not relevant to this sale. It should be understood that any item carries the risk of being an unauthorized replica.”

The cataloged portion of the sale consisted of 114 lots available live (with more than 150 people attending) and on Artfact. Those items realized realized more than $65,000 plus buyer’s premium. Hundreds of uncataloged items were also sold. There were no reserves in either session.

The highest price realized was $6,300 (including buyer’s premium) for a Superman costume in style of the one worn by George Reeves on The Adventures of Superman 1960s TV series. Also sold was a similar gray and brown costume intended for shooting on black and white film.

A replica of Batman’s Batboat, sold for $6,000, in addition to various other items including 16mm films, signed photos and action figures.

-Don Johnson, Editor, p4A.com

To search the Prices4Antiques antiques reference database for valuation information on hundreds of thousands of antiques and fine art visit our homepage www.prices4antiques.com.

« Older entries § Newer entries »