Heard it through the
Grapevine What Else Doesn’t Snag Our Interest These Days? By Ralph Finch I occasionally think about barbed wire. That doesn’t mean much, I often think about a lot of strange stuff that snags my interest. Last night I was thinking how I would deal being deserted on an island with only Rudy Giuliani for company. We all know what we collect today, but what’s on the “forget it” list? I even think of the old days, let’s say 40 or more years ago, when you would, on occasion, see a piece of barbed wire offered at a bottle show. In the far west, like in Vegas, you’d see lots of barbed wire and hundreds of sets of dice. But what else do we no longer see at shows? How about those 1960s whisky bottles in a hundred different shapes (like Jim Beam bottles in the shape of Elvis), or those cheap-smelling Avon bottles in the shape of everything. How about 1980s Pez dispensers? FYI: Wikipedia says that “one of the rarest of all Pez Disney dispensers is the 1973 Mary Poppins, which has no feet. The non-painted version is worth around $750.” Oh, Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious! I just tossed mine last week into the trash. And does everyone remember the No. 1 Pez dealer, Ralph Riovo, who died in 2012. I’ve seen the delightful Ralph (and his sweetie) on trips to England where he’d go into a store and buy every Pez dispenser in the shop, since the UK had examples not available in the U.S. And remember those Beanie Babies, that went from really hot to a really stupid scam? The “Large Wallace and his Squad” was said to have been offered for $600,000! Most Beanies ultimately ended up in orphanages, or garage sales.
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Antique Bottle & Glass Collector
This eBay item was offered by “Signed by Artist,” who added: “I have collected antique barbed wire and built displays since 1994. I take great pride in every display I build. You can own a true piece of the Old West. All cuts of barbed wire used are authentic pieces from history. All of the barbed wire that I use is taken off of old fences that have fenced the Old West for 100 years.” The item was offered with a buy-it-now price of $80, plus $22 for shipping.
And those (now) ho hum annual Christmas dishes or Mother’s Day dishes? See if you can get more than $3 for them, even if you paid $15 for them 40 years ago. But for old old bottle collectors, we remember when so many glass and nonglass items turned up at shows that you rarely see today. How about glass baby bottles? England had great varieties of interesting examples, there are books on them, and even a club (does it still exist?). Also FYI, I have a clear baby bottle embossed “Ralph’s Nursers,” purchased at a Garth (Ohio) auction for the “Alberta Rodgers **Patterson Collection.” And milk bottles in general. Once there would be tables of them at shows. You’d even see a Thatcher. (Dr. Thatcher, a Potsdam druggist who is said to have invented the milk bottle.)
And glass fire extinguishers? There once were great examples and it’s been years since I last saw one at a bottle show. (In early January, a massive collection of fire-fighting material, including at least 40 glass examples, was offered for $24,000 on eBay, but the usual examples seen on eBay are the common Red Comets.) There is another “common” glass item I rarely see: glass so-called Christmas lights. They were always uncommon in the States, but when I visited the Mother Country, in the 1980s, every glass show and every antiques shop had dozens and dozens of them. And on my last visit? Christmas lights were … extinguished. Old-line U.S. collectors liked them, but now it’s tough to find one, and even writing to Santa won’t help, except for Robert Strickhart of New Jersey. Last December he became the king of Christmas lights (he must have really been a good boy). He
